EFT or Emotional Freedom Technique, is a recent wave in the domain of natural healing. Human beings are an emotional creature. Our lives are truly defined by the dominant emotional states that we experience, isn’t it? A bad event or a trauma can leave a lasting negative impression or keep you in an inherent negative emotional state that feeds onto itself and ultimately saps the joy out of your life.

But here’s the deal :

Irrespective of the negative emotional state and irrespective of its duration, you can be out of it.

If testimonies are to go by, EFT as a natural healing mechanism has given some real stunning results that conventional medicine could not bring forth. It has brought cheers in the lives of many cases which were doomed for failure through the conventional approach. In many cases, even years and decades of emotional trauma has simply disappeared giving a long lasting relief to patients.

In this blog I will show you the scientific mechanism behind how EFT works. This understanding will help you do EFT correctly and in turn make you experience the real positive difference that you will be grateful for.

I tend to read and research. Technology has brought knowledge closer like never before. And as I try to collate my reading and observation from various sources on the subject of EFT, I indeed realized that there is a larger picture to it.

First a little thing about how I got acquainted to Emotional Freedom Technique. I remember undergoing an EFT session few years back when I was feeling low at a time as nothing seemed to go my way. That phase coupled with the curiosity of finding a magic wand to feel high again took me to many places. One of the many places being a holistic healing center that had a young vibrant lady who cured people with EFT. So I went through this 20 odd minute session.

The session seemed really boring at first. If someone were to see you through the glass window sitting all alone in a room and making movements as required in the technique, you could be easily considered on priority for a complete mental health checkup. I finished the process as was supposed to but well, eventually, EFT didn’t have the desired effect on me at least at that time. But as I also explained, I lacked the scientific understanding and in turn did not do it right. Outwardly to the practitioner it would appear as if I am following all the steps correctly, but actually I wasn’t.  So if you have also had a failing experience with EFT at some point in time and given up on it, then you might definitely want to not lose hope and read through till the little secret unravels.

The Two Areas of Research that combine in EFT:

I realized that there are 2 areas of research that are working simultaneously that makes Emotional Freedom Technique a highly effective medium for deeper healing.

Deeper research into memories

Yes, our scientists are continuously trying to dig deeper into the ways that different memories register in our brains and the way they affect our lives. They are now able to pin point with much larger accuracy the exact location of different kinds of memories and their corresponding emotions. With the arrival of hi-tech neuro-imaging devices, the phenomenon has gained an even larger interest and understanding. And one of the key discovery that has come to light (contrary to our previous knowledge) is this :

                                        EFT – Memory Research Discovery

Many human trials have happened till now to further the above discovery. And the results have been an eye-opener. Groups of people who have been administered a drug called Propranolol immediately after the recall of a traumatic memory find that their stress levels on recall of the same painful event has diminished considerably, much to their pleasant surprise. These experiments have been conducted multiple times across different study groups, successful each time. You can read more about it in the links below. But the life-changing inference from these experiments is that once the painful memories surface and are acted upon effectively, their reconsolidation into stronger memory and corresponding emotional forms can be prevented and in fact be converted into a much less stressful or just a casual memory. Subsequent recall of them would then not evoke the same painful emotions. It will rather be much lighter. Please click the below links for further reference on the topic:

1. Scientists have figured out how to erase your painful memories
2. Bad Memories
3. Scientists find secret of reversing bad memories

Acupuncture

Acupuncture, in brief, is about understanding that the human body is very intrinsically linked and that a point on the toe of the foot can have a direct connection with the topmost point of the head. It is also about balancing the two energies – Yin and Yang in the human energy system by means of needles inserted faintly at key energy points along the energy lines (meridians) related to the problem. It is the balance of these two energies which eventually gives us the feeling of well being. This healing method was accidentally discovered thousands of years ago in China during war times but since then has been a key component of the Traditional Chinese Medicine, also known as TCM.

During the same time as EFT, I also went to a trained acupuncture specialist daily for a week long course. And to my complete disbelief, I felt completely normal and back to my usual self after this week. I simply felt wow all of a sudden as if there was nothing that had really happen. And the curiosity of this positive result even led me to register and complete a short course in acupuncture & acupressure (milder form of acupuncture). Though I should add here that the results were not permanent and they started fading after a week or so, maybe I should have gone for more sessions, etc.

Emotional Freedom Technique – Joining the Dots

You must be wondering by now what these two areas of research have to do with EFT. And how did these two make me accept EFT as a commanding Source of Healing, right? Well, it turns out that EFT as a natural healing mechanism or a form of alternative medicine integrates both of the above science to provide a robust healing.

In a regular practice of EFT, there are nine points that you tap through. These points are your crown, forehead, side of the eye, below the eye, below the nose, below the lips, on the collar bone, on the side and the wrist about 2 inches away from the palm.

Emotional Freedom Technique Tapping Points

Firstly, as it turns out, from these 9 points, there were 3 points which were also a part of my acupuncture session – the crown, the forehead and the wrist. I remember that these 3 were very important points that the wrist point was called P6 (Pericardium) and one is supposed to press it if one finds heart racing, anxious and so on. It is supposed to calm you down.

While the other points could change during my acupuncture session, I remember these three points were very consistent throughout the week. So, first of all, the points for tapping in Emotional Freedom Technique were well thought of. They were proven to me from my earlier experience with acupuncture. This made me realize that EFT is not just a placebo effect that is being induced through random tapping of points. I didn’t have a placebo effect with acupuncture as I was not at all hopeful of any positive result, but it still did.

Secondly, and here’s the kicker, you don’t just start tapping in Emotional Freedom Technique. You first evoke the painful memory and associated feeling that you want to resolve and only then you start tapping as you hold on to the memory. Do you see how it resonates with the first research mentioned earlier on the memories! When the memory is revoked it is malleable and as mentioned earlier, scientists have proven that effectively intervening at this point in time can alter the emotions associated with a memory. So, instead of a pill, if you could tap on these energy / meridian points which are proven in acupuncture while the memory is being revoked and hold on to, the tapping would work as the pill and have similar positive effect of diminishing the painful memories and emotions.

You could also imagine it in this way that when you invoke a memory, there are specific areas of brain that start having an activity which represent your emotions. It could be concentrated or could be dispersed across the brain. When you tap yourself as the memory is being hold on to,  the connection representing the emotions start balancing out and new balanced connections take over. As this new connection now associates itself to the memory, the same memory which once used to give painful feelings no longer has the capability to do so. It would invoke this new balanced emotion. Gradually they lose their pull over you as the association of the memory and the stronger negative emotion weakens. And this is how it heals. As simple it sounds, it is that much scientific.

How EFT works – The missing piece

The reason EFT did not work the first time for me was that I did not recall the memory well. I was uttering sentences (which one is supposed to when one recalls a memory) but I was not mentally present. My thoughts wavered and were in completely different domain thinking about future or other important events. I had to be present out there and relive that memory with its associated emotions/feelings while letting it phase out gradually. This is also what many Emotional Freedom Technique practitioners fail to tell you when they simply go as per guidelines. They just ask you to keep repeating a sentence to fetch your emotions associated with a specific memory.

                How EFT works – The often overlooked piece

Hope I have been able to give you a clearer picture on how EFT works backed by science, and more importantly why scientifically it is justified to work. There are a few good videos on EFT which you can learn and start to practice from. I am including a few links below:A fine nuance, but this is what could make a hell of a difference in your lives.

1. How to do EFT?
2. What is EFT?
3. What is EFT Tapping?

Read more blogs that are related to nature cure on our Nature Healing page.

I would highly recommend that you read the book Can You Play. The book gives a larger, holistic and analytical perspective on various facets of life including vitality and healing. It also gives detailed scientific account of how to heal yourself mentally, emotionally and spiritually while also achieving your life’s true purpose.