EFT Case Story: From Overwhelm to Optimism

Mandy had been married for 20-odd years and had a 19 year-old son and a 16 year-old daughter. She described the marriage as unhappy , and their sex life "dull and unexciting". Husband Dennis didn't talk much, was out of touch with his emotions, had no friends and seemed to let his life revolve entirely around her and the kids. She found this claustrophobic and felt trapped, and in an effort to have some kind of life of her own, had trained in sports massage and tried to set up as a practitioner. However, she had never had many clients and it didn't give her the financial freedom and independence she was hoping for. This only served to make her feel even more trapped because her husband was her only means of financial support.

For some time Mandy had been having an affair with a man (who I'll call David) who she subsequently discovered was having an affair with someone else at the same time. This had upset her terribly as their romance had made her feel alive again and injected a bit of excitement into what she saw to be an otherwise dull life. The revelation of his unfaithfulness had caused her to feel very confused and desperate as it fed into her lack of self- esteem, making her feel devalued and unloved. At the same time, she also felt very guilty about cheating on her husband so it was like she was going around in circles and feeling more and more trapped and bad about herself. She had thought about leaving her husband but was afraid of how she'd survive financially without him. She had now ended the relationship with David which left her feeling in a vacuum and incredibly lost and stuck. She also mentioned that she was menopausal and felt that was playing a part in her current state. All these things were contributing to her feelings of overwhelm and hopelessness.

Bearing in mind the fact that her menopausal symptoms were possibly making it even more difficult to find her way through this problem, I decided to start the session by showing her how to do the Donna Eden 5-minute Daily Energy Routine. This instantly got her energies flowing more freely, allowing her to be more in touch with her body and she immediately felt brighter, lighter, more grounded and centred. Mandy loved the simple exercises, and I gave her a handout for the routine to take away with her so she could practice them on her own. I explained that learning to balance her own energies would inevitably help her to feel more empowered and experience improvements in how she felt about everything! Couple that with some EFT tapping, and she would be more than well-equipped to start finding her way out of her current problems.

Mandy then admitted to being afraid that EFT would make her open up so much to her feelings and emotions that they would totally engulf her and she wouldn't be able to cope. So we started off the tapping on how she was frightened of losing control (for which she gave an intensity of 9). This came down 9-7-4-1-0.

By now her fear of opening up had completely gone and she was pleased to see some positive results quite quickly. A good rapport had been established between us and she felt ready and very willing to start doing some more tapping on the issue. However, we only had about half of the session left, so it seemed appropriate to do some work which would see her through to the next appointment and hopefully give her glimpse of how her situation could change for the better. I therefore decided that tapping on two opposite basic statements : " I want to stay where I am and be unhappy" and "I want to move on and open up to new possibilities" would be useful and explained how a technique of switching between the two can work very quickly to loosen and dispel limited beliefs and other blocks.

Having just had an experience of tapping releasing a fear, Mandy was by now very enthusiastic about the idea of doing some more work. Asked what her emotional intensity was around the likelihood of these options being true, she said felt the chances of staying stuck were more likely than being able to let go and move on.

We started off tapping on all kinds of negative thoughts and beliefs about the situation and coming up with statements about how bad it might become in the future. This brought up some worst-case scenarios which she soon started to find were rather ridiculous. Tapping on the positive took us from grounded and reasonable possibilities to outrageously over- the- top statements about her options and potential which had her giggling, smiling happily and really enjoying herself.

We did several rounds of these opposite statements and after each one, her positive ratings shot higher and higher. We ended up with her being a +200 on believing she could move on from her current problems and discover new possibilities. The negative statement blew out of the window!!

At the end of the session she said she no longer felt so scared about the future; she didn't feel overwhelmed with her circumstances anymore; and she also felt it was possible she could make positive and beneficial changes to her life. She felt incredibly optimistic and was looking forward to doing some more work with me. "I can go home in a completely different frame of mind and be able to see my situation more objectively" she said. Overall, she felt good, calm and happy to be in her own body – all of which was a big progression from how she'd been when she first arrived.

This session was a really good start to our work which will continue for as long as Mandy feels the need to come and see me. Hopefully, she will begin to let go of the limiting beliefs which hold her back, be more in touch with her emotions, her needs and her body, gain clarity and discover who she really is.

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Sally Topham – EFT Trainer and Practitioner, Reiki Master/Practitioner, EMO Practitioner and Meditation Teacher in North West London www.energyharmonix.wordpress.com

Author of Finding the River – The Energy Self-Help Manual for Surviving Life's Challenges (available free for members in the 🏫 GoE Library)

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