History of Meridian Tapping

From Ancient Beginnings

As with many modern methods, EFT has a link to ancient practices. It probably began with a scenario similar to the following.

Around 4,600 years ago in China, two warlords were battling when one of the warriors noticed a strange phenomenon among certain soldiers. A few who were wounded with arrows showed no painful symptoms. It was odd. Why would some warriors be in agony while others with a similarly serious wound have absolutely no pain? As others began noticing the phenomenon and tracking where the arrows entered a body, they explained their observations to physicians.

Soon, systematic observations and studies led to a method of treatment that eventually culminated in the practice of acupuncture.

As you may know, acupuncture is based on 12 major energy meridians that run through the body from head to toe. These channels carry subtle energy through the body as well as vital, life-sustaining information that moves between the brain, spinal cord and nervous systems, then to organs, tissues, muscles, bones, and cells.

Each of these 12 meridians can be accessed from various points on the skin’s surface, or acupoints. Subtle energy enters the body through the acupoints.  If you have ever been to an acupuncturist, you understand how a small needle can be inserted into an acupoint and affect a completely different area in your body. This is a layman’s very brief explanation, of course, but it will serve for our starting point.

This is not intended to be a comprehensive guide to subtle energies or Chinese medicine, but a context for what follows. Also, if you couldn’t care less about energy or acupoints, that’s fine too. The method works very well for skeptics or true believers – just like a light switch that turns on the light whether you believe in electricity or makes no difference. As long as you follow the steps, you’ll get results.

Fast forward from 2600 BC to the 20^th Century.

Dr. George Goodheart, an American Chiropractor, began using acupuncture principles as he developed what is now known as Applied Kinesiology. In AK, a practitioner uses muscle testing and resistance to determine body conditions. Dr. Goodheart started using pressure and tapping on acupuncture meridian points to both diagnosis and relief for his clients. He recorded groundbreaking results while working with physical conditions.

After Goodheart’s work in the 1960’s, Australian John Diamond, M.D., followed up with using positive statements along with gentle tapping as he addressed emotional issues with clients.

Both Goodheart and Diamond were helping to change the future of health practices as they continued to look for new ways of healing.

In the 1980’s Dr. Roger Callahan, an excellent clinical psychologist who was always looking for faster, more effective ways to help his clients, provided a solid link between the work of Goodheart, Diamond, and the present.

He had a healthy practice and was intent on helping others get over phobias. However, he rarely saw anyone get cured. Sometimes clients improved, but it was an excruciating process for them.

Callahan was unsatisfied with methods that did not yield a total remission or elimination of phobic symptoms. He was always on the lookout for cutting edge techniques, and he investigated literally anything that could promote healing.

He had a client, Mary, who was afraid of water. She was not only afraid, but she was terrified — of the rain, the ocean, the shower — and when she bathed, she used about half an inch of water in the tub. Dr. Callahan tried for over a year to help her.  He tried cognitive therapy, hypnosis, biofeedback, desensitization and more. Nothing worked.

One day they were sitting in his home office, and Mary glanced out at his swimming pool in the back yard. She explained how just looking at the pool gave her an upset stomach. When she said that, Callahan recalled from Chinese medicine that there was a stomach meridian and that one of the points for that meridian was under the eye on the orbital bone. Callahan asked Mary if he could gently tap under her eye. After a couple of minutes, Mary said, “It’s gone. It’s gone!”

“What’s gone?”

“The awful feeling in my stomach.”

Mary jumped up and ran outside to the pool. She scooped up some water and splashed her face, and then with an expression of huge relief, she declared, “It’s gone. I’m not afraid anymore!”

Callahan was stunned. His tapping under Mary’s eye must have activated something that quieted her upset stomach. What puzzled him was how the tapping could have eliminated Mary’s long-standing water phobia. It seemed a miracle.

He postulated that there had to be some kind of link between Mary’s thoughts, the acupoint, and the act of tapping on the acupoint.  Callahan began his research, and after years of experimentation, he introduced Thought Field Therapy, a gentle treatment system that addressed phobias and literally any emotional distress or upset. He discovered how to get relief from an emotional issue by tapping on points while focusing thoughts on the issue.

Callahan found that with Thought Field Therapy he could eliminate phobias such as fear of heights, agoraphobia, claustrophobia, fear of water, flying and more. And, once treated, these phobias did not return.  He began to introduce his methods to the world. Undaunted by nay Sayers and skeptics, Callahan continued to help others and to refine his techniques.

His techniques used sometimes complex “algorithms” to treat individual issues. He also taught that each issue required a specific order of tapping and treatment.

In the early 1990’s two people began working on innovative tapping techniques at about the same time, Dr.Patricia Carrington and Gary Craig, and their work has become the basis for universally applied techniques that have spread across the globe.

Psychologist Carrington applied a single algorithm method based on Roger Callahan’s Thought Field Therapy. She called her technique “Acutap.” Instead of focusing clients on one point for an issue, she had them tap on several acupoints and got highly effective results.

When Carrington was developing her techniques on the east coast of America, Gary Craig was doing similar investigations and experimentation on the west coast.

Dr. Callahan trained Gary Craig, a businessman, and Stanford trained engineer. Gary had heard about the Callahan techniques and wanted to apply them to his counseling work.

After using the very specific methods taught by Callahan, Craig made a modification which was the one thing needed to make tapping accessible to all. He designed a simple method where one could tap on any issue and use the same tapping sequence on all issues. It was an umbrella treatment that was both simple to use and very effective. Craig renamed these methods to call them EFT, the Emotional Freedom Techniques.

His other innovation was the techniques could be self-applied. Now a layperson could learn EFT and then use it as needed. This was a huge advancement. It made tapping accessible to all.

Both Patricia Carrington and Gary Craig have been promoting EFT and Meridian Tapping around the world, and it is now practiced by MD’s, RN’s, PhD’s, counselors, psychotherapists, and anyone who needs to resolve emotional pain.

I learned the techniques as taught by Gary and have worked with hundreds of clients. We have applied it to not only the fear of public speaking, but to a myriad of other problems, anxieties, fears and phobias, including grief, nail biting, smoking cessation, weight loss, fear of flying, fear of success, fear of failure, to name a few. These techniques work like no other.

Tapping is like acupuncture without the needles. The techniques are painless, and since they work on subtle energies you may find that it seems they are not doing much, but your discomfort will be gone. These techniques work very quickly and efficiently.

At first the tapping may seem foolish, stupid or silly to you. We have been conditioned to think inside a certain box for wellness, for therapy, for everything. If thinking inside that box has helped you, keep it up. If it hasn’t, then you are in the right place with the techniques you’ll be learning. Just try out the Method and see what happens.

The following statement is the foundation of what you will be learning.

The Cause of All Negative Emotions

is a Disruption in The Body’s Energy System

Recall the meridians, those 12 channels of bodily energy flow?  When the body experiences a disruption in the flow of energy along one of those meridians, it can manifest in emotional distress.

Once you identify a certain disruption such as fear of flying, stress over money, fear of public speaking, anxious feelings about weight, work related anxiety, Tapping gives you a clear path to addressing and relieving that distress. But more on that during the Method section.

This summary should give you enough background to get started