In this article, I answer an EFT supervision question from a student. And that is, how should my client have been treated for his fear of flying with the Tell The Story technique, seeing that he could not feel anything above 0?
Well, every once in a while, you’ll find someone who can’t imagine themselves in the situation. There are several ways to deal with it.
The first thing I would try is to bring up those feelings in a way normally reserved for testing. She normally wouldn’t recommend going into the testing part of the session without first releasing the trauma, but in this case, she doesn’t feel it. Then she would ask him to tell the story of the flight from beginning to end, while I take notes on each part. Notice body language and voice for any emotion. If there is a part where it seemed more emotional than flat, mark it in your notes. When he has finished telling the story, ask him to close his eyes. With his eyes closed, read the story to him in great detail, really going into detail in the most intense part, asking him to notice, for example, the smell of food or drink on the plane, how the seat felt, if he was using seat belt or not, what movie was he watching or what was he watching, the voice of the pilot when he announced a danger; in other words, sight, hearing, and touch. Then ask him while reliving that, where 10 is scared and 0 is calm, what number is he feeling? If there’s anything above zero, even if it’s a 2 or 1, you can ask him to open his eyes (so he can see you play), and then you can play him down to 0. If his body language or voice doesn’t give an indication of which part was worse for her, ask her which part was worse, and then explain as above.
If the above produces total calm from the start (the client’s presentation without feeling), then you can use a cognition validity statement. For example, you can ask how true the following statement feels, where 10 is completely true and 0 is completely false: “Flying is always dangerous.” Take her time to explain first that she knows logically, she knows flying isn’t dangerous, but she wants to hear what that emotional voice in the back of her head is saying, not her logical head. Chances are she will find that emotional voice and give you a number above zero. You can then go through the story as above, only this time, go through each part of the story and tap each part twice before continuing, without numbers. When he’s done, ask him again how true the above statement is, and chances are he’s narrowed it down a bit.
Detective work may be needed for the real problem. You may be barking up the wrong tree. You may not be able to connect with the feeling of flying, but you can connect with, for example, fear of death, claustrophobia, or anything else that makes you generally anxious but has nothing to do with flying. Fear of death could be related to incomplete grief for a loved one, claustrophobia could be related to a time she was accidentally locked in a closet, just to give two of many examples of each. That can be played instead. This also has the advantage of helping her understand how a session can go, so she will later delve into her feelings about flying.
I hope this helps.
