Tap Into Empowerment

The journey to empowerment, healing, and success can follow many paths – we can help you find yours.

Sep 30

When an Upgrade is Not an upgrade

by T. Bracy

So far, I’ve been talking about EFT and the fact that I’m starting a business to work with people doing something I’m passionate about. And so far, I haven’t yet ranted about the frustrations of it all. Well, now’s that time – starting with web building! Next time, I’ll know better, but I hope it’ll be much easier!

 

Knowing nothing about web site development, and no start up income to speak of to spend thousands on a professionally built site, I researched how to do this with site builders that are out there. I have an idea of how I want the site to look, the things I want to add to it as I grow and learn more about what I can do with a site. And I wanted a trusted company to host my domain. It’s all Greek to me, so support and easy to use features are important!

So I went with Go Daddy, and it’s v7. That would seem to be the most current, easy to use, support friendly site builder they have available. They have a good reputation and tons of templates to choose from. I get to pick from their free pictures, taking the headache out of the copyright infringement issue – and anything that increases the efficiency of how I do things is always a plus for me! I mean, I keep tissue boxes in each room (car too!), even if they connect to each other, just so they’re on hand when my son or I have need of them, I don’t have to go far!

So as I get my site info to begin building it – understand, that means I paid for my domain name and monthly hosting for the next year – I find out several things right off the bat, annoyances I can’t quite wrap my mind around how they even make sense. One of the first things was domain names, like the cost of a .com! I know it’s a commercial website, and we all have heard you have to spend money to make money, but choosing a domain name and then not being able to grasp that it’s thousands for just that .com, that was something else to be sure! But it certainly didn’t stop there, the hits just kept coming for me to build my simple site!

For one thing, I learned that I’m stuck with whatever template I chose to begin with – unless, of course, I’d like to do all this site building stuff again! I went with that, thinking I could have Word copies of my pages and just past them into new pages of a new template when I eventually choose to change things up. Trust me, I will! My living room and home office can attest to that 🙂 Then I learned that my simplistic response to that problem couldn’t work, you can’t copy and paste because it doesn’t work with html (What in the world is that exactly anyways?!?!) so it’s all just staying the same or being rebuilt from scratch when the time comes. Wonderful. That fits right into my idea of efficient…

Now comes the part where I figure I can make my site like any other out there, ya know, with pages, sub pages, buttons and organized the way I want it to be organized. For instance, a disclaimer link on each page, so I cover myself legally on the site, for my business. Hahaha, I’m laughing just thinking about how naive that was on my part! Silly Mommy, as my son would say! Nope, I’m stuck with what they want to let me have.

Sure, your business webpage can have 1000 pages, but the navigation will remain at the top. And each page can have up to 3 subpages. Want to organize your pages so they actually are subpages? Good luck with that! It took me several attempts and an unknown amount of time Googling how to create the subpages before I found a very recent post about how to do it. And guess what? Silly Mommy again! Why in the world would that have actually worked for me? I had to save what I’d done and stop for the night, to start again the next day – not once but twice – before suddenly, retrying the same thing finally worked to create my subpages! 

I always planned to have a blog on my site, as well as a forum for various discussions because I want people to be able to add their questions and comments, testify about their own experiences. I want suggestions on things they want to hear about or what would make things better for them. And thank you Go Daddy, but it’s just not an option to add a forum with this upgraded v7.

No problem I think, after I rant and rave for a while about the stupidity of features being unavailable on an upgrade, I’ll figure out how to start a blog elsewhere because here’s a widget (I’m sorry, but a widget? Sounds like a character on a show my son would watch!) that says Blog/RSS Feed, and when I try it out, it has a blog and the Oh-so-NOT-helpful help page says I can add my own there and it will show, as long as my blog is published. Well, thanks to WordPress, which I understand is the top recommended Blogging site available, I have a blog 🙂 Yay me. But somehow, v7 cannot recognize my blog. Soo yeah, I still can’t link the two so any traffic I get from one can go to the other.

Now it’s late, and my thoughts are about as disorganized as the plan for this upgrade v7 website builder. I hope that in the future, I find the use of words such as “all new, upgraded, better version” will actually live up to their meanings!

Now my ranting must come to an end, I’m sure I’ll get the blog linked up to my site sometime soon. Meanwhile, I’ve read another blog summarizing the Top Five Regrets of The Dying from a book of the same name, and I can’t wait to talk about how EFT could help us all avoid those regrets!

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Sep 29

Converting the Skeptics

by T. Bracy

I don’t know how other people feel about it, but I know that it feels even more victorious when I am able to help someone with EFT who doesn’t believe in any of “that alternative stuff”. They believe it’s all in the mind, and of course, they’re not susceptible to that hocus pocus, no sir, not them!

So when they agree to try that tapping thing they know I do, and tell me how it probably won’t work on them, I have to admit it’s a little bit exciting and I want to do what I can to make sure we have some success with their issue. More than likely, they’re feeling quite a bit of pain or emotional upset to give EFT a try, so it’s the perfect time to try – and it’s also a little scary!

A couple months ago, I got the opportunity to convert a definite skeptic, someone who’s actually benefited from it before and chose to ignore it at the time but doesn’t even remember that! He complained of ankle pain so much before, and honestly, since then I haven’t heard about it, but that connection is lost on him. After a lot of things going wrong for him, he agreed to try it.

When I finally got a chance to have a session with him, I thought we would be working on something with some longer term benefits, given recent and sudden job loss and the almost mid-life crisis he’s seemed to be going through. My preconceived notions about what he was going through and might be looking for couldn’t have been more wrong! Or more accurately, the things he was willing to address was what I had wrong. 

I know EFT could have helped him to address and resolve negative feelings he has about the way in which they all lost their jobs – I was angry for him! It felt unfair and wrong, for all the employees, and especially so for him, with his higher position and discussion of more responsibilities coming his way. We could have used EFT help the energy disruption caused by the job loss, which would have then put him in a better place to be searching for and interviewing for various jobs. It could have helped him have a clearer picture of the career he wants, to put him on the path sooner rather than later. And EFT could have helped him lose the blues – he may not had admitted it to anyone, but his entire demeanor told me he was feeling some depression, totally understandable under the circumstances!

So when I checked in with him, asking him what was going on with him, what was bothering him, I was totally surprised when the issue he chose was his knee pain! I hope my surprise (and my dismay I must admit – I wanted to help him with something more lasting!) was covered well, but I switched gears and went with it. I asked him to clearly describe what the pain and discomfort was, where exactly, and then we tapped on the issue. After two rounds (for those unfamiliar with EFT, a round of tapping will take about 30 seconds) I asked him to check back in and tell me about his knee.

The look of confusion and surprise on his face said it all, as did his smile. He said, “Wait, what did you do?” Still smiling, “No way did that just work!” Skeptic successfully converted!

After that, I explained a bit more about how he could use the same thing I showed him, follow the same formula, and work on things that he might not have wanted to discuss with me. I described how he could use EFT to help with the issues I explained above, and would be willing to have other sessions as needed. 

I check in with him and he’s definitely a convert! He still taps. And he will tell people it works. That’s success right there 🙂

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Sep 25

Tap away anesthesia itching?

by T. Bracy

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A little over two weeks ago, a family member went into the hospital to have her second child, a healthy baby girl, a planned delivery by C-section. Now, I had my son the regular way, no complications, and I’ve been lucky to have never had any surgery besides oral (an awful fall smashed some teeth), so I don’t have experience with some of the effects of anesthesia I’m always learning 😉

As I spent the afternoon in the hospital room with my son’s newest cousin and her mother, I noticed she was itching every once in a while. Soon she was complaining about how the nurse needed to come in and give her something for the itching so of course, I had to ask what was going on. 

She explained that an after-effect of the anesthesia used during her C-section was that it was causing her to itch. She also said that earlier the nurse had given her something for the itching, couldn’t remember what it was, but something like a Benadryl, and it was wearing off. 

The itching was clearly miserable for her. She described it itching all over, distracting her and causing such discomfort. To make it worse, she was looking all over to find something – the call button to get the nurse to give her something more to help with it.

The controversy rages out there in the world, should we be all natural or used drugs, should pregnant (nursing women), take anything at all? I’m not in that fight, it’s not my passion or my business to tell someone else what they’re doing or not doing is right or wrong. I simply believe we should try as many natural techniques as we can before using drugs, and as always, as recommended by a licensed physician. 

But as the nurse couldn’t be reached right then, I asked her if she wanted to try EFT on it. As she knows about tapping from our discussions, she was eager to give it a try. So we spent a few moments getting a clear idea of what the itch felt like in her own words, where it was, the frustrations involved with it, and where she knew it came from before we started our tapping rounds.

One round, and about 30 seconds later, we checked back in. It was gone from her legs and she only felt itchy on her back now! She was happy and appreciative, ready to focus more tapping energy on her back. The intensity of the itching decreased on her back the more we tapped.

Before completely relieved, our new dad came to the rescue to lotion her back and the nurse came in to check on her and the baby – and more family showed up too! Our brief session was cut even shorter than she needed, but she felt much better, and could now use EFT for those itchy feelings as they came up, before reaching for the call button to get another dose of medication.

A note about anesthesia and injury:

In recent articles about using EFT for pain and injury, it has been suggested that EFT is used on the anesthesia that is used for surgeries because the effects can be lasting, and they can interfere with progress as we would like it to go. It’s interesting to me that we can seem to handle things easily and without negative effects, but our bodies can hold onto it. Anesthesia forces us to relinquish control over our entire body, and our minds, going to sleep until someone else decides it’s time to wake us up. And when we do wake up, we’re groggy and out of it, feeling loopy and still not ourselves. It makes perfect sense to tackle the anesthesia effects to move forward without taking them with us!

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Sep 25

What In The World Is EFT Anyway?

by T. Bracy

So if I just start telling people about EFT, that’s just a weird combination of letters that holds no meaning. And the fact that it stands for Emotional Freedom Technique? Yeah, that’s about as illuminating as a firefly in a black hold. Yes, it sounds good, who wouldn’t want emotional freedom, right? But it doesn’t really explain what it can truly do or why I’d be so darn passionate about it that I’d tell everyone, start a business, or spend my time blogging about it! So here’s the answer about what EFT is – and what it can do!

As far as I know, acupuncture is a pretty familiar term for everyone. We conjure up an imagine of someone lying shirtless, face down on something like a massage table while there are extremely long, thin needles sticking out all over them – or even on their face. This image brings any number of emotional responses for each of us – from fear of those needles and potential pain, to envy over the feeling or relief from pain that person is experiencing. The technique is used by those who study it for years and only those experts can do it. It is effective, and it not only works on the body, but on the energy system as well. Accupressure is a similar technique involving those points on the body, which are then held in patterns for a desired effect.

The same theoretical background for the practice of acupuncture and accupressure is shared with EFT – with some very important differences. The similarity is that EFT works also on our energy system to correct disruptions that are to blame for the issues and ailments we carry around with us. They both have powerful effects, and they are both useful for things beyond physical pain and injury. But those differences are what I love about EFT!

First of all – no needles!! Who wouldn’t love that? Then there’s the fact that it can be used successfully, with anyone. My 4 year old has thrown some tantrums that would have had Mother Theresa cursing him out, lasting an hour at times – but when we “tap on it”, those tears quiet after one round, the sniffles begin after the second, and a third has him pulling away to show me a toy and we’re on with our day like nothing happened! What parent wouldn’t want tantrum tears (or scraped knee tears!) over that quickly?!?

Now, imagine anything you or a loved one have been struggling with, no matter how big or small. Got one? Or two, or three or more? EFT can help with any of those issues, in some way or another, completely or in a major way. It isn’t going to cure a fatal disease, don’t get me wrong. But it can lessen or ease pain or other symptoms associated with it, help with sleeping, lower recovery time from surgeries – the possibilities are endless. It shouldn’t replace medical treatment, but I’d say it most definitely should work with it. And it should be used wherever we can imagine it might help. 

My favorite thing about EFT is that I can teach you the technique and then you can use it for yourself, trying it on anything and everything. In our traditional skill building or therapy sessions, we talk and talk, we teach how to help train ourselves to test the reality of our thoughts, notice our thoughts, and then pattern things differently so we don’t act in harmful ways. With EFT, we get a real, concrete, efficient tool that works quickly – that doesn’t require a session to use. Yes, a practitioner is important because there are many things we can help you to work through and directions we can guide you to, but what good is all that if you still get upset or feel a strong craving without a good coping strategy to use? One session and you have that technique. Future sessions will help you eliminate it, and as with anything, your own work will determine your success, but it’s always there with you to help whenever you need it. 

That’s what EFT is, that’s why EFT is something I’m so passionate about, and that’s why it’s become my mission to bring EFT to everyone who is willing to try it. One round is done in seconds, not hours, days, weeks, months, or years. The seemingly effortless changes we can begin to make towards goals we’ve partially given up accomplishing, the almost instant, drug free pain relief, or the release of negative emotions so we don’t carry them with us to ruin our day – that’s what EFT is to me.

I’ve made my list of things I’d like to improve and change. Aren’t you ready to tackle yours yet?

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Sep 25

Getting Started

by T. Bracy

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Several years ago, I learned about EFT for the first time. It sounded too good to be true but I tried it anyway and found it worked. Well, it didn’t just work, the results amazed me. The only problem was that I didn’t stick with it. I shared it with a friend and he found some success with nicotine cravings, but neither of us kept up with it. Life went on, time passed quickly, and I soon became overwhelmed with a lot of negativity. 

Eventually, I changed things in my life, but I still carried the weight of it all – literally and figuratively. But I came back to EFT. Something told me I knew what to do and I came back to this amazing technique. And I didn’t just stop at using it for myself. I tried it with my son, success! I shared it with friends, success! I tried it with clients I work with in my day job, success! 

Now, when I listen to people talk about pain, an injury, illness, an emotional issue, stress bothering them, a goal they aren’t reaching, or an addiction they’re struggling with, I think “They should tap on that! I could help them!” So, I did what I needed to do to become a practitioner and started seeing clients – still helping friends and family, as well as myself! 

This blog will show how I’ve started and used EFT for myself, with friends, with clients (no real names of course!) and also follow the start and growth of my business – from a simple technique used for myself, to the successful business it’s growing into.  I’ll share the struggles with marketing, finding clients, the difficulty planning, starting, and running groups for those with similar issues such as weight loss, building a website (with absolutely no experience!), designing flyers and other marketing materials, and of course, rant about struggles as need be!  And I will also share articles or other news showing how EFT can make a difference.

So stayed tuned and enjoy the ride! It’s a first for business and for blogging, which should be interesting for all of us 🙂

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