Emotional Pain Lands IN the Body!

"BALANCING THE EMOTIONS 'Any imbalance in an emotional state - when one emotion dominates or overrides the others - can predispose one to heart disease,' says Frank Lipman, MD, an integrative physician, board-certified internist, and licensed acupuncturist. 'Learning to deal with emotions is extremely important.' But studying these emotional states is difficult, concedes Lipman, 'It's not something you can measure easily.' Nonetheless, emotions can get stuck in the body. When you release these emotional holding patterns physically, he says, you're releasing emotional states, as well.' Lipman has facilitated these releases in patients through acupuncture. He also refers some patients to body workers and healers, who are able to shift energy in the body." https://www.webmd.com/depression/features/many-emotions-can-damage-heart Want help moving those painful emotional states? Email me for a Christian EFT practitioner referral - we have practitioners in several countries in a couple continents! Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Brain Can Change Itself (with some help from us!)

Wonderful quote! Norman Doidge, M.D., a neurologist at Columbia University and author of “The Brain That Changes Itself”sums it up nicely: “The discovery that the human brain can change its own structure and function with thought and experience, turning on its own genes to change its circuitry, reorganize itself, and change its operation, is the most important alteration in our understanding of the brain in four hundred years.” And that’s what we do when we use EFT tapping - change our brain and change our DNA genes! —— Example: Tapping on how a mother was emotionally distant growing up would look totally different with each person/client because how that was felt or experienced is specific to the person who is tapping. We tap on events, events, events, neutralizing as we go along, step by step, day by day. Tapping has a formula but it’s just that. A formula. Chemistry and mathematics have formulas, too, but outcomes of both are dependent on what factors are attached to the formula! Tapping outcomes differ between people, too, depending on multiple factors, but we plod on, tapping, doing the best we can. If we hit a wall, time to call me for a referral to a Christian EFT practitioner! Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Empathy vs. Compassion

“Wisdom without compassion is ruthlessness and compassion without wisdom is folly.” Fred Kofman “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle.” Plato “By practicing compassion, we can become more resilient and improve our overall well-being. Bloom says, ‘careful reasoning mixed with a more distant compassion […] makes the world a better place.’” “The problem with empathy is the flip side that psychologists refer to as emotional empathy. That’s our yearning to not only understand other people but to feel their pain, too.” https://www.betterup.com/blog/compassion-vs-empathy We’ve discussed the difference between empathy and compassion on this board before, and I created a YouTube video on the topic. People who claim to be ”empaths” own a hard road, I believe. Feeling others’ pain” as a “thought” in our head rather than as a bodily sensation can help keep us from completely “sucking” up the other person’s physical problems/disease. Being empathetic is an attempt “to feel” the other person’s angst almost as much as if the originating event actually happened personally to us. Either compassion or empathy can lead to the same end we are trying to achieve - helping one another (Galatians 5:13, 1 Corinthians 10:24), but compassion is healthier because we aren’t carrying the actual emotional burden that gets our body into biochemical problems! This is worth reading. Tapping, I believe, can make us more compassionate than empathetic, keeping us healthier both physically and emotionally. And Jesus exuded compassion in His ministry by finding ways to help others without getting tied up in our human drama until the Father allowed Calvary. Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Is EFT Tapping in the Bible?

Sometimes I have people ask me, "Is EFT in the Bible?" Well, of course, it isn't, nor is our automobile (wonder what Jesus would have ridden in on Palm Sunday instead of His donkey???!!), or airplane or refrigerator and washing machine, and we still use those freely. What is IN the Bible is lots of humans with lots of negative emotions that caused all kinds of societal fallout, as it does today. We are human, we have emotional turmoil, but it doesn't HAVE to rule us. Once again, God has provided everything we need, including a path out of emotional pain. The EFT tapping tool sits waiting for us to grab it and use it! Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Emotional Pain Sticks to US

It’s indeed a bit like treating the symptoms vs. treating the cause. The “symptoms” are our emotional angst and possibly physical issues. The underlying “cause” (disease) is our trauma, big stuff or lots of little stuff, hurtful memories, and disturbing events in our life. Those emotional “causes” stick around in our cells where our unconscious mind puts them, completely unknown to us. Our cells can be equated to a house attic, storage unit, old barn loft, etc. We stuff items in any or all of those places, forgetting about them, until sometime possible catastrophic happens and NOW we have to deal with the stored up junk. Emotionally it’s the same thing. Bad stuff happens, we “get over it” (time doesn’t heal all wounds, sorry, folks!), move on and THEN our body starts yelling and our emotions begin to flare, forcing us NOW to deal with the past - all those things we stuffed in our emotional attic, barn, and storage unit. Tapping BEFORE we accumulate all that junk keeps the “storage” unit of our unconscious mind clear, clean, and uncluttered! Tap, tap, tap! Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Early Infant Attachment and EFT

DR. AIMIE APIGIAN “Whatever the degree of regulation we achieved through relationship in the first 6 months of life is the degree that we will be able to connect with others and want to connect with others. The degree to which regulation did not happen through regulation in relationship with our mother reflects the degree that our system had to rely on the freeze response for state control. Attachment is the degree of internal regulation (or dysregulation) that we experience in authentic and intimate relationships to ourselves, others and the world.” Here again EFT tapping is often quite helpful! Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Trauma and Memory Holes

Trauma sends our hippocampus (mind's historian that keeps track of events and time) off-line. The trauma is so hurtful the mind simply shuts it down! Trauma also shrinks the hippocampus up to 25-30%, particularly when one has post-traumatic symptoms, so it makes sense that many of us have big memory holes! The hippocampus comes on-line about age 2-3, if I remember correctly, but our amygdala (alarm center) is present in utero; therefore, we have alarms ringing in our mind before we have processes to figure out what is going on. It amazes me how much tapping we practitioners do on VERY early memories, some of them we swear happened before we were born, and as a practitioner, we just go with whatever the client brings to the tapping table. Sadly, science clearly shows us that we carry around so much epigenetic trauma from our ancestors! It's no wonder some of us are so burdened down with emotional stuff! Anyone have a tapping story to share around any really, really early memories? We'd love to hear them! Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Early Childhood Trauma Tapped

DR. AIMIE APIGIAN “For the first 6-7 months of life, a baby still believes it is physically connected to their mother. This is why by themselves, they become dysregulated. Separation from a biological mother for any length of time in the first 2-3 years of life is traumatic. The earlier the separation, the earlier the trauma impacts and imprints feeling unsafe and insecure into the developing nervous system. The social standard of moms to receive 6 weeks of maternity leave is a very common reason for unknown attachment trauma. This will result in the features of the earliest shock to an infant’s system, the Connection- Attachment NARM style, which happens with an infant experiencing inadequate regulation during its first 0-6 months and having to adapt with the dorsal vagal freeze response. (1) 1. Schore, A. N. (2008). Right brain affect regulation: An essential mechanism of development, trauma, dissociation and psychotherapy. PsycEXTRA Dataset. https://doi.org/10.1037/e608922012-004” Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

EFT Tapping - God's Invention

“Our mind forgets what our heart refuses to remember.” And there is where our emotional pain tends to begin. Forgotten consciously; remembered unconsciously, driving our thoughts, actions, & physical sensations, controlling our very life. ……..until God’s EFT tapping enters our confined, limited space. And our Lord busts us out of that prison by His own healing invention! Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Persistent Emotional Pain

“….persistent symptoms, in fact, can start innocently enough but go on relentlessly-a cold that leads to a lingering cough, a stomach bug that leaves you with a long-term aversion to the food you ate just before getting sick; or a sports injury in which the pain continues after it’s allegedly healed, and there’s no pathology to support it. But once the initial cause of the symptoms passes, there is a new spark that fuels them. And for many people, the spark is a rising level of what I am going to label as ‘discomfort’ - a discomfort that creates a NEW NETWORK {my emphasis} in the brain and body that continually feeds the symptoms. Amazingly, this level of discomfort flies below their mental radar until a symptom crescendos and takes root.” Page 7. “Your Survival Instinct is Killing You” by Marc Schoen, Ph. D. Note: we create an emotional trigger that turns physical and the brain creates an entire new “story” around that issue or symptom, just like a group of old men embellishing fish stories around the dinner table! Once that “tale” is in place, the nerve pathways in the brain dig it in deeper and permanently. Good luck changing that because most likely you consciously don’t even notice……and now you’re stuck! Enter EFT. God’s brain changing technique. What issue/thing/event in your life bugs you? A lot? What happened 6-12 months prior to this ”new” thing popping up in life? That prior event that just came to mind would be the “thing” I’d start tapping on and chatting with Holy Spirit about! There’s your beginning point! Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Stimulating Acupuncture Points

Did you know that stimulation of pressure receptors (acupuncture points) releases neurotransmitters oxytocin (also a hormone), dopamine, and serotonin. This stimulation also reduces stress hormone cortisol and its precursor hormone ACTH (adrenocorticotropic), increases vagal nerve actions(parasympathetic or relaxation), helps neuroplasticity in body’s sensory organs, and restores internal organ functioning? All this helps us to experience contentment, comfort, joy, peace, and happiness! What a God we have! He created all of this for you to access and we access it by using EFT tapping! Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Paper Tigers Chasing Us

We often discuss “paper tigers” in EFT training classes. “Evolutionary” science shows us that, like animals, we often instinctively know what is dangerous and we take steps to avoid the same mistakes in the future. Today dangerous fatal situations rarely exist yet we often react to emotional events just as if these were threatening our mortality! “Indeed, the majority of discomfort (dangerous situations)is typically self- manufactured. As Mark Twain once wrote, ‘My life has been filled with terrible misfortunes-most of which never happened.’ We are our own worst enemy. So with a lack of an external battle or enemy, an internal battle has emerged. What’s more, our discomfort today typically revolves around trivial issues that are construed by our mind and body as being ruinous. The war that then takes place within us isn’t just confined to our minds - it also materializes at the cellular level. Nowhere else is this so obvious as in autoimmune illnesses, which are characterized by the absence of an external threat yet the body begins to wage a war within itself, one that takes a serious and sometimes deadly toll.” “Your Survival Instinct is Killing You” pg. 40. Marc Schoen Am I saying we do any of this on purpose? Absolutely not! Our unconscious mind reacts for us as a protective mechanism. God created it this way to keep us alive, but trauma spins it out of control, leaving us with angst, pain, emotional unsteadiness and disease. All the trauma remnants go into a body part(s). We find out 20-30-40 years later what body part(s) absorbed it. Time to let it go before we discover where that discomfort and pain all went! EFT tapping awaits you! Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Childhood Limiting Beliefs Hang On!

I heard Simon & Garfunkel’s song “My Little Town” other day and the lyrics got me thinking, again. Verse 3 goes as this, “And after it rains there's a rainbow and all of the colors are black. It's not that the colors aren't there, it's just imagination they lack. Everything's the same back in my little town, my little town, my little town.” For many of us our childhood trauma has locked us in just like the rainbow that lacks imagination. We were so busy protecting ourselves and our hearts from further pain, all the color of life was lacking, and we stayed small within our “little town” of our mind. We created limiting beliefs, lies, about everything around us - who we were, what we were, where we belonged, who did/didn’t love us, including God, what our abilities were, were we even safe at all, etc. For me, when I dream or just have my eyes closed I see no color, just black, white, and maybe gray. Through the decade plus of tapping, as I just about fall asleep and am in that alpha-theta brain wave state, I get glimpses of vivid pictures complete with its full compliment of appropriate colors! It’s beautiful! Once I realize consciously what I’m seeing, it all disappears! I know that as healing continues more will come. I guess my subconscious mind still, even today, doesn’t feel safe enough to go full techni-color, like the old movies called it. So how much of our trauma gets tied up into those sensory pieces? Neurologically it’s an interesting question! Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Tapping to the Radio

Who else ”keeps time” to the radio by tapping on the steering wheel while driving? That’s still “tapping” if you are using the edge of a finger or the thumb. It counts as part of your daily tapping regime even if you aren’t tapping on anything specific! Why? Because JUST tapping is keeping your body calm and it’s helping with emotional regulation! Turn up that music and tap away! Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Stealth Tapping

Here is EFT International EFT Trainer Cathy Reiling (https://www.efttappingacademy.com/workshops) teaching "Stealth Tapping" on EFT for Christians YouTube Channel. Stealth Tapping is extremely useful when in an emergency we find ourselves emotional and triggered but cannot just stop to tap. Give it a try next time a situation causes emotional angst! Here is the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ustlBobSFRA Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

True Health and Happiness

“…true health and happiness, I have learned, is not about merely having a life full of comfort and pleasure. Much to the contrary, it’s about the ability to feel safe and comfortable despite life’s inevitable hardships, drawbacks, and challenges." Pg. 38. “Your Survival Instinct is Killing You” by Marc Schoen Tapping is your neurobiological wiring changer! This quote is indeed an achievable goal, as Apostle Paul so stated in Philippians 4:11. Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

How Energy Psychology Works with Internal Issues

“How energy psychology works with internal issues: a. Bringing to mind a memory, thought, or cue related to relationship difficulties . . . b. Activates the amygdala and initiates a stress response (cortisol, adrenaline, and other stress hormones flood the system and the hippocampus goes offline). c. BUT stimulating selected acupuncture points initiates an opposing process: d. The alarm response is turned off, even though the memory or trigger is still present. e. With a few repetitions, the memory or trigger no longer evokes the alarm response. f. The hippocampus can process the current experience in concert with the prefrontal cortex. g. This becomes the “new normal” – the internal model has been changed. 4. Acupoint tapping changes the brain in any of five ways: a. Reducing the amygdala’s threat response. b. Extinguishing conditioned responses. c. Supporting hippocampus and prefrontal cortex activity. d. Increasing the neural impact of positive self-imagery. e. Increasing the neural impact of well-conceived suggestions." David Feinstein, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist who has served on the faculties of The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Antioch College, and the California School of Professional Psychology. Author of more than 80 professional articles and eight books, he has been a pioneer in the areas of Energy Psychology and Energy Medicine. His books have won nine national awards, including the U.S. Book News Best Psychology/Mental Health Book in 2007 (for Personal Mythology) and an Indies Best Books Award (for The Promise of Energy Psychology). Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Buy Yourself a New Years Gift!

Buy yourself a New Years gift for $25 USD. https://www.facebook.com/groups/695813854276933 Send your $25 Paypal payment to Cathy Corbett Reiling @ CathyReiling@gmail.com. Cathy will then "admit" you to this private Facebook video learning page for one month. Cathy has created a how-to tap video of almost to 2 hours in length, and I added another short example of a personal tapping session, too. You can watch the videos over and over and over again for 30 days until you understand the nuances of HOW to tap for yourself. This product is the SAME as the EFT for Christian Workshop that is offered by our publisher for $39. The $39 one also gives you 2 e-Books which this Facebook venue does not. Either one will get you some great basic EFT tapping instructions. Christmas blessings to each of you and your families! Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Dopamine, Our Pleasure Neurotransmitter! Friend or Foe?

Did you know that when we experience pleasure of one kind or another, our brain chemicals impact our limbic system including the hypothalamus, hippocampus, amygdala, & nucleus accumbens, in particular, and ventral striatum, which are connected to the neurotransmitter dopamine and the brain’s natural opiate, endorphin. Once the body associates a pleasure with those chemicals, it wants more! And more. And more. Let’s use chocolate as an example. Often the mere thought or seeing chocolate produces a release of dopamine in the brain. Then when we taste it, opiates (endorphins) are released further binding our behavior to chocolate eating! Once we eat the chocolate our dopamine level begins to drop. The ANTICIPATION of the pleasure drives the dopamine more so than the actual consumption! Now we have entered dopamine lack which often leaves us feeling deprived and we reach for more chocolate to drive the dopamine back up. It’s cyclic and chocolate is simply an example, as anything pleasurable can send our dopamine levels into overdrive, including other foods, alcohol, sex, shop lifting, work, exercise, dare devil activities, drugs, etc. A similar experience happens with cortisol and sugar. This can be the beginning of an addiction or a craving around a substance or activity that drives anxiousness. Anxiousness is very uncomfortable, but tapping can help. How? By often finding the source event or memories driving the pleasure and tapping on those. Many ask why would I want to rid myself of pleasure! You wouldn’t but perhaps letting go of the excess behaviors might feel like a good idea. And it is, as it often then leaves us more satisfied with less of something (like calories, alcohol, etc.). Questions? Thoughts? Comments? Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 5 Book Series

Resistance to Actually Doing Tapping

Emotional healing is personal to each of us. How we do life is all based on what we learned as youngsters. If our family understood emotions, listened to each other express them, and reacted in an appropriate way, we often live our adult lives in a more comfortable emotional way. When a child has seen much emotional abuse, learning to express oneself as an adult is often more difficult. It is a learned behavior. There are times when we wish or think we are ready to heal, but doing so just plain doesn't come easily. Why? The youngster inside us doesn't feel it is safe to confront or access earlier feelings now because it wasn't safe to do so back in childhood. Our feelings today directly reflect how we felt decades ago. Tapping is all about feeling safe. Sometimes during talk therapy, and I know this from personal experience, discussing how we feel now about something decades ago often brings a torrent of tears, anger, and sadness. It just plain feels safer NOT to discuss any of this. Leaving it buried deep within our psyche seems to be a more prudent course of action, however, doing that usually doesn't bring healing. When a client doesn't seem ready to change, we call this "resistance" in the EFT trade. Sometimes it sounds like we are blaming the client for not wanting to get emotionally better. In reality most of the time it has to do with safety and feeling ok to discuss, tap on, and let go of our old emotional baggage that just isn't allowing us to move forward as our Lord would have us do. It isn't satan holding us back, it is our own stored stuff. And it may not be our fault we aren't ready to heal now. It is our responsibility to try to work on it though, as emotional healing usually brings us closer to our Lord. EFT is one of the best techniques and the closest thing to a safety net that is known today. When we access a memory that makes us uncomfortable, tapping most often will settle down the feelings that come up around it. A few tapping rounds usually does the trick. Don't beat yourself up if there are memories you aren't quite ready to tackle alone with tapping yet. You can also email me to obtain a referral to a Christian EFT Practitioner who can walk beside you as you do tap on these memories. Andy Hunt's article is all about feeling safe during tapping in order for us to access and let the emotional content of old memories go back to the Cross where they belong. God bless your healing! Remember, EFT is NOT a substitute for sound emotional or medical care. Call your own personal physician when you need that kind of help. Sherrie Rice Smith Certified EFT Practitioner EFTforChristians.com Author of EFT for Christians 4 Book Series Use Promo Code SAVE20 when ordering from Publisher to get 20% Off