Tapping: The Reset Button

Recently I ran into one of my former patients in a grocery store parking lot. When she asked me what I was doing these days, I told her that I'd incorporated BodyTalk into my practice. After a short description of BodyTalk, in which I mentioned that the Cortices technique in BodyTalk might help her son's asthma, she remarked with amazement that she recalled tapping on her own head as a child to stop her wheezing.
You might have noticed that some of the newer treatment modalities involve tapping: there's EFT, which works on emotions, there's NAET, best known for allergy elimination, and BodyTalk. Aside from the tapping, all three modalities seem very different.
Why do they all use tapping? Well, for starters, tapping has been around in indigenous cultures for centuries. Tapping wakes up the body and the brain and helps bring about healing.
Think about your spine. Inside your spine—and surrounding your brain--is cerebrospinal fluid which, according to osteopaths and craniosacral therapists, moves in its own rhythm. In NAET and BodyTalk, we are gently interrupting this rhythm to change our relationship with a substance or to call the brain's attention to something. The interruption of this rhythm is communicated to the brain and other places in the body via the cerebrospinal fluid and spinal nerves, which travel up and down the interior of the spine and emerge out of each vertebra.
We've all had a similar experience when we've contracted a case of the hiccups, which miraculously disappears when someone comes up behind us and startles us...and the hiccups miraculously disappear. We've just been reset, and our diaphragm no longer spasms with each inhalation.
It's like having a conversation with a friend, and just as you're in the middle of relating how your boss gave you so much work to do, someone runs up and interrupts you very loudly by shouting something in your face. Your mind goes blank. You can't remember what you were saying.
The same thing happens with tapping. As you tap on your head (or as your practitioner taps on you), causing a gentle interruption of the natural rhythm of the cerebrospinal fluid, your brain is surprised enough to be able to change its relationship with that substance, as in NAET. Or as in BodyTalk, your brain notices a lack of communication between your lungs and your spleen that has been causing coughing and phlegm for the past two weeks, and re-establishes the connection.

Can't Stop? Gotta Have It?

Have you ever noticed that sometimes you eat something (chocolate, for instance, or potato chips), and it just tastes soooo good, you just want that taste running over your tongue forever, and you keep eating and keep eating? Sometimes do you notice that you just can't stop? And then later, do you find that your stomach hurts, or you're just really bloated, or you get diarrhea after one of these episodes?
Or do you ever eat one thing and then really crave something else? Whenever I eat Indian food, for instance, I really REALLY want something sweet afterward.
What is this phenomenon? Why does this happen? Is it really that we have absolutely no control over our palates?
Actually, it's not you.
It's allergies.
You see, sometimes allergies look and behave a lot like addictions. If you know anything about Alcoholics Anonymous, you'll know that the first step is admitting that you're powerless over your addiction, and secondly you acknowledge the disease concept of alcoholism that your body is allergic to alcohol, and that's why you can't stop drinking. They even describe alcoholism as an “allergy.” And the truth is, they're absolutely right.
The reason you can't stop eating certain foods, or drinking, is because you happen to be allergic to that specific thing. The allergy creates a biochemical reaction in your body that makes you want more.
This also explains why some people are addicted to sugar and others aren't—it's the same reason why some people are alcoholics and others aren't...because everyone's biochemical makeup is unique.
This is why allergy elimination is so powerful. After preparing the body by normalizing the immune system with a certain number of treatments, we can treat you for the thing you're addicted to. Suddenly, it doesn't have the same pull it used to.
I remember when I was treated for my sugar addiction. I happen to be the adult child of a carb and sugar addict. For those of you familiar with addiction, you know that dual addictions are often more difficult to treat. And as a patient of mine once said, “I never met a piece of bread I didn't like.” I couldn't go to a party without standing next to a bowl of pretzels or popcorn and eating it all. I couldn't pass up a plate of doughnuts without having at least one and usually two. Yet after treating sugar, I suddenly didn't need to do that. I could pass up the doughnut because truthfully, I didn't want it anymore. I still appreciated the taste, but I could stop, and I could say no.
Don't misunderstand me. I'm not simply using the language of addiction to make a point; rather, I'm using the language of addiction to demonstrate how powerful allergies can be, and to assure you that it's not in your head. It's not because your character is weak. It's not because you're not good enough. It's because there is a biochemical process that is causing you to lose control. And now, with allergy elimination, there's hope. You can have control over your addiction.

Cold and Ancient China

For thousands of years, Chinese Medicine has said that cold enters the body via the acupuncture points on the back of the head and upper back when the protective energy surrounding the body is weakened. An entire system of acupuncture, known as the Shang Han Lun, was developed some 1700-1800 years ago, that traced the invasion of “cold” into the body. As cold penetrated deeper and deeper, an individual got sicker and sicker until they eventually died. Herbal formulas and acupuncture point prescriptions were developed for each stage of illness, beginning with the simple cold, continuing to high fevers, to abdominal pains and exhaustion, to urinary tract infections, and to complete depletion and death. This is how doctors in ancient China kept people alive. Oh, and by the way, the doctors of ancient China only got paid when people were well. So there was a great incentive to keeping people from being sick.
If we were to engage our universal translator, we'd look at the last paragraph and say, “Oh, back then they had viruses, just like we do, except they didn't have antibiotics. And this is what it looks like when you have a virus that you don't treat—it weakens the immune system until the white blood cells can't fight anymore, and then you die.”
Of course, back then they didn't have antibiotics. People tended to stay home and rest when they got sick, rather than going to work because they didn't have sick days or because they had to finish a project. When a major contagious disease swept through a village, people were quarantined, and they complied voluntarily to try to contain the disease as much as possible. Their very existence—and the existence of their towns and villages—depended on it.
Life in ancient China was different in other ways, too. People had a pretty ascetic diet. There was no fast food, hardly any sugar, and not a lot of alcohol. Life was hard, and people didn't party like we do.
What in the world does this have to do with you or me in 2009?
I would argue that it has a LOT to do with us!
If we focused on preventive health, instead of palliative or curative medicine, health care in the US would look completely different than it does today. But even if the rest of the world doesn't change, we can focus on preventive health for ourselves and the people we care about. Here's a brief list of things we can do, taken from simple wisdom of Ancient China:
1. Pay attention to how you feel. Notice when you start to feel tired or run down. Respond by RESTING, not pushing through it.
2. Cut down or eliminate sugar, fast foods, and too much partying.
3. When you get sick, take a day off. Chances are you will nip it in the bud rather than spreading it around your whole office.
Best wishes to all of you for a prosperous and healthy 2009!