Emotional Freedom Techniques

EFT Tapping in a Nutshell

Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT Tapping), a therapy combining ancient acupressure with modern psychology, is categorised by NICE¹ in the UK as a Combined Somatic and Cognitive Therapy. By using fingertips gently to stimulate acupoints on the body (somatic element) whilst using specific phrases to focus on troublesome feelings (cognitive element), calming signals are sent to the brain, helping alleviate emotional or physical issues. This gentle process reduces negative emotions, relieves stress, and supports overall well-being and resilience.

What EFT does

EFT stands for Emotional Freedom Techniques. It is simply named for what it is and does – techniques that you can use to give you freedom from the ways that your emotions (your feelings) can adversely affect you.

These techniques are very easy to learn and wonderful to use for emotional first aid. EFT is often referred to as “tapping”, because you tap lightly with your fingertips on start or end points of acupuncture meridians. It has also been described as psychological acupressure. Once you have learned how to “tap”, you have a skill for life, a way always to at least take the edge off whenever you feel upset or stressed. Often you can achieve much more than superficial relief, particularly when you book a course of sessions with a practitioner. (For more information about this go to our Therapy page).

Emotional Freedom means freedom from the feelings that weigh you down and hold you back, bringing a quiet, calm clarity that enables you to navigate any of life’s challenges with much more ease than when you are feeling pressured, worried or stressed.

About an EFT Session with a Practitioner

During an EFT session you will be guided to use the tapping to calm your nervous system any time you start to feel upset at all or feel any emotional pain. (It can also be used to calm physical pain). You will talk about your current problems or bothersome memories, as with cognitive (talk) therapy, but because the tapping is so effective for calming you, if you are upset at all or feeling emotional pain, your practitioner will guide you immediately to stop talking and just tap (apply EFT) until everything feels a bit easier. Thus, you will experience a session as a comfortable, easy-flowing mixture of talking and tapping, during which you are supported, never judged and encouraged to mindfully accept and work with the truth of how you feel, constantly calming yourself in relation to that as you work through the session. While tapping you will be guided to repeat certain phrases to keep you focused on or “tuned in” to a specific issue that is bothering you. Your practitioner will encourage you to break your issues down into small specific aspects that you apply rounds of EFT for, one at a time. When you can tune in to something small and specific enough to really feel the depth of the problem and stay focused while you tap (apply EFT), the tapping will quickly bring relief from related troublesome thoughts, feelings and symptoms, in certain circumstances permanently.