EFT: A personal experience
Christina Bustamante tells how EFT freed her from a lifetime of extreme timidity and low self esteem

Seven years ago I was a very different person. I was introverted, unconfident, with very little self-esteem, shy and very timid. I’d been excessively timid and shy ever since I can remember. So I believed that I was born a shy, timid kind of person.
On the outside I was ‘ok’, happy, I’d had a happy childhood, a loving mum and dad, and no traumas. So why was I so introverted, shy and unbearably timid? Why was I afraid to say ‘no’ to people? Why had I had an unhappy and abusive marriage?
When my children left home I was already separated. At last I had time to do what I wanted to do. But I was totally confused when I found I didn’t know what I wanted to do, and worse still, I wasn’t too sure who I actually was. I needed to work, and wanted to work with people, so I enrolled in a 3 1/2 year course in Therapeutic Counselling. The course required that I work on myself. I agreed, though I didn’t believe I needed to. At the beginning of every session we sat in a circle to share what we wanted to about the intervening two weeks, and our tutor always asked the same question: ‘How have you been in your body?’ It took me a year to understand that she meant: ‘How have you felt – what has been going on in your body?’ I began to realize that I had lived my whole life up to then in my head, being unaware that I had a body. As I began to tune in to how I felt in my body, I discovered a whole new world. I saw that there were several reasons and events in my early childhood that may have contributed to my timidity. For example, I was in awe of my dad, and because he never had time to play with me I thought it was because he didn’t think I was good enough. Totally untrue, but as a child I believed it, and I grew up and lived my life believing that I wasn’t good enough.
With my Advanced Diploma under my arm I started practising, but felt frustrated at how slow were the results. Then I discovered EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques), and I trained to Level III and Practitioner Trainer. The technique involves gently tapping on several of the energy points in the body used in Acupuncture, whilst feeling an uncomfortable emotion.It is very gentle and needs no tools or equipment. It is the only therapy I know that works directly on how you feel rather than what you think.
As I trained in EFT it took me on an express ride uncovering and tapping on the events and memories and beliefs that were the causes of my extreme timidity and lack of self-esteem. Tapping on an emotional memory reduces the emotional charge round the memory, so that it can then be remembered without any discomfort. When there is no emotional charge round a memory, there is nothing to be triggered. I began to understand that healing is a process, and to heal from deep core issues takes courage, determination, a willingness to change and time, each person’s time. Deep healing nearly always means change, and changing the kind of person you believed you are can change the way you relate to people. We nearly always fear that when we change there will be trouble, upsets and difficulties especially with the ones we love, even to the extent of losing them. Mostly these fears are groundless - in our mind; in fact, changing ourselves nearly always brings relief and happiness. Tapping away and letting go of limiting beliefs like ‘I am not acceptable,’ or ‘I am unlovable’ are the hardest, but the most rewarding. After all, when we truly love ourselves, we are able to love everything else. Life becomes easy, and one doesn’t need much to be content.
My biggest insight and breakthrough happened only recently, when I had already become happy, nearly totally self-accepting, and loving to myself. The cause of my timidity came from a ‘scene’ that I visualized. It was triggered by a rejection that I had just experienced. The rejection felt like a cold rush to my body, and I felt very shaky and shivery. I phoned an EFT practitioner colleague who tapped with me, and I ‘saw’ myself as a child of 3-4 months old (still unable to sit up), lying in a cot, my hands by my sides, paralyzed with shock. I didn’t know what the shock was or who or what perpetrated it, but as I lay in the cot I felt shaken to the core, devastated, unable to move, and totally alone. I believe that the shock had affected me especially strongly and deeply because it had happened when I was so young, open and vulnerable, with no logic or defences to deal with such an event.
I do not know to this day what really happened. But the most amazing result is that since tapping through that visualization I have completely lost every trace of my timidity, my fear of people, my need to be liked. I am deeply content, trusting in the unknown, open to people. I also know who I am and what I want in any situation. Furthermore, in being now in touch with my ‘real’ inner self, I fi nd I am attracting people and circumstances into my life that flow and make me happier than I have ever been. EFT is a wonderful tool that has transformed my life and is still doing so.
Christina works from home and can be contacted on mobile:
07947 011 914 or email: christina@liveyourvision.co.uk