By Steve Wells
Recently this question was posed on the EFT Practitioners Linked In group about psychological
reversal:
Psychological reversal? Can anyone explain how we can best explain to students how tapping
the Karate chop point during set up 'fixes' this? I'm confused myself ...
First some background for those new to tapping and EFT: Psychological reversal is the concept
that someone's energy system can be reversed, as in flowing in the opposite direction, from
their intention. It was used in EFT and its predecessor TFT as an explanation for failure to
progress, and is seen as the basis of self-sabotage. In EFT the "correction" for
psychological reversal was supposed to be the set-up statement, which includes a verbal
description of the problem, combined with a self-acceptance statement (such as I deeply and
completely love and accept myself), whilst tapping on the karate chop point or rubbing a sore
spot on the chest.
Here's my response to the question which was posed:
There is no such thing as psychological reversal and there is no need to tap on any
particular points to "reverse" it. What many EFT'ers call psychological reversal is what
therapists have been calling resistance, secondary gain, self-sabotage, and so on for many
years, ALL of may simply be different aspects of the problem OR a failure on the
practitioner's part to get rapport, understand the problem, engage meaningfully, provide
safety, or address treatment to the right area, among other things.
It seems EFT Creator Gary Craig has also come to this point of view, as he now states in his
online tutorial:
"The term Psychological Reversal (PR) has been eliminated because, after years of experience,
I think it was mis-named. In practice, PR is a form of secondary gain/loss or a new aspect of
the original problem. While the correction for PR remains in the Basic Recipe, I have found
that PR can be handled effectively with the proper treatment of Aspects, Specific Events, and
Detective Work."
However, Gary does say "the correction for PR remains in the Basic Recipe". Now why you still
need to include the "correction for PR" if you no longer believe in it, I don't know! Still,
Gary has said that he likes using the set-up language to do reframes and it makes sense to be
tapping when you do.
By the way, the set-up statement can be a nice way of framing a problem but can also lead
many people into thinking it is really necessary to use it for results, that using words to
describe the problem is necessary to treat problems effectively, or that there is something
magical in a self-accepting statement, when anyone who tests this can find that you will get
results without any set-up statements, sometimes the words can get in the way of really
focusing mindfully on your issue, and using self-accepting statements actually tunes the
client into their lack of self-acceptance rather than helping them to accept themselves more.
The fruitless search for the perfect words to describe the core issue also prevents many
people from being meaningfully helped, holds them back from using the tapping, and frustrates
many practitioners who would do better to focus more attention onto their clients...
I should say that some years ago when we were developing our own Simple Energy Techniques
(SET) I discussed with Gary how we were getting results without any need to use the set-up
statement, just simply to go with whatever is present and tap, Gary was adamant that the
set-up would be necessary for more difficult issues. Looks like his view on this has changed...