All stress (and stress relief) is not created equal.
Did you know that some stress is actually good for you? In small amounts, stress can improve brain function, make you more creative, help you get fit, lower your risk of breast cancer, Alzheimer’s, and lots more.
It’s chronic stress—the “stress overload” you feel day in, day out—that’s silently but systematically sabotaging your health and well-being.
Here’s the thing, though. You’re smart. You exercise, get your 7 hours of sleep, do deep breathing, yoga, meditation… You’ve even logged hours on the couch (the therapist’s couch!) trying to get to the “root” of your stress.
But still, you feel its effects. Even worse, this stress-related disease shows up everywhere you look.
So what gives?
The Answer: Like stress, not all stress relief is created equal.
Stress isn’t just in your head. Stress is also physical. (There’s loads of scientific research proving this, by the way.)
Until stress is fully released, it stays lodged in your body and in your cells, running rampant, putting your health at risk.
Still unconvinced? The health-damaging effects of chronic stress are scientific fact.
1. You think about something stressful—work, money, relationships, family, whatever’s bothering you.
2. Your amygdala (in your mid-brain) senses danger.
3. Your amygdala helps to initiate your body’s fight-or-flight response to stress.
4. In “fight or flight,” your body releases adrenaline and the “stress hormone” cortisol, diverts blood away from your digestive tract, leaving you less able to digest food and absorb nutrients AND more likely to gain weight.
5. In this physiological “crisis mode,” you’re more vulnerable to pain—from chronic illness, arthritis, fibromyalgia, migraines, stomach upset, and more.
6. In this state of heightened physiological “alert”, your brain’s creative center is deemed “non-essential” and shuts down. Down goes your problem solving, your creative skills, your intuition.
7. You feel increasingly irritable, isolated, and impatient. Your relationships suffer.
8. Stress affects your sleep. Your metabolism slows.
9. Your body secretes even more cortisol, wreaking more havoc on your digestion (and waistline), increasing your blood pressure, and lowering your immune response.
10. After releasing too much cortisol for too long, your body goes into “adrenal fatigue.” You feel depleted, exhausted, and depressed.
11. You no longer have the energy to adhere to your exercise routine, your healthy eating, meditation, yoga. Migraines, insomnia, stress-related hair loss, chronic pain, and any number of other issues become regular parts of your life.
12. Battling low energy, you can hardly focus at work, and elsewhere. Your relationships suffer.
13. Your depression deepens. You (and your body) are STRESSED OUT.
And while you may feel better, it’s often only until the next morning or credit card statement.
40% of the population exercises for 30 minutes, 1-4 days per week.
NO debate here. Exercise is crucial for a healthy lifestyle. Physical activity promotes the release of endorphins, known as the “feel-good” neurotransmitters. These make you “smarter” and more creative by increasing blood flow (and oxygen) to your brain and acts as “meditation in motion,” providing mental and physical stress relief.
The reality: However critical, it’s hours, even days after that stressful meeting with the boss or that fight with your spouse before you can seek out the solace of your running shoes. (If you have that healthy habit…)
38% of Americans use “complementary and alternative medicine,” which includes yoga, meditation, and other natural stress relief.
Again, NO debate here. These practices provide powerful stress relief, increased focus, creativity, and lots more.
The reality: Yoga and meditation provide significant stress relief and other benefits that yield significant results in weeks or months with regular, frequent practice. Many who try meditation give up too soon because they feel it’s “not working.”
A study performed by Dr. Dawson Church, Ph.D. and Dr. David Feinstein, Ph.D., measured cortisol levels before and after treatment.
83 participants were divided into 3 groups: the 1st group received an hour of Tapping, a practice that combines “talk” therapy with acupressure treatments; the 2nd group received an hour of psychotherapy (“talk” therapy); the 3rd group (control group) received no treatment.
Results: The 1st group demonstrated a 24% decrease in cortisol levels; the 2nd and 3rd groups showed no change in cortisol levels.
The reality: Psychotherapy alone relieves stress, but over a long period of time. The immediate benefits of psychotherapy don’t register in your body, where excessive amounts of the “stress hormone” cortisol still run rampant, putting your health at risk.
Tapping, the practice that produced a 24% decrease in cortisol after just one hour, blends Western psychotherapy or “talk” therapy with Eastern wisdom about “meridian points” or acupressure.
It acts fast and you can use it anytime, anywhere. It only takes 5 – 20 minutes.
Because it accesses your emotions and body simultaneously, it provides powerful stress relief, lowering cortisol levels faster than most traditional and alternative stress relief methods.
Study findings show that Tapping balances activity between the sympathetic and parasympathetic regions of your brain, producing “a neutral emotional state,” the gold standard of health and wellness.
The sympathetic region of your brain
Prepares your body for vigorous physical activity, speeding your heart, dilating pupils, contracting blood vessels, reducing digestive secretions.
In a perpetually active “stressed out” state, you’re more vulnerable to heart disease, high blood pressure, insomnia, weight gain, irritability, and impatience. This is what chronic stress looks like in the early stages.
The parasympathetic region of your brain
Prepares your body for relaxation, cell regeneration, and digestion by slowing the heart, constricting the pupils, stimulating digestive secretions, and dilating blood vessels.
In an overactive state, you suffer from depression, weakened immune response, fatigue, and diminished motivation. This is what chronic stress looks like over time.
“High sympathetic/low parasympathetic ratios have been linked to both psychological and physiological disorders and may, in fact, “be the final pathway linking negative states and conditions to ill health.’” CREDIT: Dr. Dawson Church, Ph.D. and Dr. David Feinstein, Ph.D., “Modulating Gene Expression Through Psychotherapy: The Contribution of Non-Invasive Somatic Interventions”
EFT Tapping regulates activity between these regions to achieve balanced activity and optimal health.
Study findings show that EFT Tapping is “substantially more powerful” than diaphragmatic breathing at lowering cortisol.
Extra Benefit #1: Relief from the excessive cortisol and adrenal fatigue – your body and mind re-balance. Your energy is restored, you sleep better, feel healthy again. This revitalizes your metabolism and your body is again able to heal itself.
Extra Benefit #2: The rapid and comprehensive body/mind stress relief you get from Tapping normally takes hours, weeks, or months to achieve with meditation, yoga, “talk” therapy, and other treatments.
Extra Benefit #3: If you already practice meditation, yoga, affirmations, and others, Tapping can enhance the benefits of those other practices by lowering your cortisol levels much quicker, promoting even deeper relaxation “on the cushion” and beyond.
So, what does it all mean?
Chronic stress is sabotaging your health and well-being, making you more vulnerable to depression, disease, and worse.
EFT Tapping quickly relieves chronic stress on physical and mental/emotional levels.
One of the easiest ways to get the relief you’re looking for is with The Tapping Solution App!
With over 100 Tapping Meditations readily available on your mobile device whenever you need it, it’s like carrying a personal Tapping Professional around with you wherever you go. 🙂
Until next time…
Keep Tapping!
Nick Ortner
Copyright © 2024 The Tapping Solution, LLC
Reading this post reminds me of the incredible value I have received personally and professionally as I have used EFT in the past. This post has re-ignited the awesomeness of EFT and the simplicity of the amazing results that can happen in using it. I am trained in and teach many methods of healing and find EFT to be the simpliest for anyone to use easily and effectively for themselves and to share with others. What a gift. Sometimes we have to be reminded that the simplest things can also be the most powerful. Thanks for bringing more awareness about EFT to the World.
I’ve used tapping for many things and it always works. The biggest problem I have is that I get too busy and forget to use it until my body reminds me that I’ve gotten all stressed out again!
I love how EFT engages the mind & body together. So many things intended to take us further on our road to health & wellness engage the mind or the body seperately. But as we are embodied creatures, it makes so much sense that we benefit far more from a whole person approach to wellness like EFT.
Thank you so much for this – perfect for ME – info.
You described me pretty much to a T… bad digestion – getting worse, irritable, IMPATIENT, and my brain feels like it took a train somewhere! I just got a bunch of blood tests back and most all LOOKS good, but I certainly don’t feel myself these days. Thought it was just Menopause crap – age related stuff, and YES I have been “stressed out” – like alot of people money issues, and now physical issues, obviously stemming fr. the Stress!
So glad to have an answer not only to what’s going on, but to a “Natural” way to fix the problem – YEA!! I do know a bit about tapping, but certainly could use some further guidance. I would LOVE to win the copy of that Tapping Pkg.:) It would be a wonderful thing to add to my Energy Healing/Life Coaching(yet to be).
Love & Light ~ Lezlie
2011 changed my life. I’d experienced many forms of allopathic and alternative therapies over the years. My world crashed. My sanity plummeted. I received an invitation to tune into the 2011 World Tapping Summit. I’d experienced N.E.T in 1996 — it saved my life. I invested in Body Talk for years; it worked when nothing else did. I viewed many of the ‘experts’ during the conference; took voluminous notes and began practicing unrelentlessly — I thought I was losing all touch with ‘reality’ and I “desperately” needed something to grab on to for relief — I didn’t know how I would survive the life-altering shifts I was being subjected to without any warning.
Since that time, thanks to so many team-players EFT provided what no other therapy had for sixteen years of searching for medical relief for a wide-range of diagnosed ailments including: CFIDS, Asthma, Candida, 40 percent life-force in operation – poor to no bowl function, and much more.
For the first time in my life, I did not seek revenge for affronts perceived; my heart remained open and I refused to harbor any hatred towards someone I’d come to consider my Beloved.
Bowl movements are regular — I’d been given colonics and the water had to be siphoned out as I could not pass even the water; I’d crawl to the bathroom to urinate; I was sick and dlying. I’d laid out over $100,000 out of pocket over twelve years searching, seeking resolution and healing — it didn’t come.
EFT saved my life. In 2011 I earned my certification as an EFT Practitioner. I knew what I wanted to do: share this profound gift of life with as many people as I could without preaching, rather sharing and teaching.
Today, I have my own EFT clients, teach Workshops, Adult Ed classes and share EFT
everywhere someone is suffering and struggling. Iatrogenic illness is not a myth. EFT results are legitimate.
This modality offers transformational life-changes. “The Tapping Solution” is something I ordered and present to my classes each semester — Seeing, hearing, tasting the wide variety of cases offers much credibility to those who harbor the “Apex Syndrome.”
It still confounds the imagination that with all the evidence, we do not yet have full-scale programs in our elementary schools, churches, universities — all avenues of healing and energy psychology.
Those who are willing , eager and hunger for change, who are willing to take responsibility for their health and well-being are the people who reap the greatest benefits from The Emotional Freedom Techniques. We are so conditioned – our paradigms can be shifted, but first, we must become aware that we are domesticated, programmed to think and act — and desire more than anything else, to break free — then, EFT can save your life.
Reverend Debra Sue Lynn
Certified EFT Practitioner
Reiki Master
Spiritual Counselor
Teacher
Thank you for the information in this blog. I found it describing me, in many of those 13 sad steps!! It was really awakening!!!
I have been using EFT since 2008 variating. Why not all the time..? The answer is in your information – my stresshormon/cortisol level has been so high that I haven’t been able to adhere to joga and meditation anymore as I did regularly for over 30 years! Now I’m convinced to continue tapping and also learn it to my clients in my practising Homeopathy, NES-therapy, Flower-therapy and Reiki!
Thank you Nick!
Just came back from my doctor who suspected adrenal fatigue and put me on a Cortisol manager and gave me a lecture about stress. And now… this post, almost word-for-word of what my doctor has just said! Someone is trying to tell me something and I know exactly what it is. Back to my tapping. Now. Thank you so much for this post! And please spread the word, everyone. Do you know anyone who is NOT stressed? Even our kids!
This could not have come at a better time! I have been “looking into” tapping for the last year or so, but not really making it part of my life. This information has inspired me to stop looking and start doing.
Thank you for the detailed information
Tapping is a technique I practice on things while I use NEI on other issues as well
Both protocols are excelant in Bioenergitic balance; this is my personal discription.
Thank you again
EFT is a tool, and it is even useful as a placebo. But in order to get rid of chronic stress, you have to get deeply in touch with the root cause of that chronic stress. Always tap on the past events, tapping on the present only gives temporary relief. That way, you can clear it from your system forever.
Thank you for reminding me to tap!
I have personally tried Tapping on different people in my family and have got immidiate results. Just yesterday, in the car with my wife and kids, when my daughter had a “HUGE” headache, I asked her to tap, saying, “I truly and deeply Love and Accept Myself” and the headache was gone in minutes.
Wonderful cure without drugs.
Keep Tapping guys and girls……
I am an author and there is stress attached to writing, and editing and proofreading, particularly if writing to a deadline. I have just begun ETF, know very little about it except that one taps various places on the face and body, but I have every faith that all the comments I have read will happen to me also. Thanks, Nick. Joanne
Thank You Nick! This article was like a gift dropped from the sky today 🙂 Its now 4 months after the death/loss of a close family member & I’ve been feeling physically worse than during the actual crisis. It is quite a shock to me that I could forget to meridian tapping throughout the entire crisis of losing someone to cancer. Prayed yes, Meditated yes, supported and loved but forgot to tap 🙁 I can see now how compiled chronic stress over the past year has impacted my body & my health, and all I was offered from 2 western doctors was antidepressants for the exhaustion & fatigue symptoms….even though I’m not suffering depression as such, thats all they can offer. I had forgotten about the hormone cortisol & its dangers and yes, I too have far too much cortisol & am suffering adrenal fatigue for sure. I’ve also gained alot of weight around the middle (which I never had before). So I am enormously grateful for this timely Reminder to use Tapping. For me, this has been an absolute OMG moment & huge wake up call! Blessings & Heartfelt Thanks to you Nick.
Reviewing the 13 sad steps was a real eye opener and that tapping balances activity between the sympathetic and parasympathetic regions of your brain, producing “a neutral emotional state,” the gold standard of health and wellness.Thank you very much!!
Hi Nick!, I guess I better get better at tapping ~ or at least keep tapping. I have a Dr’s. appointment set up for later in the week thinking it’s my thyroid ~ maybe it’s stress ~ I’ve had a lot! I’m tired, my hair is falling out, and I’ve even lost the passion to ride and train on my horses ~ it takes all my strength. I’ll step up the tapping! Thank you!
Hi Nick, Thank you for all efforts in helping me and others in understanding how tapping works and fits in to a healthy life style. I have benefited from tapping over the past few years
since seeing your movie on the topic. I have tried all the other methods of healing as mentioned above for a period of 20 years and found some relief. Tapping has moved me from a place of management and slow improvement to a place where I have given up all other
therapys and drugs to a place I am living my dream, just ticking off my “Bucket List”. I have just returned from a weekend in the Snowy Mountains near Canberra, Australia where I camped out and rode my horse in the wilderness. Thank ýou, Elaine
Dear Nick, the article is excellent and promising for helping others to cope with stress situations through Tapping. Thank you very much and blessings.
Great Article!
Five years ago I first heard of tapping. I was intrigued and curious but it seemed, quite frankly, a bit silly, like what you would tell a child in order to get him to do something he didn’t want to do. I no longer believe this. Maybe it is silly, but so are some of the emotions and crazy ideas we get into our heads at times. I can’t believe how fast it works and how transformational it is. It does work, so I use it all the time now. Thank you Jessica and Nick and Dawson for all your coaching!
I always say to others that I swear by E.F.T., but what you have stated here spurs me on to make sure I put it as a priority above my other exercises rather than on a par with them. Thank Nick.
All the best,
Elissa.
I have used tapping for a few years and have done two World Summits. I t has helped me in many ways for stress and weight loss.
Thank you, that is the first time I have read an explanation of just how EFT works on stress.
Very helpfull and encourages me to purservere.
Thank you for this post .It reminds us on what is actually happening to us everyday and we usually notice it very late.Yes, the stress is killing us and yes ,the tapping makes the difference..
The information in this blog hit me deeply. The stressful scenerios described ME. It is disturbing. I am one of those who quit a technique because I feel it’s “not working” or I get bored. I am convinced my health issues are a result of chronic stress and I need to get tapping again today. I can only hope for follow through. Need these type of reminders to take charge of my health and wellness.
I love hearing about the benefits of tapping – seems I can’t hear them enough. I need the reminders to keep me motivated to tap every day. Nick, thanks for all you do to bring health and healing to the universe!
Hey, guys! That was a really nice article. I’m a newbie to EFT, and I plan to try it right away! Peace and warm fuzzies,
Mariam
Tapping is a much quicker intervention than other commonly recommended treatments for stress, even combined treatments. I did not realize that 20 minutes a day is the recommended time frame. I was doing much less and then gave up. I think tapping for 20 minute sessions is worth a try!
Reality check for stress. I know I am experiencing more stress, but wasn’t aware of the extent of possible effects. I intend to commit to more regular exercise (I used to exercise 1-2 hours/day 5 days/week), healthy eating, and tapping. It’s better to be consistent. Big stressers for me are lack of easy transportation (my own working car) and chickens that behave poorly, pooping where they shouldn’t and getting into things they shouldn’t, often damaging them. Also many irons in the fire, making it difficult to focus on any one thing fully.
I needed to see this really badly! Thank-you so much for this reminder. I have been chronically stressed my whole life and I have been using tapping for about a year now. Funny how I haven’t tapped on this stress as much as I should be, I tap for money and health and weight loss. The weight loss though has not really happened:( I’ll have to dig deeper.
Thank you
Haley
Very interesting the timing of this article because I am seeing a counselor for work related issues causing stress and she mentioned the exact same things you mentioned about the areas of the brain and ways to decrease cortisol. She was very pleased to hear that I had discovered the field of tapping through your website. She gave it great praises. It always intrigues me how the “universe” brings correct information into your life at the time you need it the most. Thank you!
Fabulous information. Wish I’d known about tapping years ago. It would have been of immeasurable help. However, it’s great to see it helping so many in this way now. This type of stress is so destructive. To have this information is so invaluable to so many.
Hi There,
I am new to this whole Idea so the post above was really great!
I have seen in people, and clients, that although the Bowen treatments I do
completely relax them and they leave feeling lighter, stressfree, and totally relaxed,
they go back to their lives, their habits, their habitual thoughts the very next week.
I have been looking for something to help on a different level and I am thinking that EFT might just be the thing. I also believe that chronic stress is responsible for many of the dis-eases that we see today, or at least in part, starts the ball rolling. Everything in this article resonates with me. I am very much interested in learning more about this and perhaps taking some courses etc. If I win this package it would be a great beginning! :o)
Sincerely,
Anastasia
Thanks for the evidence-based information about reducing cortisol levels with EFT.
I know I definitely needed this nudge to return to regular tapping. My stress levels have been higher for almost a year now, and recently have ramped up even more, as I have a brother dying of cancer, and my husband is still out of work since last May.
Interesting how the Universe provides what we need when we need it the most.
With gratitude and appreciation for all you do at The Tapping Solution….
I found this explanation of the way the stress response works and what you can do about it very useful and clear. good luck with your next launch. Clare
Every single time I practice tapping, I get to the core of what’s stressing me out emotionally. It’s like a miraculous truth serum! However I didn’t realize, until reading this article, that it has such a profound effect on not just emotional but physiological health. I am a person who swings wildly between extremes of both thought and emotion, and that is a very stressful way to live life. The fact that tapping balances systems in the body adds a new dimension of valid reasons for doing much more tapping than I have in the past. Thank you for this article!!!!!
HELP!! HELP!!
I have had migrane/cluster headaches every single night for about 28 years. I have high blood pressure, arthritis, gained a ton of weight, etc. I have exhausted every avenue for help. Visited many neurologists, same result: different doctor, different prescription that didn’t work. Please help or stear me in the right direction for help!!
Thanks
Fabulous article – it read like my biography. Belive it all. 2 years ago it was like my body imploded with pain – diagnosis of rhuematoid arthritis. One of the primary tools that has helped move to improvement on any level is using EFT – I’ve had an amazing EFT specialist t work with me – Sue Hannibal; catalyst for fabulous breakthroughs. I still struggle with the RA – but even times when I wake from sleeping because of the pain – I can sit on the edge of my bed and do several rounds of EFT and it will release enough of the pain that I can usually fall back asleep. All told, I believe in my soul I will find my way to healing – and I also know the EFT is playing a big part.
The article tell me that I’m screwed! I’ve known it for a long time. There have been a lot of studies done on how a career in law enforcement negatively affects your health. Our pension system perpetuates itself on the assumption that a high percentage of us are dead within five years of retiring. Keep in mind that is in a profession where the majority are retired before they’re 55. Within that group, there is another group that are retired before 45. I used to workout regularly, eat much better, and have more quallity relationships. Now, my body just hurts all of the time, and seemingly for nothing. I feel isolated and have ZERO ambition, desire, or energy. Several holistic practicioners have said that it’s from chronic stress in my job. So, what to do??? I’m hoping that the use of EFT and other things will put me on the path to a new career that I can enjoy, and, of course, make a substantial amount of money. I hope to have good news for you shortly…
This helped me trace what I’ve been experiencing for a few years. I’ve been searching here & there, no permanent results. I actually sometimes resist tapping. I do it while I’m exercising though. If I’d have kept consistent for all the years I’ve known about it, I would be quite well today. So, this is definitely back on my schedule, thank you:p.
I’ve been “studying” stress for many years, both academically and in my own body. I’ve tried everything, spent literally thousands of dollars on alternative therapies and nothing works like tapping! I want to commend you, Nick, for such an elegant, yet thorough explanation of how stress occurs in your 13 steps. It boiled down several graduate-level classes very effectively!
Thank you.
I have suffered from Adrenal fatigue for a very long time- to the point of being very close to and Addison’s Disease diagnosis. I would love to see a specific tapping script to address these issues. I have been using tapping daily for a long time and tapping alone does not relieve the issue. An ideas?
HOLA : EL ARTICULO ES EXCELENTE, COMO ASI TAMBIEN LA TECNICA EFT.
SIEMPRE ME SORPENDE CUANDO EN LA SEGUNDA O TERCERA RONDA EL SUT BAJO CASI POR COMPLETO EN LOS PACIENTES QUE ATIENDO. ACLARO QUE SOY MAESTRA DE REIKI Y EFT ES UN COMPLEMENTO PERFECTO .
CUANDO DICTO EL SEMINARIO EFT SIEMPRE ACLARO QUE DEBEN USAR EFT PARA TODO, PORQUE POR LO GENERAL LA GENTE LO USA SOLO PARA CUANDO TIENE UNA DOLENCIA. TENGO UNA DISCIPULA QUE HACE MUY BIEN SUS DEBERES, Y SU CAMBIO FUE RADICAL.
SE INGLES, PERO PREFERI ESCRIBIRLES EN MI IDIOMA.
Thank you so much for this info. I started yoga three years ago to release stress from my life, and, while it has helped quite a bit, I am still aware of underlying tension and stress when I am supposed to be ‘relaxing’. I am definitely going to begin studying your methods as I really feel this might be the missing piece to help me understand and release my stress, and hopefully lead on to helping others as well.
I NEED to get rid of this feeling of fatique, lack of motivation and other physical negative effects i am experiencing. PLease select me as the winner of your 2011 package. I NEED it desparately!!!!
I have lived in a state of chronic stress since childhood. Through other work I do, I have discovered many ways in which I limit my life in order to protect myself from having the adrenalin levels heighten in an acute response. These limitations have held me back from fully giving all I have to give… and have been a source of self-hate. Through making conscious the source of the the patterns of compensation, I have discovered a sense of compassion for myself… and the child who developed these patterns in order to cope. I am now ready to give up protecting and clear them.
A couple of years ago, I did a couple sessions in your big tapping seminar and followed these with many tapping session that were very powerful. However, the practice faded. A friend just sent me this because she heard me speaking of my struggle with adrenal blow out…. and god knows, the world is becoming an ever more stressful place to be!
I am ready to apply tapping to this situation… and so need to brush up on it.
Thanks for the free e-book… I look forward to using it.
Sincerely,
Elizabeth
Thanks Nick, for all the articles. You are doing a great job. I have been always interested in ways to make life easier and happy. Having studied Acupressure in the early 1950 area in Japan; then the Silva system in the 60s, EFT in the late 90s . At 82 I am stll learning and looking forward to new horizons opening. Please keep up the great work you are doing.
Still on the Path,
Lester Armentor
This question is for Nick or anyone else who may be knowledgeable about the situation. I use both tapping & B E music to start my day. Do you see any conflict with tapping while listening to the B E music. Thanks for any comments or info.
Wow! These findings are amazing…I didn’t know that tapping could decrease cortisol levels so much. I will definitely use it to help myself and inform my stressed-out clients! Thanks for sharing.
Stress, or better known as hypertension. Fantastic EFT Tapping really works. My G.P. has reduced my blood-pressure meds down from 300mg to 150mg and I have moved so much of that junk we drag around behind us and continuing to release. I am looking forward to reducing the meds to NIL. Thank you Nick, Jessica and all the crew for all you great work.