Emotional Freedom At Our Fingertips - An Interview With Brad Yates

Chronic stress can severely limit our well being and general functioning. In this episode of the Within Us podcast, guest Brad Yates, an expert on Emotional Freedom Technique, or 'EFT' Energy Tapping, explains the mechanism through which tapping works, and how we can learn to empower ourselves to live more fully and fearlessly by using it.

Reviews

Loved this. Can’t wait to start tapping. Thank you for bringing this wonderful tool to my attention, it is certainly going into my tool belt. ❤️🙏🏼😌

Amazing topic! Tapping is something I will try now. I love learning about new ways to help with self esteem issues and anxiety. Thank you.

I have a couple books on EFT and have seen a few YouTube videos when the book illustrations simply were not sufficient for my learning needs. Long ago, I learned that I need the "why" or backstory or "motivation" (from an acting perspective) to do or understand something wholly new to me. This fact was a fairly long-lived source of frustration years ago when we decided to jointly play World of Warcraft (which my husband had been playing for a while) and I kept asking WHY exactly it was so important that we go here, do that, find this, fight the other, etc. I needed to know the 'toon I was playing wasn't just randomly moving around - there was a purpose to it at the end of the day.

This podcast helped tremendously in that respect when it comes to tapping. For my own backstory, I have a Master's in counseling psychology, have engaged in accupressure for a long time, am not fond of needles (though found the few sessions I managed to do quite helpful), do general energy work, have studied the basics of both medical and spiritual uses if herbalism, aromatherapy, and stones/crystals, am a fairly good dowser (mainly pendulums) with decades of work there, have been a part of a paranormal research and investigation team for years, but also do the debunking and scientific study as well. Quantum mechanics, xenobiology, astrophysics, and particularly time/location travel are all of tremendous interest to me, among other things. All that said (the vastly abbreviated version), it seems perfectly reasonable that tapping would be so effective. I practice Tai chi, Qi Gong (well, still learning that one a bit) and love the Japanese art of shinrin yoku (forest bathing), which affords me lovely time for both my walking meditations and contemplative photography practices.

I've traveled a lot and have noticed some interesting similarities to tapping within the mudras, and many other culture-specific practices. Polynesian (encompassing the wide range of cultures there) dances often involve touching similar areas. The Maori haka slaps key points which if placed on the energy meridians, line up nicely. Certain Native American dances do as well. The common thread I observe is the repeated touching of specific areas in a rhythmic context and for a specific intent which is the purpose of the dance - joy, success on the hunt, intimidation of enemies, courtship, etc. Each intention carries specific emotional vibrations and the dance reinforces these by the repetition and rhythm.

Analysis, as you may have guessed, is one of my core strengths. At times it can be detrimental, and I have actually used some very simple tapping to just generically "let it go" when things don't make sense. I started studying clinical hypnotherapy but realized that although I loved it, there was little market in such services in my area, so I let it go. After almost 20 years working in vocational psychology and vocational rehabilitation, I am finally allowing myself (as a new empty-nester) to return to my former loves, which include genealogy and cognitive/perception/personality theory within psychology as well as the hard sciences. Guess what? I still want to know "why" and I still have trouble letting this go when it's time to do so.

I keep looking over to my EFT books on my shelf here. They teach technique, sure. They provide affirmations or scripts, all very practical. One told me - which I had long ago figured out - that the sites were the energy meridians, true, but it came from the Chinese medicine framework. (Shocker! I learned that from a reflexology training book years ago.) What was missing was the "why" behind it.

If you have read this far, I thank you for your patience. The crux of this is that for all my reading and watching, I never had a decent or satisfying backstory/"reason" for tapping. I do now! This interview shed a lot more light on the intricacies of tapping, beyond the 101 level. Just what I wanted and needed.

I live with multiple chronic health conditions, many caused by a rare genetic condition I have. Some can be "cured" with diligent application of epigenetic principles (helping genes switch on and off intentionally) but it is hard, long, and it's easy to grow discouraged. Others are basically management-only. These are the issues for which I first started looking into tapping. Things like stress relief (flares certain symptoms up), digestive problems (a massage technique taught by our child's GI specialist worked well and also crosses some meridians), depression and anxiety from the unpredictable and time-consuming grind of working to stay as healthy as possible while remaining employed and engaged with family life, sleep issues (I currently use binaural beats and other non-medicinal techniques), and my long practice - since 2004, formally/clinically, but late 1980s informally - with self-hypnosis for pain management and similar issues have all been helpful. I started doing gua sha ("scraping") a few months ago but while helpful, sometimes my skin and neuropathy don't allow me to do so effectively. Tapping seems to be an ideal alternative, maybe even becoming primary in nature.

Listening to this podcast interview has re-ignited my enthusiasm for tapping, particularly with the deeper insights provided. I am going to pull those books I have down off the shelf, and once I finish working on entering the source citation for an exciting new discovery in my family tree, I will be revisiting those books and most likely, going to find and subscribe to Brad's channel. 😊

Thank you so very much, both of you, for taking the time to discuss, record, and share this information with all of us. I see the light within you both. Happy tapping! 🤲🏻❤️🤲🏻