Peter Shaffer exudes the calm and centeredness quite often found in those who practice healing arts. He warmly greets me in the welcoming reception room of the Sonoma Holistic Center and ushers me into a pristine room. We sit down in comfortable office chairs facing one another. He begins to tell me all about Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) and precisely how it can change my life.
Stanford-educated engineer Gary Craig developed EFT in 1991 after a 40-year search of a process that would improve the emotional health of people suffering from psychological issues. EFT works on the same principles as acupuncture, but instead of needles fingers are used to tap specific points on the hands, head, face, and body. The tapping or “meridian energy therapy” is easy to learn and is self-applied.
According to Dr. Craig’s web site, EFT was originally designed to overhaul the psychotherapy profession. It started out helping people tackle their emotional problems, including addictions, eating disorders, low self-esteem, phobias, but soon practitioners were noticing physical healing was taking place. People using EFT now claim to have been cured of a wide variety of conditions and illnesses.
“I think alternative medicine and treatments should have a prominent place alongside western medicine,” said Shaffer, who started working as an Emotional Wellbeing Facilitator in the ‘90s after working as an insurance agent. “What you have to be mindful of is that western medicine is primarily based on the study of cadavers, where some alternative medicines, like EFT, focus on the mind-body-spirit relationship.”
During our hour-long session, Shaffer asked me to isolate a particular emotional problem I was experiencing and then asked enough probing questions to get to the root of the problem. Shaffer used a combination of intuition, life experience, and professional skill to help me realize when and where I could situate myself in the past to best find myself in the midst of that certain emotional discomfort.
“Our emotions are energy in motion, similar to the electricity pulsing through our homes and when our homes have a power surge or circuit overload the fuse blows or the circuit breaker flips off,” Shaffer explained. “The same thing happens to us when we have an emotional upset or trauma. If that emotional upset or trauma (blockage) is not resolved, at some point in a few weeks, months, years, or even decades it will manifest into a physical illness.”
As instructed I started tapping my Karate Chop Point, which is located at the center of the fleshy part of the outside of the hand between the top of the wrist and the base of the baby finger. Using the index and middle finger of my dominant hand I struck the opposite hand at the Karate Chop Point numerous times while repeating an important affirmation that identified the problem while also expressing self-acceptance.
“All the training I have done and my work as a healer has given me a greater understanding of how much of a role our emotional state plays in our physical well-being,” said Shaffer, who discovered EFT seven years ago and has since completed many advanced workshops. “Over the years I have worked with and helped hundreds of clients, using EFT to change their lives dramatically.”
I went into the session open to the process, but I was surprised at how quickly I moved beyond my journalistic skepticism. Shaffer was expert at making me feel at ease and open to positive change. At one point he commented that I was “a tough one,” but his patience and determination soon paid off. For me, the experience was very emotional and ultimately quite healing.
Peter Shaffer, 707.799.9095. Web site: eftsetmefree.com
