How to calm feelings of anxiety with Tapping

Yesterday I had a wisdom tooth extracted.

I’m not going to lie to you, I was feeling somewhat anxious.

I knew it was for the best. I had been told by the oral surgeon (oh yes this bad boy needed more than your average dentist to remove it) that the tooth could be removed within 10 minutes.

Did that make me feel any better? Not really!

As I sat in the waiting room on my own waiting to be called I was aware that my heart was beating faster than normal and I was doing what I could to focus on my breath. Not easy when you are wearing a mask.

The radio was playing and a very annoying DJ (they really do talk bollocks don’t they?) was only adding to my heightened sense of anxiety, but I didn’t dare turn off the radio or turn it down for fear of being told off for ‘touching’ something!

I was brought into the room and asked to remove my mask and lay back in the chair. As I did I became aware of how bright the lights were. Laying there I found myself thinking that surely it would be a much more soothing and calming experience if they had low level lighting and maybe stars on the ceiling to help calm people down!

How to use Tapping to calm you down

The surgeon was telling me about the procedure and the different types of injections I would be given, and although I was nodding, I wasn’t really taking in what she was saying.

All my mind was hearing was ‘this is going to hurt’.

Despite that awareness, I knew that this was a time to ‘put my big girl pants on’ and focus my mind.

I’ve spent the last 9 years teaching my clients about focusing the mind, so come on, this was my time to practice what I preached!

Instinctively, I started to tap.

Just to be clear here, I wasn’t tapping in the usual ‘even though I’m feeling anxious about this MASSIVE needle coming towards me’ kind of way….

I simply laid there and softly started tapping the acupressure points on my fingers. I wasn’t saying anything (bit hard when you have half your face numb and someone poking around in your mouth) out loud.

Yet in my mind as I tapped each finger point, I thought of all the people in my life I felt grateful for for introducing me to Tapping – also known as EFT.

I was actively giving my mind something to focus on other than what was happening, and by tapping on the EFT points I was also calming down my central nervous system and my amygdala.

The result?

Job done in less that 10 minutes.

And me feeling so much calmer and in control.

So the next time you have a visit to the Dentist, G.P, Hospital or even when you are on public transport and feeling anxious or nervous and you need to calm down and focus your mind, simply tap each of the fingers (at the side of the nail) and combine this with some gratitude thinking.

You can think of all the people in your life you feel grateful for as you tap each finger point. Or all the holidays that you have had which you (especially now!) feel so much gratitude about. Or whatever makes your heart fill with appreciation and notice the calming and soothing effect this has on you.

Curious about how else EFT can work for you? Check out our online EFT video package now!