HeARTful Transformations With The ART Of TAPPING

The root of all suffering is separation from and denial of our divine origins (called “soul loss”). Trauma is the energetic imprint of this division, a split in consciousness arising from adverse and unintegrated experiences, resulting in a fundamental disconnect from who we are as divine beings, felt most deeply in our hearts. Disconnected from our soul’s essence, we experience a loss of innocence. The purity of our nature and the depth of our pain is covered by layers of “who we think we must be” to survive the unbearable and shadowy landscapes of false appearances and pretense. Innocence is not safe when its vulnerability leaves us prone to all sorts of harm. We can only live a meaningful and purposeful life when we can remember, reconnect and become WHO we were always meant to be by birthright! With this book, you can take back control of your life! Paint, draw, play, experiment, and tap on everything that comes to mind during the art process, even if it might sound, look or feel a bit crazy to you. Try to see everything through the eyes of a child. Have the courage to acknowledge your trauma, show compassion and forgiveness for yourself, release your past and move on stronger than ever! That’s when you transform trauma into triumph. You may ask me how the idea to write this book was born. It all started when I was working with a teenager suffering from high levels of anxiety and panic attacks. When I looked at her sitting across the table from me, I suddenly remembered my first encounter with art therapy and how deeply it had touched me as a client. Intuitively I felt that this was the only way to be able to build rapport and establish a safe place quickly. I asked my client if she could draw on a piece of paper what happened when she was in a situation that induced a panic attack. She drew a picture with numerous shapes in different colors. Her hands were sweating, and I immediately started the tapping process. “Even though I’m surrounded by so many different shapes, and it feels overwhelming and scary at times, I deeply and completely love, accept and forgive myself.” We tapped on many aspects like “shapes moving around, while I feel paralyzed”, “all the people looking at me and “I just don’t know what to do… I’m so scared, I want to hide”. After a couple of rounds, I saw the tension dissipate. My client opened her fists and her body started to loosen up more and more. I asked her which of the shapes belonged to her and she told me that it was missing completely. We found out that her unique shape was the heart. “Wow,” I said “that’s the most important shape ever. It cannot be left out. Please add it to the other shapes.” She drew a tiny heart because there was not much space left between the other shapes. I started tapping again “Even though I feel very small and unimportant, I deeply and completely love, accept and forgive myself.” and “this tiny heart amidst all the big shapes… they are invading my space… they are intimidating… I don’t feel safe…” etc. “I would like to see a bigger heart.” I encouraged her and she said, “There’s no space; it would overlap the others.” “That’s ok,” I answered and smiled at her. Now, she drew her heart in the middle of the picture, and indeed it was overlapping a few of the other shapes. We started tapping again: “Even though my shape is overlapping other shapes, I deeply and completely love, accept and forgive myself.” “It is ok to overlap… it is ok to move as well… it is ok to interact… it can be fun to move and socialize with others… it might not be so difficult… it makes me curious to learn more about the others… what if it’s exciting to mingle with different shapes…” etc. We talked about how we can learn from others and how they can learn from us and a few sessions down the line she told me that her whole world and perspective had changed through exercises like that. Now we were able to rewire the neurological pathways of the brain to apply new strategies for future scary moments and from there we went into • recognizing anxiety triggers quickly to • prevent panic attacks in their onset, • using mindfulness exercises like breathwork or just tapping on the side of the hand, • reframing scary thoughts about the situation. Those steps helped build self-awareness and self-confidence. My client learned who she was at soul level and she became aware of her strengths and skill set. She discovered how fear and self-doubt robbed her of her full potential and how feeding her heart with self-compassion and self-forgiveness set her free and gave her wings to soar. The transformational process was incredible. A shy teenage girl with anxiety and phobia turned into a social butterfly. Soon I got invited to a high school musical and with tears of joy filling my eyes I witnessed her performance as a dancer and singer. Testimonial: After participating in conventional therapies, my teenage daughter who has crippling anxiety was more anxious than ever and began having panic attacks while out in public spaces, she was not able to go out unsupervised. We decided that she needed to try something different and found that Monika offered dance therapy which she was very excited about. After a few visits of Monika’s unconditional support, kindness, acceptance, and love she began to trust and has excelled far beyond what we thought possible. She is now able to go out socially and has decided to go into public high school after being homeschooled for her whole life. Monika has helped to give her insight and control over her anxiety, and we thank her for changing our daughter's life! Catherine C. and John B., British Columbia