Question: I have suffered from a fear of speaking and reading aloud in public for many years. One of the problems I've had with using EFT to treat these fears is that I can think of so many aspects to each problem that I become overwhelmed and don't know where to start. For example, some of the aspects for the public speaking include: fear of people staring at me, fear of being trapped, fear of embarrassing myself, fear of voice shaking, fear of being unable to express my thoughts clearly, fear of mind going blank, anger at father for not listening to me, etc.

 
Answer:  Whenever there are multiple aspects and you are uncertain where to start, a good rule of thumb is to start with the earliest memory about the issue and deal with that first.  It may be back of much of the problem and clearing it can, at times, dispense with the entire difficulty.  You indicate that you have anger at your father for not listening to you, so I suggest that you target this memory first.

If you do so, however, don't expect that this will necessarily be a simple matter.  It is likely that the difficulty that you experienced when your father didn't listen to you (perhaps this happened many times in your childhood?) will have a number of aspects of its own, each of which will have to be addressed in turn.

 

To use the required repetitions of EFT you might schedule one aspect a day to work on, or one aspect every other day, according to your schedule.  When you do go to work on a particular aspect, be sure to continue until your stress level (SUDS) has come down to a 2 or below.  With all the multiple aspects you describe, it will probably take many days, weeks, or possibly months to handle them, but some of the very best things in life take that kind of time.

Often when working with EFT, after treating one aspect of an issue, you will find that other aspects of that issue will automatically clear up as well. Of course, this is not always the case. However, there is no need whatsoever to be discouraged when there are many streams to follow when clearing an issue with EFT. What is needed to deal with such a situation is a quiet, steadfast persistence and an awareness that certain things TAKE TIME.

For a more thorough discussion of this topic, refer to Should every aspect of a complex issue be tapped down?.

 

Dr. Patricia Carrington, EFT Master