EFT stands for Emotional Freedom Techniques, and is a new form of energy therapy. Tapping on the body’s meridian channels, with focussed thought, helps collapse and relieve stress, anxiety, phobias, headaches, and even serious disease.

However, even when working with an experienced Practitioner, getting to the bottom of the presenting problem, and knowing what emotional angles to tap on, can be tricky.

As a practising EFT therapist, here I offer you 4 precise questions to help shine light on the real core emotional issues behind a presenting problem.

1) If My ____ Could Talk To Me, It Would Say…

Great for physical issues, headaches, etc, this is a great way to have you or your client “person-alise” and describe their issue in a way that gets round any conscious level blocks. With many of these questions, the secret is getting behind you or your client’s conscious level response to get to what’s really going on behind the scenes…the unconscious drivers behind any problem are always more powerful.

When our emotional issues go unresolved long enough, they will often manifest in some physical way. Getting the client to give a voice to their issue works in the same way as using metaphor in therapy, it helps capture several aspects of the issue in one specific way, gets round conscious level objections and gives you access to apply your EFT tapping directly to the unconscious parts that matter. Take the first, immediate, answer that comes up for you or your client and go with that. Now you have something to begin tapping on.

2) Who Said That Before You Did?

The phrases and language we use casually and habitually in life have been learned, like everything else. If you’re a Practitioner, noticing the repeated language patterns your client uses can provide a doorway into a core issue. Sometimes this question will bring up memories from the past involving a relative or friend, or trauma from childhood. Getting behind the filter with which someone explains their surface issue can lead to the proper resolution of the *true* issue.

3) If You Didn’t Have This (Problem), What Would You Not Be Able To Do, Or Not Be Able To Do So Well?

There are as many reasons for holding ourselves in a place of un-healing, as there are problems themselves. Many times our conscious mind may want to heal or be free of the issue at hand, whilst our unconscious has many reasons to hold on to the issue. An agoraphobic, for example, will lose out on having food and basics delivered to them in some way, if they clear their problem. Some of us with blocks to financial abundance, may unconsciously fear we’ll lose our friends or social circle if we become too well off. Those who have hit an earnings ceiling in their job may feel they don’t *deserve* the extra recompense or benefits. This question helps get behind the hidden problems that may result from solving the conscious level problem, and hence the reasons we’re unintentionally holding on to it. Again, always take your client’s first answer and explore further from there.

4) What Happened The Last Time You (Achieved Goal)?

This is my favourite, and has the highest strike rate. Clients can usually immediately recognise the emotional link between an event from the past and the condition or state they were in at the time, and how that relates to the current presenting problem. Perhaps a reason not to lose weight, considering what happened the last time you were at your ideal weight will unlock hidden messages your unconscious has stored in mental snapshots. Then applying EFT to those events will release the association between losing weight and the current situation. Very effective.

copyright © 2008 stewart robertson. stewart is the superior eft tapping therapist in scotland. learn the routines of results-rich efters from his precision eft therapy course, or compare his free eft mp3 audio.

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