Increasing your effectiveness with EFT, part 13.
Are you familiar with the phrase “Don’t be attached to the outcome?”. I’ve heard it being used in several different contexts, such as business, sales, dating, or even when working with clients. And I think it’s great advice.
Why is it important for us to be unattached to the outcome? (as much as possible, anyway). Well, because being overly attached to a desired outcome tends to backfire. Why? First, whatever desired outcome we intend to achieve isn’t usually fully within our control. For example, we cannot control whether the person we are attracted to wants to date us or not, or whether someone decides to hire our services. Sure, there are some actions we can take that might have an influence on that one way or the other, but it’s never fully within our control.
Second, being attached to the outcome tends to put a lot of pressure on both ourselves and the other person. It also tends to get in the way of being able to stay present and attuned with the situation. And it can also drive our nervous system into “survival mode”, worrying about: “what if I don’t get my desired outcome?”.
Now, does this mean that if we are unattached to the outcome we don’t care at all? That we don’t put in any effort? No. It’s about approaching the different situations of life with high intention and low attachment. In other words, we strive and hope for the best, but we aren’t triggered by the possibility of getting a different outcome than we expected.
So, how can we use EFT to release our attachment to the outcome? It’s simple: we need to apply EFT to whatever negative emotional reaction we get when thinking about not getting the desired outcome.
Therefore, applying what we know from previous articles, we can come up with a “made up future event” where we don’t get the sale/date/outcome we wanted and ask ourselves: “what feeling, emotion or sensation do I notice coming up for me now when I imagine this situation taking place?”. And then we can apply Basic EFT as usual, noticing the shifting aspects after each round.
So, our first EFT round could look something like: “Even though just imagining that at the end of my upcoming job interview they tell me ‘thanks, we’ll be in touch’ and I can tell based on their tone of voice that they don’t intend to get back to me, I feel this sadness in my chest, I really wanted this job, and I accept this is how I’m feeling right now”. Reminder phrase: “this sadness in my chest”.
Hopefully at the end of the session, after we tapped on all the different aspects that came up, we won’t feel such an emotional reaction when imagining the possibility we don’t get this job. And perhaps we might even have the cognitive shift that: “sure, I do need a job, but it doesn’t necessarily have to be this one in particular. There are many other jobs out there I could apply for, or I could even start my own business”. So as our nervous system starts moving away from “survival mode” we can have more of an “abundance mentality” instead of a “scarcity mentality”.
This will allow us to go to that job interview with that “high intention, low attachment” mindset that I mentioned before. And we’ll probably be better able to stay calm, relaxed and think on our feet in response to the interviewer’s questions.
So, to recap, how can we use EFT to become more unattached to the outcome? Clear your negative emotional reactions to not getting the desired outcome. Come up with a future event where this might take place. You might also need to tap on previous times when you didn’t get the outcome you desired, if when thinking about them now you notice that they still have a charge.
That’s it for today. I hope this post was helpful to you. My name is Bruno Sade, and I’m a certified EFT practitioner with a mental health background as a clinical psychologist licensed in Argentina.
I’d love to know: What do you think about this approach? What other approaches would you recommend to work on releasing your attachment to an outcome? Please let me know in the comments below.