Tap Yourself Rich?

The Law of Attraction has been getting a lot of attention recently. With the popularity of The Secret (both the book and video), books such as the Abraham books by Esther and Jerry Hicks, as well as the many hundreds of ever-popular classics, such as Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich, the idea that you can “create your own reality” has never been more fashionable. There are also skeptics who deny that this is true. They say, “if it was so easy to create your own reality, why are so many people sick, poor and unhappy?” Who would choose such a reality? Even many people who believe in the ideas of positive thinking and the Law of Attraction are secretly afraid that it’s just too good to be true. Well, my understanding is that the Law of Attraction is 100% true. There is only one catch, and it can be a zinger for those of us trying to apply this principle in our lives. The problem is that most of us have subconscious blocks to our efforts at creating prosperity consciousness and better lives in general. The fact is, we consciously want all the good things in life, which is perfectly natural. Yet a part of us, often there since childhood, is convinced that we are not deserving, that money is scarce, that it’s not moral to be wealthy or some other such belief that is not consistent with actually manifesting abundance. There is a simple technique that allows us to almost instantly remove blocks. It is called EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique) and is based on the Chinese system of acupuncture (no needles though!) combined with modern psychology. It is so simple in fact, that many people are skeptical that it can really work –until they try it. EFT works by having us tap various points on our body. This sends energy through the meridians (pathways that energy follows through the body). Tapping is combined with certain dialogue, which can be spoken out loud or too oneself. These are something like affirmations, but more sophisticated in that they are not only positive statements, but a removal of negative beliefs. This “tapping” technique has been effective at treating a wide range of physical and emotional problems. One practitioner, Brad Yates, has specialized in using EFT for removing blocks to abundance. By tapping on certain points and repeating key phrases, we quickly come to believe that we truly deserve to be prosperous. People have even reported having long term health conditions drastically improve after a few tapping sessions. This may seem miraculous, but when you consider recent medical evidence that much illness is caused by stress and other emotional conditions, it is not really so farfetched. If we can change the way energy moves through our bodies, we can change many conditions, both emotional and physical. This “trickery,” however, is an important part of the healing process, whether you are talking about a healing mantra or a pharmaceutical drug. Belief is a very important part of healing –or not healing. This is why almost any method, if truly believed in, can be helpful. With EFT, however, we are talking about something beyond simple belief. When you tap, you are actually stimulating very real energy centers in the body. What’s interesting is that I’ve read cases of advanced EFT practitioners who could get the same effect by simply imagining that they were doing the technique! To a die-hard skeptic, this might suggest that EFT is “all in the mind” and therefore not “scientific.” To me, it just proves how important the mind is in the healing process. That is why EFT can be such a powerful technique. When combined with affirmations and other helpful self-talk, it works on the physical and psychological aspects of ourselves simultaneously. I believe that the effectiveness of EFT, along with almost all techniques, whether medical, psychological or spiritual, is partly based on what is sometimes deceptively called the “placebo effect.” This means, simply, that the mind “fools” itself, and/or the body that it feels better because of a belief. Is this technique too easy and simple to really work? Well, that point of view is itself the kind of limiting belief you can literally tap away!