How tapping on my face helped me not freak out
Emotional Freedom Techniques aka Tapping are a game changer for anxiety and lots more.
The Build up…
I was sitting at my desk in my office and I could feel myself starting to lose it.
At the time, I was working as an administrative assistant at an International bank while I was also finishing up my clinical hours to become a Licensed Psychotherapist.
Six months prior to this, I had failed my stupidly hard clinical exam for the state of California where I was practicing Psychotherapy at the time. It has like a 56% passing rate. WTF? And it was a four hour exam with 170 questions. A timed exam…my worst nightmare. I’m a slow reader.
After months of studying, I failed by two questions. Two…damn…questions. This was after years of getting all of my 3000 clinical hours needed to finally become a Licensed Marriage and Family therapist in the state of California. Needless to say, it was not a good day.
You have to wait at least three months before you can apply to re-take the exam. I waited six.
If I was given a choice at the time to have to retake this exam or pass a kidney stone in order to get my license, I’m really not sure what I would have picked. I heard passing a kidney stone is pretty brutal…but so is a panic attack.
Now I should say as someone who has had some form of anxiety throughout my life, I have never actually had a full blown panic attack. But on this particular day, I came pretty darn close.
It was two days before I was to re-take my clinical exam. I had taken a bunch of mock tests during the week and did pretty well. And I was feeling good that morning at work.
I’m not sure what set my mind off, but I started thinking about the exam and this terrifying fear came over me, “What if you fail again??”
Catastrophic Thinking
In Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, we use a term called, Catastrophic Thinking, which is pretty much what it sounds like. Our minds come up with all of the worst possible case scenarios of what could happen in any given situation. Basically, we scare the shit out of ourselves.
And that morning I was doing a pretty great job of that. As someone who is used to scaring myself, I could normally handle it, calm myself down and move on. But this time felt different. I couldn’t calm myself down.
And I noticed a feeling building up in my body that I had never felt so strongly before. It was as if I was a steam whistle full of fear and I was about to blow.
I realized I needed to quickly get up, go to the bathroom and see if there was anything I could do to help myself calm the F down.
I stepped into the stall and tried talking to myself. “Lori, it’s going to be ok. You can do this. You got this. And if you fail again, it’s ok too. You can totally re-take it again, it will be ok. It’s not the end of the world”
Nope, my body was not having it. In fact, that may have made things worse and pissed it off too.
Then I suddenly recalled something. Several years back I had been seeing a Therapist who used a modality called Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT), otherwise known as Tapping.
I was working on some issues and she highly recommended this newish modality to help with them. I did find it helpful, eventually moved on and hadn’t really thought about Tapping in years. But at this moment something in me, (a higher power maybe?) remembered.
What is EFT/Tapping?
For those of you who have no idea what EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques) is, here is a brief explanation:
EFT is a practice that combines the principles of Ancient Chinese acupressure and modern psychology. The technique involves using your fingertips to tap on specific acupressure points along the bodies meridians.
While you tap on the points, you focus on the emotions or physical sensations that are causing you distress. The point is to help calm down your nervous system and rewire the brain to respond in a more productive way to whatever is distressing you.
The Fight-or-Flight stress response
Tapping affects the part of the brain responsible for our stress response — the amygdala. The amygdala sends us into fight-or-flight mode so that we can stay safe in an emergency and avoid danger. However, in modern times, it gets activated way too frequently when we are usually not under any real threat.
But when you practice tapping, you think about the things that are causing you stress while also sending a calming signal to the brain and the amygdala, letting it know it is safe to relax.
And according to many recent clinical research studies, EFT has been scientifically proven to reduce cortisol by as much as 40%.
The Miracle moment
Back to the story…so I immediately just started tapping on my face. I couldn’t remember all of the tapping points, but I remembered the ones on the face.
I started tapping near my eyebrows, moved to my side temples, under my eyes, under my nose, and under my chin. The whole time I was just tapping through all the points and saying “I’m gonna freak out. I’m so anxious right now. I’m gonna lose it. All this anxiety in my body.”
I did that for a while to allow my body to feel it all and accept that this was how I felt. Then I switched it. I said, “It’s safe to feel this anxiety and it’s safe to let it go. I’m releasing this anxiety. I’m feeling calmer in my body. It’s safe to release this anxiety. I am safe. I am safe. I am calm.”
I did that for quite a few minutes. And what happened next is nothing short of miraculous.
I felt as if someone had given me a quick shot of Xanax. I was so calm that I was actually more than calm. I was kind of giddy. I remember just standing in that stall smiling and laughing and thinking, “What the hell just happened?” And I walked back to my desk feeling a little drunk, swaying even on my way. Unbelievable. I was sold.
For the next two days I tapped a lot! Whenever I felt that fear creep back in, I would just start tapping. And on the morning of the test, I actually didn’t wake up panicked. I still tapped on the way to the test and am very happy to say, I passed!
After this incredible experience, I knew this was a modality that I just had to get trained in. When you experience first-hand results about how well something works, you just want to share it with the masses.
See for yourself
I do need to say that we know that not everything works for everybody, so you will just have to try it for yourself and see if it works for you.
But if you are someone who gets anxiety or even panic attacks, this is an incredible, drug-free tool that you can use on your own whenever you need it to help you.
And now there are also many Certified EFT practitioners and Psychotherapists trained in EFT who you can work with to help with lots of other issues besides just anxiety, such as chronic pain, limiting beliefs and even trauma. You can start by just doing a simple search on YouTube and see lots of great videos you can tap along with.
I recently moved back east from California and found out that I need to take another licensing exam for New York State as they don’t recognize the California clinical exam. Grrr…I would say shoot me, but knowing I have this tool for when I have my freak out moments about taking another exam, I think I’m gonna be ok.
