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Meridian Tapping - A Procrastination Solution

Getting stuff done in a timely way can be a challenge for a lot of reasons. Maybe you’ve got a really full schedule. Or a seemingly endless to-do list. You might have a lot of people depending on you for a lot of things. But there might be another reason.

Are You Procrastinating?

Sometimes the problem is just that you’re putting it off. Everybody does it at one time or another. You know how it goes …. “Oh, I’d better do this first and THEN I’ll get to it.” Or maybe some version of “If I just wait, maybe it will get better/go away/get done by somebody else.”

What’s The Big Deal?

Maybe your delay doesn’t cause a big impact that you can see. But procrastinating uses up a lot of energy, when you stop to think about it. There’s energy spent each time you think about when you should do the thing. There’s energy spent on blaming yourself (or somebody else) for not doing it yet. It takes energy to tell yourself all the reasons that you haven’t done it. So you see? Putting things off consumes a lot of mental energy.

And it’s really stressful to delay doing things. It can cause worry, aggravation, guilt and other unpleasant feelings. Then your body responds with tense shoulders, tight jaws, headaches, fatigue — you know how that goes. Stress can sure wear you out.

Tapping As A Solution

Tapping can be a quick fix to get you moving. You don’t need to beat yourself up. You don’t need to analyze it.

Just focus on your resistance to moving ahead. Then use tapping to clear that resistance. It doesn’t have to take much time, and can really get you rolling again.

Follow These Steps

Note: If you’re new to tapping, click here for quick instruction on the basics.

  • Assess your emotional intensity on the resistance, on a scale of 0 to 10.
  • On your sore spot or karate chop point, do your setup: Even though I have this resistance to doing ________, I love and accept myself anyway.
  • Then tap one round on this resistance.
  • Tap a few rounds on your thoughts and feelings about it — for example, I don’t feel like doing this. It’s gonna take too long. Why doesn’t somebody else do this? I hate doing this…You get the idea.
  • Stop tapping and reassess your emotional intensity.
  • Do your setup and more tapping rounds on remaining resistance.

A Few Pointers

Being angry at yourself and/or feeling ashamed can really slow down the releasing process. It’s as if self-blame and shame are magnets, just holding tight to the resistance.

If you’re prone to feeling like that, it can be helpful to first tap away your shame or self-blame. Keep it simple and just focus on the bad feelings about this one thing you’re putting off. Then move on to tapping away your resistance.

Maybe It’s Not That Simple

Sometimes there are big, complex reasons for putting off a particular task. If that’s the case for you, the simple tapping process outlined above may not be enough to get you moving.

That doesn’t mean that tapping won’t work for you. This may be the time you want to call on a practitioner to help find the core issue beneath your procrastination. Then together you can eliminate that root cause so you can get on with your project.

Procrastinate Often?

The steps outlined above can work really well to get you moving on a specific project. But if procrastination is a familiar way of life for you, consider using tapping to eliminate the whole habit. Here’s another situation where working with a practitioner will serve you well. First you can get the help you need to uncover the root cause(s) of habitual procrastination. Then together you can neutralize those core issue(s) behind putting things off so you can release the habit.