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EFT for Educational Use

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EFT for Advancing Educational Skills Page 2

By Dr. Patricia Carrington

"Even though I find JAVA boring, I choose to find unexpected areas of excitement and creativity in it."

I intentionally introduced the idea of creativity into the phrase about JAVA because this is one of Martin's very positive experiences. 

He expressed interest in this phrase and considerable surprise about it, and proceeded to do one round of the EFT Choices Trio using it in his set-up and reminder phrases (for details on the Choices Method and Choices Trio see chapter 3 of my Choices Manual)

After a single round of the Trio, Martin's boredom level had not moved, he was still a "7", but in response to my question about what had been going through his mind while he was tapping he said, “I actually started thinking about JAVA, how I really do have in interest in making it work.  I'd like to make it work. I'd have a feeling of accomplishment if I did."

So far, so good, but there was still much to do.  After he did another round of the Choices Trio I asked him to pick up the manual again, look at its cover, and rate how boring the book looked to him now.  His rating was now down to a "5 – 6", and he said, "I don't feel the cringe anymore."

For the next round he made a slight change in the wording, one which brought it into a more active tense.  The new phrase he used was:

"Even though I find JAVA boring, I choose to find the excitement and creativity in it."

Notice how this phrase now becomes a more definite statement — he now believes that there actually are areas of "excitement and creativity" there to FIND!

Another round of the Choices Trio, and his boredom score had come down to a "4 – 5",  but he told me that he had just realized "something else" -- -- JAVA was INTIMIDATING to him.

We had hit upon a new aspect!  Just how intimidating did he find it to be on the intensity scale?  "About a 6", he answered.

We could have just continued tapping on the general category of "Intimidation", and slowly but surely the intimidation would probably have lessened.  But something prompted me to suggest to Martin that he interact directly with the book and the real challenge it presented, at this point.  I had a feeling that the intimidation he was experiencing might be linked to some deficiencies in his ability to process the information in the book.

My instructions to him were to open the book and read any sentence that caught his attention.  He was to read it to himself and then tell me how he felt as he read it.

His answer came easily. There were, he said, two unfamiliar terms in there –– "int” and the word "float" used in a way specific to JAVA made him very uncomfortable.  His distress rating when looking at those terms was a "9".

Perhaps Martin had not been able to read technical material easily because he may never have learned how to properly handle unfamiliar terms?  The next set-up phrase we constructed directly targeted this problem.  It was:

"Even though I find unfamiliar terms intimidating, I choose to know that I can find their meaning, and things will become clear."

I had suggested the latter Choice to him because I didn't think that Martin himself would have thought of it — it was simply not in his experience to be able to FIND the meaning of terms, and therefore this Choice was aimed at supplying some educational guidance.

Martin confirmed that he would never have thought of such a phrase but that he found the idea "interesting".

With one round of the Choices Trio using this reminder phrase, his "intimidation" score was down to a "5".  After another round it was down to "3".  Now, reading the same sentence again as a test, he spontaneously commented:

"Now when I look at it, in my head I'm thinking, ' I don't know this but I can look it up'."  Martin was now beginning to make a mental connection between "not knowing" and being able to "look it up", an essential step if one is to successfully navigate technical courses.

After still one more round of the Trio, when Martin looked at the same sentence it actually looked to him "pretty good" –– no longer intimidating.  His "intimidation" score was now down to a "1 to 2".

Then, as so often happens when people have come way down in their intensity ratings, creative solutions to his own dilemma began to pop into Martin's mind.

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