Instead of having New Year Resolutions, which normally get dropped by the second week of January, I like to set myself goals for the year.
You can start out by asking yourself some questions about how your 2015 was, e.g.
What were my gifts?
What were my successes?
What were my challenges?
What was my biggest lesson?
Then think about what you want to achieve in 2016. If you have a big goal, e.g. studying for a qualification, then it can really help to break it down into smaller goals. So you might have a goal each term, or for each major piece of coursework.
Then write out your goals for 2016. You can get really creative and use a vision board and fill it with your goals and inspiration to help you along the way. Stand in front of your board every day and visualise how good it will feel to achieve your goals. You can use EFT on any issues you have along the way, e.g. fear of doing a speech, anxiety about a test, feeling overwhelmed etc.
“Keep your dreams alive. Understand to achieve anything requires faith and belief in yourself, vision, hard work, determination, and dedication. Remember all things are possible for those who believe.”
Gail Devers
Wishing you lots of happiness and success in 2016.
Fear of what I hear you say? Success? I know most people are familiar with fear of failure. What is often surprising though is that a lot of people also have a fear of success. So how do you go about dealing with that fear of success? Firstly, you need to understand what success means to you and the expectations you associate with it.
Think about past times in your life and the specific events when you were successful. Now if any of those upset you then use EFT to clear out the negative emotions. Try the movie technique to clear out any negativity from those events. Many people actually sabotage themselves so that they don’t achieve their success. EFT can really help you clear out this self sabotaging behaviour.
Try the following questions and write down what comes up for you…
Success means ……………
I fear success because ……………
I don’t deserve success because ……………
Last time I was successful …………… happened
Being successful means I’ll have to ……………
Being successful means I won’t be able to ……………
Being successful means I’ll have to give up ……………
Being successful means I’ll lose ……………
I sabotage myself by doing ……………
You can now use this information and do some tapping. So, if for example, you are worried that if you are succesful you won’t have enough time for your family then tap on that. If you think you’ll have so much pressure on you to keep up that success that it will drain you until you crash and burn, then tap on that. If you think you don’t deserve to be successful, then tap on that. Tap, tap, tap!
Here is a sample tapping script that you can use. Score your fear before you start tapping (where 10 is maximum fear).
Even though I have this fear of success, I’m open to changing that today
Even though I’m really frightened I’ll be a success and that will put so much pressure on me that I’ll crash and burn, I acknowledge and accept my feelings
Even though I’m so scared I’ll be a success and then I’ll have no time for my family, I’m open to finding the right balance in my life
Eyebrow: I have this fear of success Side of eye: It seems strange to fear success Under eye: I’m scared I’ll have all this pressure on me Under nose: I don’t want to get so busy that I have no family life Chin: What if the pressure is too much for me Collarbone: What if I feel overwhelmed Under arm: I’m scared of success Top of head: I’m scared I’ll have no time for my family and they’ll resent me
Eyebrow: I don’t deserve success Side of eye: There will be too much pressure on me to keep this success going Under eye: I’ll get overwhelmed Under nose: I’m not good enough to succeed Chin: I’ll feel guilty that I’m not giving enough to my family Collarbone: I don’t want to succeed and then find it all too much to handle Under arm: I’m scared of sustaining this success Top of head: What if my family hate me for doing so well
Eyebrow: I’m open to letting this fear go Side of eye: I want to clear out all these doubts Under eye: I’m open to changing this fear today Under nose: What if I can enjoy my success Chin: What if I can find the right balance between success and family life Collarbone: Maybe my family will support me Under arm: Maybe I do deserve to be successful Top of head: I’m open to enjoying my success
Remember to use your words where appropriate. Re-check your score and keep tapping and adjusting your statements until you are down to zero. Tap on all the different aspects of your fear. Test your results when you think you are finished. Visualise yourself being successful and check that no negatives come up. If they do, then do some more tapping.
I will leave you with this amazing quote from Marianne Williamson:
“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”
Here’s the rub. You hear about this strange-sounding technique called EFT or Emotional Freedom Techniques. You discover lots of people have helped themselves or been helped by a practitioner and the more you read the more you think – I’ll give that a go myself! Then you read about those 1 minute wonders and think that will happen for me too.
As an experienced practitioner, I’d say those 1 minute wonders don’t happen very often. Many people try EFT for a couple of rounds and think, ah it’s not working for me and give up.
Well EFT does work. Often it is our persistence that is the key. So my advice is to keep tapping! Here’s some tips to help you, if you were expecting a 1 minute wonder that didn’t happen!
Always do your SUDS level – just think how do I feel about this issue on a scale of 0 to 10? Where 0 is no intensity and 10 is maximum intensity.
Start tapping on your issue and keep going!
After each round or two, re-check your SUDS level.
Keep tapping until you are down to 0.
If you get stuck try saying “Even though I’m stuck on this issue at a 3 (insert your number), I deeply and completely accept myself and choose to easily get it down to a 0”.
You can tap for your frustration if things aren’t moving as quickly as you like. You can also tap for the issue being more complicated than you expected. I’m sure you’re getting the idea now that you can pretty much tap on anything and everything!
Remember that working by ourselves it is often difficult to see our own problems. We can’t see the wood through the trees. So get some help. Preferably from an experienced practitioner like myself. Even a friend will help though – they should help you see things you can’t yourself.
In a future blog post (watch this space) I will list out some fantastic questions that can help you discover the root cause of your problem. With EFT we often peel away the layers as we tap. What we end up tapping on, maybe completely different to what we started on. All that matters though is that we persistently and gently keep working until we get to that root cause. Once we find that true healing takes place.
So always remember to be persistent and keep tapping!