| | Ed,
Roger Callahan was watching a presentation being given for chiropractors while he was waiting for the psychology presentation he was at the hotel to see. They were doing some kind of tapping that changed the person's apparent strength, but wasn't related to psychology. It triggered some creative thinking in Callahan and he started experimenting.
At least that's how I understand the beginning of this tapping business. Callahan had some stunning results and he tried to tell Nathaniel who was NOT sympathetic early on. But Callahan was a friend, and he persisted in touting this wonderful technique. Nathaniel has always been open to new techniques, which is very different from being open to some wacky new theory. After a number of years, Nathaniel gave it a try and convinced himself that something was going on here.
Branden described this as energy flows and along meridians, but I never had the feeling that he was invested in the theory - it was more like a convenient explanation, like whatever they used to explain how aspirin worked before they understood the biochemical pathways it used.
I never liked the Chinese/Indian traditional medicine or energy meridian explanation and I wanted an explanation that made sense to me. I used the technique with a great many clients when I was practicing and the results ARE stunning when it works.
My explanation is that some experiences we have are traumatic, if only in the sense that the intensity of the fear we experience is very high and has lasting effects that are triggered. My belief is that the traumatic experience creates/invokes circuits in parts of the brain stem - our lizard brain. Specifically, the amygdala can respond to severe traumas with an fear response that seems to be recorded such that it gets replayed each time a trigger is encountered (PTSD, post-traumatic stress disorder, is a perfect example).
The experience lays down a memory and forms connections apart from the fore-brain, giving us less control over our fear reactions to those things that act as triggers. The explanation so far isn't mine, it is backed by research.
Here is where I add my made-up part to explain tapping's effectiveness. The client is asked to remember that which is scary for them (objects or actions related to phobias, or PTSD type trauma triggers), and that excites those circuits, and the therapist taps while asking the client to do what they can to keep the fears as high as possible. My belief is that the tapping somehow interrupts a needed rewrite function. That somehow, a traumatic memory stored in the lizard brain needs to renew itself somehow, as it is triggered, or it is gone. The evolutionary value of having a trigger to generate instant fight or flight reactions is understandable. A young lizard is sunning itself on a rock, there is a shadow and a swishing sound and the lizard starts to run, but too late - a hawk manages to get his talons into the lizard's tail. The tail is torn off. Very traumatic and the lizard's brain will now automatically send it running at full speed the next time there is a shadow or a swishing sound. Why a logic routine would have the feature of needing to be rewritten automatically as part of its exercise... I don't know.
That's my theory and I've just made it up since all I need was a way to hold this in my mind as a possible explanation that wasn't part of a mystical Oriental philosophy that I don't agree with. I have no idea how Nathaniel holds it in his mind (he may be using "meridians" as a metaphor).
Whatever the actual mechanism turns out to be, it is quite real but limited on what it works for. In my experience it wasn't as helpful, or not helpful at all with many of the normal defense mechanism type of emotional issues (shame, guilt, depression, anger, anxiety, etc.) but often a 15 minute cure... CURE...(not something psychologists get to claim that often) for some fear-based issues.
It has been several decades since I've heard what Nathaniel has to say about Tapping (that's what I call it), and his thinking has probably evolved and his techniques improved over what I learned from him.
Here is what he wrote about Energy Psychology in 2002 (copied from his web site):
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Brief Comments on Energy Psychology
by Nathaniel Branden, Ph.D. (nathaniel@nathanielbranden.com)
Copyright © 2002, Nathaniel Branden, All Rights Reserved
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I have been asked to discuss how I integrate Energy Psychology with the kind of issues I discuss in my books, which chiefly have to do with self-esteem, autonomy, and self-development.
Let me mention that I write of "Energy Psychology" rather than "Thought Field Therapy" (TFT) because the latter is one school, although by far the most influential one, within the wider field of Energy Psychology. These days I am immersed in the study and practice of Seemorg Matrix Work, developed by Asha Clinton. Clinton uses some of work originated by Roger Callahan in TFT and I understand that TFT people use some of Clinton's work... which is all as it should be.
I think of psychotherapy as having two broad tasks: the elimination of negatives (phobias, anxiety, depression, self-destructive attitudes, etc.) -- and the cultivation of positives (living consciously, self-acceptingly, self-responsibly, self-assertively, purposefully, with integrity, a positive attitude toward the challenges and opportunities of life, etc.)
Although these two tasks commonly overlap, there are distinctions here that need to be understood.
The absence of anxiety does not equal the presence of self-confidence. The absence of depression does not equal the presence of happiness. The elimination of negatives does not guarantee the establishment of positives.
The elimination of negatives opens the door to the possibility of building positives, but different processes are involved.
My writing has chiefly been concerned not with the overcoming of negatives (although indirectly my work has often proven helpful in that regard, if only by inspiring courage) but with clarifying the kind of positives essential to a fulfilling life (e.g., the six pillars of self-esteem).
I have found Energy work extraordinarily helpful in dealing with negatives--healing traumas and eliminating traumatic patterns, overcoming anxieties and insecurities, healing psychic wounds, curing phobias, lifting depression, and so forth. But I have never found any school of Energy Psychology to be a totally stand-alone therapy.
So in my work I interweave the kind of themes I write about into my practice when I am also using some form of Energy Psychology -- and I interweave what I have learned from Energy Psychology into my practice when I am working with someone on issues of self-development and self-actualization.
When I am working on eliminating negatives, I am also weaving in positives--and when I am working on developing positives, I sometimes need to pause to focus on the elimination of a negative.
Does Energy Psychology offer some tools for installing positives? Yes. Some. But by my standards not enough by itself. I might be mistaken but I don't think most therapists of a basically Energy orientation would give me an argument about this.
Surely it is enough to say that in my judgment Energy Psychology has made revolutionary contributions and I am profoundly grateful to colleagues like Callahan and Clinton.
Forgive the brevity of this note, by I am being very wicked by playing hooky from the book I am writing to dash off this note. I hope it's useful.
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Atheists may have many other virtues, but on one of the least controversial and most objective measures of moral behavior—giving time, money, and blood to help strangers in need—religious people appear to be morally superior to secular folk.
