DailyOM: Briefly explain what tapping is and how the process can help us heal emotional wounds and lose weight.
Marcella: Tapping goes by a lot of names: emotional freedom technique (EFT), Meridian tapping, and others. The simplest way to think about it is as a form of emotional acupuncture. EFT was developed by a man named Gary Craig. He discovered that when we tap our fingertips on points at or near the ends of certain acupuncture meridians, while recalling stressful situations, the tapping acts as a circuit breaker on the stress signal and diffuses its trigger.
Even after all these years practicing tapping, I continue to be amazed by how quickly it can work. For example, I worked with a woman who was seriously addicted to diet soda. She knew she had to give it up, but at the same time she was extremely defensive about letting it go. When we explored the emotional roots of her struggle, we found a little girl running away from her dad's abuse. That little girl loaded up a wagon with donuts and soda, the only food she had. After some very deep tapping, she was able to soothe and reassure her younger self and let her know that she wasn't alone in dealing with her dad.
Not everyone has such dramatic results right off the bat, but I do have the privilege of seeing many people make quantum shifts resolving their emotional eating, binging, and sugar addictions. When people resolve the emotional distress surrounding those core traumas, it's easier for both the body and the psyche to release the body weight that no longer serves them.
DailyOM: In Lesson 5 you start people on the "heroine's journey." What is this, and how does it apply to this work?
Marcella: To be honest, I have no idea how the heroine's journey became a part of my work. I love Joseph Campbell, and about two years ago I watched his interview series with Bill Moyers again. I began thinking about my clients and students, and this phrase popped into my mind: "All acts of healing are acts of heroism." I began to explore what that meant. When a woman who's struggled with her food habits and body hatred seeks to go way beyond restrictive dieting and punitive exercise and heal her wounds at the soul level, she's a heroine on an archetypal journey. This is no small task. Truly, I stand in awe of these women. These are the bravest and most beautiful women I know.
The heroine's journey begins with a calling, a tremendous feeling of dissatisfaction or crisis that sparks the need for deep transformation. Here the heroine has to summon the courage to heed her inner voice and embark on the journey. I find that for women who feel so much shame, thinking of themselves as a heroine on a journey is so empowering. It gives them a blessing to make friends with their shadow side in a way that more conventional healing modalities don't allow.
DailyOM: A course like this really is a journey, from understanding our triggers to confronting and healing core beliefs. Why is the journey so important?
Marcella: The journey is important because the journey is the teacher. It's through the journey that the deepest healing occurs. So many women blame themselves for their failed diets. From the point of view of the heroine's journey, so-called failure is part of the adventure. Failures are actually stepping-stones to success, but it's hard to realize this if you don't make the journey.
Why is healing core beliefs important? If we don't heal our beliefs, none of the other healing we do has a chance to stick. Let's look at obsession, for example. We can become obsessed with eating sugar. We can become equally obsessed with avoiding it. In my opinion, this is one of the many reasons that diets don't work. Restricting a trigger food just transfers the obsession from indulgence to abstinence.
The point is to get out of the obsession loop altogether. What drives that obsession? Beliefs like "I'm not worthy," "I can't have," "I don't deserve," and so on. When, on the other hand, women use tapping to relieve the guilt and shame associated with those beliefs, the obsession vanishes. They naturally turn to wiser food choices. They stop stepping on the scale 10 times a day. All that freed-up energy begins to flow into creative outlets of expression.
DailyOM: Everybody is tapping these days. It has become very popular. Do you use tapping in your own life to heal?
Marcella: All the time! I've had an amazing journey with tapping. I was introduced to it through my hairdresser. She has such a generous heart. In addition to her hairdressing work, she also does tapping with people who have facial disfiguring to help them heal the trauma and stigma of that and discover their true beauty. She does gorgeous work, and one day when I went in for a haircut, she said, "Hey, I'm learning this new thing called EFT. Wanna try it?" Within five minutes, I was hooked.
Something I had been holding on to for years just went poof! After that I became a client of a wonderful EFT practitioner for three years, which was pivotal in my life. None of the other healing modalities that I've been involved with over the years has given me the breakthroughs that tapping has. I'm living a life today that I never would've imagined was possible, and I feel so deeply privileged to watch my students and clients do that as well.
DailyOM: Toward the end of the course, you teach about one of the last phases of the journey, which is being witnessed and acknowledged as having changed. Talk to us about this important step.
Marcella: I once heard a tapping practitioner and success coach say, "One of the deepest needs we have as human beings is to remain consistent in how we are identified in the eyes of other people." That's when I realized how crucial it is to the healing path not just to develop your inner congruence but also to learn how to stand in the space of being a healed person inside your tribe.
Who are you in the family system if you're no longer "the chubby one"? How does your relationship with your mother change when you lovingly and firmly set the boundary that she is no longer allowed to comment on your body? How do you handle walking into your workplace and having everyone witness how beautiful you look? This is such an important part of the journey to address because without the skills to traverse this terrain, it's easy to run for cover and erase all the progress you've made.
DailyOM: What can students expect from this course?
Marcella: The content is a mix of tapping exercises, how-to videos, and guided meditations, and it takes students through the heroine's journey that I outlined earlier. I routinely receive feedback from women all over the world about how transformative this program's been for them, which just makes my heart sing!
One day, I discovered a handwritten note in my mailbox from a lovely heroine in Ohio. She wrote, "I feel, for I believe for the first time in my life, free of food bondage. I don't have the nonstop fixation on food anymore, nor the body hatred." That just brought me to tears.
DailyOM: Can men take this program too?
Marcella: Yes, even though this course focuses on the heroine's journey and is in a strong feminine voice, it's absolutely appropriate for both genders.
DailyOM: Thank you, Marcella, for sharing your heart and your work with us. If you're new to tapping, as with most things, you have to give it a chance. Under Marcella's expert guidance, you'll learn how to perform tapping the right way and with a sense of purpose. Until next time, be well.
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