article - Have you tried tapping

have you tried tapping

There's another option for managing your feelings of anxiety. It's a little different to the options elsewhere in our help pages as it involves learning a combined mental & physical technique commonly known as 'tapping'. This technique helps you to dial down your feelings of anxiety when they begin to take a hold

Read on to find hints & tips about how to improve your anxiety through the magic of 'tapping'

have you tried tapping?

In other articles in our help pages, we talked about 'cognitive distortions'. In effect, how we challenge our own negative patterns of thinking & in the process try to tackle the root of

our anxiety. Tapping

offers something different.

In & of itself tapping

won't tackle the root of a person's anxiety, but it will dampen the effects - read on to learn more

so what is tapping?

'Tapping' is technically known as the 'Emotional Freedom Technique' or 'EFT' for short. It was developed in the 1990's & a quick internet search will throw up lots of hits for you to check out

In short 'tapping' is a mental & physical technique for dialling-down feelings of anxiety. There are three steps - don't worry more detail with examples for each step later on

The first step in the 'tapping' technique involves identifying either the symptom/s of your anxiety or the trigger/s or both. For some this will be pretty straightforward, for others it'll be a little harder to work out. But don't worry, more details plus examples later

The second step in the 'tapping' technique involves physically tapping specific spots on your body whilst repeating a phrase that you'll adapt to your own circumstances - lots more details in a minute

The third step in the 'tapping' technique involves rating the intensity of your anxiety after you've finished a round of 'tapping'. Has it gone up, is it the same, or has it been dialled-down. More detail later, but in short, the idea is to find a specific spot on your body combined with a phrase that works-best for you. We're all different, this technique will need to be adapted to work in your specific circumstances

You may be asking how does 'tapping' actually work? Well, this is still a matter of some debate. If you'd like to learn more, check out the link below for further info

Interested in learning more about the origins of 'tapping', click here

More detail + examples for each step

Step one

Step one of the 'tapping' technique involves identifying either the symptom/s of your anxiety or the trigger/s or both. The best time to try to work this out is when a bout of anxiety has started. Grab yourself a pen & paper, sit down, and really focus on what you're feeling, your symptoms and what happened in the run-up to your anxiety. This might be hard if you're feeling overwhelmed by feelings of anxiety, this is totally understandable. Just do your best, and keep trying if you're not successful at first

You are being asked to work this out (your symptom/s & trigger/s) as this information will become important for step two & especially step three. Why? Because in step three, you'll be asked to rate the intensity of your anxiety after you've 'tapped'. If your anxiety hasn't reduced, you'll be asked to tweak what you're doing to try to get a better result. Having as much info about your symptom/s & trigger/s at your fingertips will help you to be as effective as possible as you move into step two & three. If this feels confusing at the moment, don't worry, there's more detail plus examples in a minute

Here are some examples

By symptoms we mean things you notice in your body when your anxiety begins to take hold - for example:

Tightness in chest
Unsettled tummy
Sweating
Dry mouth
Light headedness
Weak knees or legs
Croaky voice
Indistinct sensation in your throat or another part of your body
Sweaty palms

What do we mean by symptoms

What do we mean by triggers

By triggers we mean the thing that caused your bout of anxiety to start - there may be a number or just a few. Also, a trigger may be something very specific or something big, quite vague & hard to describe - for example:

Being with people you don't know
Feeling trapped & out of control
Seeing a person who hurt you
Visiting a place where something happened
Being reminded of something from your past

Once you've spent a bit of time thinking about your symptom/s & trigger/s, make a note of them. If you're struggling to come up with answers to these questions, please don't worry. The more you think about it, the easier it should become. If you continue to struggle, you might want to speak to someone you trust to ask for their help. Many of us have a blindspot when it comes to thinking about

ourself, our feelings & our anxiety - please don't worry, this is very common

Step two

Step two of the 'tapping' technique involves

tapping one of a number of specific spots on your body whilst repeating a phrase. More about this phrase in a second, but in short, you'll use the info from step one (about your symptom/s & trigger/s) to tweak this phrase to best-fit your own circumstances

Let's first talk about the tapping points - then we'll talk about the phrase which has been mentioned

Below are the different 'tapping' points on a person's body. When you start a round of 'tapping', you'll use your fingers to quite firmly 'tap' one of these 'tapping' points on your body - you'll do this about five times. Start by 'tapping' the point located on the top of your head with your fingers. When you've finished 'tapping' this point, move on to another 'tapping' point. Try to work out which 'tapping' point works best for you. The idea is to find the 'tapping' point which dials-down your anxiety the most. This is the 'tapping' point you will use most, if not all of the time when you 'tap'. But as mentioned, you can adapt the 'tapping' technique however you want so it best-works for you

Okay, so we've talked about the different 'tapping' points, how you actually 'tap', now let's talk about the phrase you'll repeat

whilst you're 'tapping'

The phrase you'll repeat follows this structure:

"Even though I have/feel/fear

[bit of the phrase you'll adapt]

I deeply & completely accept myself"

As you can see it's a pretty simple phrase & nice-and-easy to remember. Whilst you 'tap' a 'tapping point' you'll slowly repeat this phrase.

The key is to tweak the phrase to your own circumstances to make it work-best for you.

So, how do you do that?

Well, to make the phrase work best for you, you'll need to adapt it using the info gathered during step one (your symptom/s, your trigger/s or both)

Okay, let's try this. Choose one of your symptoms or triggers and add it into the phrase. For example:

"Even though I fear [talking to new people]

I deeply & completely accept myself"

The idea is to keep adapting the phrase until you find one which works best for you.

Each time you start a new round of

'tapping' you will want to swap-in a new symptom or trigger. The phrase which best dials-down your anxiety is the one to go with. You'll probably be surprised how some versions of the phrase simply won't work, but others will really resonate. Trial & error is what it's all about here

take a look at some examples

Even though I have 'tightness in my chest', I deeply & completely accept myself

Even though I feel 'light headed', I deeply & completely accept myself

Even though I have 'sweaty palms', I deeply & completely accept myself

Even though I have a 'dry mouth', I deeply & completely accept myself

Phrase adapted to use a person's

symptoms

Phrase adapted to

use a person's

triggers

Even though I feel 'anxious around people that I don't know', I deeply & completely accept myself

Even though I feel 'trapped & out of control in meetings at work', I deeply & completely accept myself

Even though I feel 'anxious when I'm reminded of that time when I was hurt by my family & friends', I deeply & completely accept myself

If you're still feeling unsure about how to do the physical 'tapping' or how to use the phrase, please don't worry, there's lots & lots of videos you can check-out - just do a quick internet search using "EFT tapping" as your search term

Step three

The third part of the 'tapping' technique is trying to keep track of which 'tapping' point & which phrase works-best for you. We've already talked about this a little already. Ideally when you complete a round of 'tapping', you will try to rate the intensity of your anxiety & jot this down. You have a few options: the first is to rate the intensity of your anxiety before & after a round of 'tapping' on a scale of 1 to 10. You might find this a bit hard, especially if you've

just started 'tapping'. The second option if you're struggling to rate your anxiety precisely on a scale of 1 to 10, is to simply jot-down whether your feelings of anxiety went-up, stayed the same or were dialled-down by the round of 'tapping'

The other thing you will want to think

about is whether different phrases &

different 'tapping' points work better in different scenarios. What do I mean by this? Well for some, a bout of anxiety might be triggered by just one thing & might cause just one symptom. But for many, things will be more complicated. For many their anxiety will be triggered by a few things or perhaps a number. And their anxiety will lead to a number of symptoms. If this feels like you, you will probably want to experiment with different combinations of phrases & 'tapping' points in different scenarios. You may find one combination works in all scenarios, but perhaps not. Trial & error is your friend as you explore what works best for you

A worked example of how to adapt 'tapping' to your circumstances

Step one

Triggers of anxiety: when i'm around people I don't know in a social setting, but also sometimes at work. I feel worried that I'll embarrass myself when I talk in front of people I don't know. I once had a bad experience of public speaking in a work meeting when I was feeling ill with a virus.
Symptoms of anxiety: I feel nervous. I have a dry-mouth & my voice quivers when I talk. I have a sensation in my tummy which most would describe as butterflies.

Step two

Tapping point: 'tapped' top-of-head 'tapping point' five times whilst repeating phrase
Phrase: "Even though I feel 'anxious around people that I don't know', I deeply & completely accept myself"

Step three

Anxiety' intensity before tapping: 8/10

Anxiety' intensity after tapping: 7/10

2nd round of 'tapping'

Step two

Tapping point: 'tapped' top-of-head 'tapping point' five times whilst repeating phrase
Phrase: "Even though I feel 'anxious about having to talk in front of people that I don't know', I deeply & completely accept myself"

Step three

Anxiety' intensity before tapping: 8/10
Anxiety' intensity after tapping: 5/10

3rd round of 'tapping'

Step two

Tapping point: 'tapped' top-of-head 'tapping point' five times whilst repeating phrase
Phrase: "Even though I feel 'anxious about having to talk in front of people that I don't know because I had a bad experience a few years ago', I deeply & completely accept myself"

Step three

Anxiety' intensity before tapping: 8/10
Anxiety' intensity after tapping: 4/10

4th round of 'tapping'

Step two

Tapping point: tapped 'karate-chop' 'tapping point' five times whilst repeating phrase
Phrase: "Even though I feel 'anxious about having to talk in front of people that I don't know because I had a bad experience a few years ago', I deeply & completely accept myself"

Step three

Anxiety' intensity before tapping: 8/10
Anxiety' intensity after tapping: 3/10

5th round of 'tapping'

Step two

Tapping point: tapped 'karate-chop' 'tapping point' five times whilst repeating phrase
Phrase: "Even though I have 'a dry mouth & my mouth quivers when I talk in front of people I don't know', I deeply & completely accept myself"

Step three

Anxiety' intensity before tapping: 8/10
Anxiety' intensity after tapping: 2/10

As you'll see with this worked example, by changing the 'tapping point' plus tweaking the phrase, it was possible to gradually reduce the feelings of anxiety to the lowest possible intensity. This took a bit of trial-and-error, but we got the best possible result in the end. As you'll also see, using a combination of 'triggers' & 'symptoms' in the phrase got the best result

But, please remember

Everyone is different. It's hard to generalise about these things as there are 101 different reasons about why you might be feeling the way you do.

If you feel that you are not able to manage your feelings of anxiety on your own, please don't suffer in silence. Help is available. Please seek the help of a suitably qualified medical practitioner.