Originally published in the Rising Sun EFT Newsletter 10-18-09.
In two recent sessions, I was privileged to work with adults who still needed some healing for the loss of a parent in early childhood. In both cases, we used an Inner Theater approach (engaging the imagination) to create a safe place within, and then we went back in time to find the little girl or little boy they had been.
So much of this healing work was about presence and witnessing and being with the child. Bits and pieces came, such as the confusion and fear around the open coffin, the weirdness of being told, “just go out and play” or “don’t touch the flowers,” and the way no one really talked to the child about what had happened. In this part of the sessions, I found that the phrase, “It’s time to bring healing to this” really helped with the tapping.
“Even though I don’t understand… and I’m really scared…. it’s time to bring healing to this…”
“Even though I feel so confused… what does all this mean?…. it’s time to bring healing to this…”
“Even though no one’s paying attention to me… no one knows how lost and scared I feel… it’s time to bring healing to this.”
As we got further, feelings of loss and grief began to emerge. Especially in past generations, people haven’t realized that children have the full range of human emotions. It wasn’t recognized that even young children go through a grief process — children often got no support or help with grieving. So when we reach back in time to bring in healing, there will be grieving to do that couldn’t be done at the time.
What was most healing here was for the adult self to simply be with the child self and acknowledge the child’s feelings. In this case, the EFT phrase that helped the most was one I learned from my friend Jade Barbee: “I can let these feelings safely flow.”
“Even though there is so much sadness, I can let these feelings safely flow….”
“Even though I miss ______ so much, I can let these feelings safely flow…”
“Even though my heart is broken, that’s just how I feel… I can let this feeling flow…”
“Even though I could just cry and cry, I can let these feelings safely flow… it’s all for healing now.”
Grieving cannot be short-cut or short-changed. It is a process and in order to move through grief, we do need to let feelings flow. In these cases, it was moving to see how the adult self could reach out to the child self and give him or her what was needed — listening, presence, support and permission to feel. In both cases, we brought the child into the inner safe place. As we continued tapping, and the feelings did flow, there was a great sense of relief that the child was not alone anymore and that the loss could finally be expressed and have a chance to heal.
Very beautifully, in both cases, the parent who had died appeared in the safe place to join the adult and child parts and reassure them. An inner reconnection took place that felt very healing. I actually didn’t suggest this — it happened spontaneously. And since what happens in the inner world is very real on the feeling level, these reconnections brought a new sense of completion and peace. I held these sessions with care and I feel honored to have been a part of these very tender healing journeys.
