My amazing supervisor, Debi Scimeca-Diaz, (EFT New Jersey Trainer, www.njceft.com, couplestherapynj.com) has occasionally reminded me, “Don’t just focus on what you did wrong in a session, notice and highlight what you did right!”

This is so important. It’s easy to see the moments we want to redo, times where we didn’t jump in, catch a bullet, deepen the emotion enough… I could go on and on, right? Even the best EFT therapists can watch their tapes and find moments they might have choreographed differently. We need to be aware of these moments, we need to notice and learn about new choices we could make, different interventions to try, a slower pace or a more”attachified” reframe—this is essential to gaining confidence and traction with EFT. But only noticing our missteps and missed opportunities at the expense of highlighting all that we are doing right is going to hurt our confidence, slow our traction with the model, and possibly vault us into the “I can’t do this” or “I’m a terrible therapist” spiral. Early on in my EFT career, this used to happen to me in session. When the session was getting away from me or I was stuck and at a loss for what to do, I would beat myself up—“I suck” —was pretty much the drumbeat in my head. What’s worse is that while I was beating myself up, I was no longer attuned to my clients. I was more focused on myself and my feelings of inadequacy. You can imagine how that impacted my work in the moment.

As Debi Scimeca-Diaz has also said to me, a little EFT is better than no EFT. Of course we are all in this to get better. EFT is inspiring (Thanks Sue Johnson!) and we all strive to be great EFT therapists for our clients, for ourselves. So yes, notice the places where you want to do something differently, where you want to ask for help from a supervisor. But also praise yourself on all that you are doing well. Watch your tapes and congratulate yourself for each intervention you offer that helps your client—each reflection, each reframe, the way you are attuned with your clients, or the way they are attached to you and feel safe with you. Just like when our clients do something new, different, and brave in the room and we stay with it, highlight it, heighten it, because we know that swimming in that new, positive moment will start to rewire the brain and shift the negative cycle, we want, we need, to do that for ourselves.

So this week, focus on all that you are doing right!

Please feel free to comment!