Why Consider Mentoring in Evidence Based EFT?
As of 2020, if you want to get your final certificate of completion after your Evidence Based EFT training, you need to complete the following requirements:
Send two written case studies to you trainer (a format is provided).
Complete a Masterclass of your choice and provide a copy of the certificate to your trainer.
Document and show your trainer evidence that you have done 30 days of your own Personal Peace Procedure (a template is provided).
Have three mentoring sessions with your trainer or another EBEFT trainer.
Provide your trainer with a video recording of a session with a client (with their permission).
You need to demonstrate that you understand how to do the Basic EFT recipe, as a minimum requirement, and that you are committed to doing your own personal work as a practitioner if you want to be able to call yourself an Evidence Based EFT Practitioner. Once you have supplied all of this to your trainer, you will be sent your certificate and be given access to the logos for use on your website and advertising material.
This way your clients and referrers know you have reached a standard set by Dr. Peta Stapleton herself, and that you have not just done a three day training course with no further study or mentoring.
The requirements were increased in 2020 in recognition of the fact that the Evidence Based EFT training is an introduction to learning about EFT in many ways. You learn a lot of things in EBEFT which you don’t learn in other EFT trainings, like the science behind EFT and the ever growing research into the efficacy of EFT.
You also learn how to explain EFT in a way that you can “build a bridge” to help other health professionals and clients more easily understand EFT, in a way that makes sense to them.
All of this knowledge can help you to feel more solid and confident in what you are doing by incorporating tapping into your other therapy practice. Because you know that EFT has been scientifically proven to be clinically effective. It can also help your workplace to know that what you are doing is “Evidence Based”, and your manager may be more likely to be supportive of you offering EFT to clients with that knowledge. I certainly found this to be the case when I was working in the hospital system.
With Evidence Based EFT we are aiming to reduce the “woo woo” factor associated with EFT/tapping and to increase the science/research factor, as this helps to make EFT more acceptable to the mainstream.
But EBEFT training is not a training for the purpose of certification in EFT, like the Level 1 and 2 trainings.
In order to become certified in EFT you need to be going through a certification process with one of the large organisations, (like EFT International or EFT Universe) and you need to provide 50 session notes to your trainer, and receive ongoing mentoring of your clinical work with clients in order to be certified in EFT.
Only then can you accurately call yourself a “Certified EFT Practitioner”.
Evidence Based EFT is a three day skills training course, designed specifically for health professionals, which provides another tool in the tool box of a professional who is already in a counselling role or working therapeutically with clients.
It assumes a certain level of skill in counselling, and a knowledge of professional boundaries and ethics in working with clients which the average lay person would not be expected to understand.
EBEFT can be a stand alone training, in that you are not required or expected to do other trainings in EFT.
But if you really wish to become proficient in using EFT, and want to offer your clients the very best care and results, you may want to do more training in EFT. You can take the Evidence Based EFT for trauma training or the Level 1 and 2 EFT training, and possibly become certified in EFT with EFT International, EFT Universe or ACEP down the track.
Many people who do the Evidence Based EFT training have already done, or go on to do a Level 1 and 2 training, and then go through the mentoring process to become certified in EFT, simply because they love learning more about EFT, they enjoy EFT trainings, and because they want to meet the high standard of requirements set to reach that level of certification.
They will also ensure that they have the appropriate insurance cover as they know this protects their clients as well as themselves.
But if this is not where you are, that is totally fine. If you are brand new to EFT, having just completed your Evidence Based EFT training, there is already so much to take in, and no rush to do anything more now. Your trainer can help you through whatever process feels right for you now. And all you need to do is start practicing EFT (on yourself to begin with) and then with friends and family, or with clients if you feel comfortable. You can then go ahead and send in your case studies, have a few mentoring sessions, and eventually record your video.
As EBEFT trainers, we need to know that you are competent in the main techniques in EFT. And the only way we can tell if you know what you are doing in your EFT practice, is to see your session notes written up, to see you in practice with a client, and see that you have at lest begun your own personal work by completing your Personal Peace Procedure, and having three mentoring sessions.
You need to take personal responsibility for your own emotional well being in order to be a good EFT practitioner, and you will learn a great deal about EFT just by being “the client”.
Lots of people also repeat the EBEFT training at a reduced cost ($150.00) as they know they hear different things each time, learn something new every time, and they value the opportunity to practice with other willing and enthusiastic participants.
Why consider doing some mentoring in EFT?
Even if you don’t want to complete all of the requirements to get your final certificate in EBEFT, mentoring can provide you with many benefits along your EFT journey.
It’s like having a tour guide with you in the new world of EFT, someone to hold your hand a bit, who knows what it’s like to be on “L” plates again, in that you are learning this new tool yourself, and introducing it to clients, often before you feel totally confident in using it yourself.
You might feel that your clients will expect you to know exactly what you are doing, at least in your main profession as Psychologist, Social Worker or counsellor, and when learning EFT you probably will not always feel confident.
This factor can deter health professionals from using EFT to its’ full extent, with the majority of their clients.
It can feel awkward being paid as a skilled “professional” who is actually just beginning to learn a very new and different way of processing emotions and trauma.
But there is only one way to learn EFT, and that is by practicing; on yourself, with friends and family or anyone who will sit down with you long enough for you to tap with them.
There’s no fast track to building your skill and expertise in this somatic modality, and it’s fun to learn to tune into the body and the unconscious mind. Practice will increase your confidence that “it actually works” from your personal experience, and I find that most clients are open to trying EFT if you know how to introduce it well. And most people are happy just to experiment with seeing what EFT can achieve.
If you are concerned about this and hesitant to start introducing EFT to others, you have some tapping to do!
We don’t make big promises to “treat” anything, instead it’s better to underpromise and hopefully overdeliver.
Your mentor can encourage you to keep going with EFT when you feel “stuck” in yourself or with a client.
They can help you to tap on your fear of getting it wrong, and the fact that you don’t always know what you are doing with EFT. Sometimes it feels so easy to get it right with tapping, and other times, with some people, it feels very complicated!
Your mentor can help you identify why it is that you are not using EFT enough on yourself, to conquer your own limiting beliefs.
Or why you are only using it with some clients?
Maybe you have been afraid to “come out” to your colleagues or management about your use of EFT, even though you are really excited about the great results you are getting through using EFT with your clients.
Your mentor has weathered all of these storms, and knows how to help you through them.
Mentoring in the EFT world can also be as much about the “personal” side to our work as it is about the “professional” aspects of your work, and your incorporation of EFT into both.
One of the very best ways to learn how to deliver good EFT is to be the “client” and have your mentor tap with you on some of your own stressors or blocks to your own success.
When you see it done well by someone who really knows what they re doing, you learn it experientially and it makes more sense.
You experience those “big shifts” and this inspires you to get better at it yourself.
It’s not like the clinical supervision that many of us are accustomed to in our professions, where it feels like a senior staff member is judging your clinical work, or monitoring your caseload.
You can make mentoring all about your client work if you wish, but EFT mentoring can also be focused on you, and this is very beneficial approach to take.
In fact with EFT there is a popular saying - “IT’S ALL ABOU YOU” - which means when your tap on your own feelings/issues/fears around the challenging situations and people in your life, those situations and people tend to change.
You have so much more power to influence your circumstances than you realise, but you have to tap regularly on your own stuff to access this.
Booking in some mentoring sessions can help to get you started on this path of self discovery and improvement, and you can even claim it on your tax!
You don’t know what you don’t know.
EFT is a very simple tool that can be used for self help, and it can even be taught to children in its’ simplest form. It’s fast and effective, it’s generally safe and it should feel gentle.
However if you are working with clients, you are working with people who have experienced trauma, there’s just no avoiding that.
Your clients come to you with a “presenting problem” but what you will learn by doing lots of EFT is “The Thing is not the Thing”.
Your client may present with “low self esteem” and not identify that they have experienced any “trauma” by their own definition, as they may not remember the bullying in high school which contributed to this. Or they have likely filed those bullying events away as “not important” and definitely not “traumatic” from the adult point of view. Maybe a parent or other adult reinforced this for them at the time, that they were “being over-sensitive”.
The fact is most of your clients will not be aware that “childhood trauma” is the reason they are feeling “stuck” in their current circumstance, unable to move forward, anxious, depressed, angry, over-eating, drinking too much or experiencing physical symptoms or chronic pain.
It’s your job to understand this and to help your clients navigate this new terrain into emotions they have not accessed, sometimes for decades. This can feel like a big responsibility, and it is really, so you need to have a good grasp of the basic tools.
EFT can peel back the “layers of an onion” for a client pretty quickly, leading to them becoming suddenly quite overwhelmed and emotional.
You could be tapping with your client on them feeling Angry or Anxious about one thing, and next minute they are wanting to tell you about “ALL the times when….” they felt angry or anxious, leading them to feel a lot of unexpected emotional intensity.
Suddenly they may feeling very vulnerable, scared, or unsafe, and neither you nor they are sure why.
You need to know how to handle that situation, so that EFT feels comfortable and safe for your client. As well as for you! Or your clients can be put off by EFT and not come back. In your mentoring sessions you can discuss specific cases and how best to approach these with EFT.
Your mentor can also help you to build a successful EFT practice, by identifying who is your “ideal client”, what is a good “niche” for you once you feel ready to “specialise” in something.
They can help you through all the hurdles involved in getting your EFT practice up and going, or transitioning over from a more traditional “talk therapy” based practice to a more EFT oriented practice.
Do yourself a favour and have some mentoring in EFT, to find out how much more enjoyable the journey is when you have a seasoned guide who knows the terrain.
Your mentor can suggest other trainings you can do to help you feel more safe and competent as a practitioner, or as a therapist who does a lot of EFT, and they will reassure you that where you are at is just fine.
Please get in touch with me if you would like to discuss having some individual or take part in monthly group mentoring sessions.