The Controversy Over the EFT Set Up Phrase – I Love And Accept Myself
Written by Gene Monterastelli
I hear it all the time from clients. They ask, “Do I really have to say ‘I love and accept myself’ when I tap?” This is like saying, “I love riding my bike and I can’t wait to get in shape, but I really don’t like the uphill parts. Can I skip them?”
To me, loving and accepting ourselves is it at the core of most, if not all, healing.
When we love and accept ourselves, the negative and critical internal dialogue quiets. When we love and accept ourselves, it is easier to try something new that seems just out of our grasp. When we love and accept ourselves, we are filled with much less fear because we recognize how little in the world can hurt us.
It Is Really Hard To Say “I Love and Accept Myself”
I understand where clients are coming from when they ask this question. I know they are not looking for a short cut, they are not looking to save time, and they are not trying to avoid the work that needs to be done. They are asking the question because saying “I love and accept myself” can be a really hard thing to say.
It makes perfect sense. If not loving and accepting ourselves is at the core of many issues then that means the moment we sit down to use EFT is the time we are most aware of the fact that we don’t fully love and accept ourselves.
It can be difficult to say because we don’t love and accept ourselves, we don’t think we are worthy of loving and accepting ourselves, or we feel we are being immodest in saying such a bold phrase out loud.
The nice thing about tapping is we don’t have to believe something is true when we say it for it to be useful. In many cases tapping works much better when we say something we don’t believe because that is when the healing begins.
If saying “I love and accept myself…” whilst tapping is really hard, then this is probably a clue that that is exactly what needs to be tapped on.
Sneaking Up On Loving And Accepting Ourselves
Just because the goal is loving and accepting ourselves it doesn’t mean we will get there in one step or one tapping session. In some ways it is like deciding to run a 10km race. If we haven’t run in years then running 10km our first day isn’t going to happen, and if it did we could injure ourselves.
It’s best to work our way up to it.
When we really struggle with saying that we love and accept ourselves it might be too much to do it all in one go. When this is the case it’s best to take small steps towards it like we are in training for a race. Here are some of my favorite ways to sneak up on loving and accepting myself:
- Even though I can’t say I love and accept myself, I love and accept myself anyway.
- Even though I don’t love and accept myself today today, I believe that someday I will love and accept myself.
- Even though I don’t fully love and accept myself, I can love and accept myself a little more today than I did yesterday.
- Even though a part of me doesn’t feel like I am worthy of loving and accepting myself, I choose to know I was made to love and accept myself.
- Even though I have screwed up so many times and don’t believe I am worthy of loving and accepting myself, I choose to know I am worthy of loving and accepting myself.
- Even though I don’t love and accept myself right now, I choose to know it is possible to love and accept myself one day.
- Even though I don’t love and accept myself or believe it is possible to love and accept myself, I hold out the hope that one day it might be possible to have the hope that one day I might love and accept myself.
Some of these phrases are so far away from saying we love and accept ourselves it is like running only 100m when training for a 10km run. But by getting as close as we can to saying we love and accept ourselves, no matter how far away we are from fully loving and accepting ourselves, the closer we get to our goal.
The more we use these EFT tapping phrases, the closer and closer we are going to get to love and self-acceptance, which will be helpful in clearing many of our issues. If you take a few moments and tap through the phrases above before you tap for any issue it will make it easier for you to be honest with yourself and see your issues more clearly, which will lead to faster healing.
