Power of the Positive

It has only recently been explained to me why it is that we remember all the bad things that happen to us and often forget the good things. This is actually a survival mechanism that goes back to the earliest times. It was essential for our survival to remember any oversights or mistakes we made. Imagine for instance a hunter bedding down for the night in a cave without first checking for bears. If he survived this, he would never ever do that again. The mind is wired in this way to remember the dangers and to make sure that we don’t put ourselves at risk again. Knowing this, is it any wonder that we remember all the betrayals and harsh words that have come to us?

Despite the usefulness of remembering these negative experiences, remembering positive experiences provide us with internal resources.  The primary principle of EFT is to resurface, remember and resolve the core issue which was hurtful and still affects us. Once we have done that, we have a great opportunity to make the change even more effective by remembering, reinforcing and even creating some of the good experiences which may have been discounted in the past.

Clearly there is something to be gained from dwelling on our positive experiences: our successes, victories, happy and peaceful feelings. When we have more of the “good stuff” we create more receptors for positive emotions. An increase of these receptors means we will feel happy and contented more often. This is why I really like Dr Patricia Carrington’s work on “Tapping in the Positive” and her “Choices” method. “Tapping in the Positive” creates a storehouse of nourishing experiences. When we have tapped in these emotions they are much more readily available to us as an internal resource.

We know that when we are worried, concerned or anxious our whole physiology contracts and it becomes increasingly difficult to access our positive feeling states. Of course a few rounds of EFT will alleviate that, and before you know it your body has relaxed and those nourishing feeling states become available to us again.

In my practice a considerable number of clients live a fear based existence, due to early trauma. This has meant that they have gone through life feeling anxious, frightened and worried, and their bodies have habitually contracted. Often these people suffer from on-going health issues as well as feeling emotionally challenged. Due to the environment they grew up in, they have not been able to build up a reservoir of positive feeling states.

For those people who have grown up in a reasonably balanced environment (a good enough environment), it is fairly easy to shift out of a negative feeling state and consequently access positive feeling states. For the person who has developed a fear based way of surviving in the world this is not so easy. Generally speaking there will be a shift, a lessening of the pressure, a relaxation when using EFT.  However, the reaction to those better feelings can be interesting. Some people will feel uncomfortable and unsure as to what could/should replace their habitual feeling. We are dealing here with people who have very strong coping strategies, which they have invested in over a life time. As I continue tapping with my client and we get closer to the core beliefs, I have found it useful and sometimes essential to tap in specific positive feeling states such as: “calm and confident”, “proud”, happy” and “peaceful and grounded”.

For example: A female client in her late 20’s, Diane (not her real name) was very anxious about her husband being away for a week. They live out of town and have small children. We started tapping ….. “I’m worried I won’t sleep all week, and I’ll be a wreck, I deeply and completely accept myself.” This dropped the intensity somewhat. After a couple of rounds we went from 8 to 7 to 6. We then started replacing the “… I deeply and completely…” with

….I choose to sleep soundly till morning. 

After tapping a round for the negative we followed with a positive round, tapping in “sleeping soundly till morning”.

A few more phrases we used were:

… I love the night time sounds

… I love having the whole bed to myself

… I love being cosy and warm and knowing I’m safe

… I choose to feel calm and confident

(We did not use the standard Choices method, just kept tapping a round of the negative feeling followed by a round of positives.)

Not only did the worry drop completely, Diane experienced an “Aha” moment when she realised she could actually have those feelings, and have a completely new experience of spending those nights on her own. The positive phrases opened a door for her to new experiences, and they also worked as an anchor. Whenever a worry popped up during the day, she would say to herself “calm and confident” and simultaneously access the positive experiences we had tapped in. To her and her husbands’ surprise and delight she slept remarkably well that week.

The client in this next example, Jane (not her real name) was the one who prompted me to write this article, because her feedback was so clear. During our last session she thanked me for giving her these positive alternatives, which were surprising and new for her. While she reported her delight at successfully clearing significant unhelpful core beliefs she was amazed at the extra optimism she felt as she tapped to reinforce positive feelings.

Here is her story: Jane grew up on a farm where she was fairly isolated from her peers until she started school. She had some physical challenges during her pre school years, which were all but overcome by the time she went to school. Of course these had shaped her self concept, and the way she coped in life. By all accounts she was a happy pre-schooler, despite these physical obstacles. She was totally unprepared for the bullying from her class mates, and the rejection by the teacher. Prior to going to school she had very little social experience and had no idea how to cope with these situations. Her basic philosophy about life became:  expect the worst and then you won’t be disappointed.

If you consider the Law of Attraction (that which we focus on increases), you can imagine the types of experiences Jane kept having. Another core belief was: I have to work twice as hard as anyone else just to be accepted. As we started working on Jane’s core issues she had no concept of there being a possibility of feeling differently, let alone any idea of what that could feel like.

We tapped to clear the “not good enough” core beliefs and the “I don’t fit in” core beliefs by using specific experiences. For instance:

…  I’m not as fast as the other children

… I can’t think fast when I’m put on the spot

… The other children laugh at me when I give the wrong answer

After we randomly tapped a whole range of aspects, Jane was feeling clear of those unhelpful core beliefs, yet it still left her feeling unsettled and somewhat incomplete. It wasn’t until we started using some positive feeling phrases that things really started to gel for her. Those of you familiar with Carol Look’s way of working will see this is similar. We tapped for:

… Others don’t accept me (a summing up of the old core belief), I truly accept who I am

As described above, we would do a round on the negative: … others don’t accept me…. And follow this by positive phrases, such as:

… I appreciate being different

…I am proud of the way I managed so far

… It’s safe now to be me

…I love feeling calm and confident

… What people think of me is their business

… I appreciate who I am no matter what

… I love feeling good about being me

… I like me just the way I am

Not having had access to these positive feeling states naturally, Jane may well have created an old familiar scenario to match that old “comfortable” and habitual feeling again. However, now, having anchored these positive feeling states she will have a very different response. Should she start experiencing that habitual feeling again she will recognise what is happening. Anchor phrases such as: “I like me just the way I am” will be available to her as a resource, together with the associated positive feelings we have tapped in.

My clients tell me how much they enjoy “tapping in the positive”, so now I suggest this for homework. Here’s an example. When someone tells me they feel comforted by being curled up with their cat, I suggest they tap as they remember, and also tap while they are physically enjoying that moment with their cat, being specific and tapping in:

… His/her soft warm fur… (no set-up phrase needed, just tapping on the points repeating this short phrase)

… His/her beautiful deep eyes

… His/her comforting presence

When we tap in anything at all that creates a good feeling inside us, we start building a storehouse of positive feeling states and create more positive receptors, so we can feel good more often.