In 1980 a psychologist named Dr. Roger Callahan was working with Mary, a patient who was deathly afraid of water. She suffered frequent headaches and nightmares related to her fear of water. Dr. Callahan had worked with her for a year or so using traditional talk therapy methods but Mary still was terrified of water.

 

Dr. Callahan had been studying the body’s energy system. He had also become interested in acupuncture, the procedure used in or adapted from Chinese medical practice in which specific body areas are pierced with fine needles for therapeutic purposes or to relieve pain or produce regional anesthesia. During a session when his patient Mary complained of stomach discomfort, he decided to tap with his fingertips under her eyes, which is an end point of the stomach meridian.

 

He was astonished when Mary announced she didn’t have her usual disturbing thoughts about water. She ran down to a nearby swimming pool and began throwing water in her face. The nightmares and headaches all vanished. She was free of her water phobia. 

 

Dr. Callahan began using this tapping procedure on other patients and developed a process that he called TFT or Thought Field Therapy, an effective process that requires the use of specific algorithms to determine the tapping areas as well as the sequences. He then taught many other psychologists, psychiatrists, therapists and healers to use his method. 

 

One of Dr. Callahan’s students, Gary Craig, went on to found EFT or Emotional Freedom Technique. He simplified Dr. Callahan’s process and discovered the tapping sequence wasn’t important, that people could be healed of emotional and physical illnesses regardless of the tapping order. Gary Craig went on to make EFT available to people all over the world.    

 

Dr. Callahan and Gary Craig knew what scientists had learned – that energy courses throughout the body. According to the Chinese system of acupuncture, there are 12 sets of pathways or meridians in the body along which vital energy is said to flow. When we have a distressing thought or go through a stressful situation, the body’s energy system is disrupted. By tapping on certain meridians in the energy system through the use of EFT, these disruptions can be cleared, causing emotional and physical healing in many people.

 

Many people who practice EFT adopt the slogan “Try It On Everything.”  It’s been shown to be a benign practice that can effectively reduce physical and emotional pain of many varieties.