My introduction to Energy Psychology came quite by accident in 1991. I had struggled with a fear of heights since early childhood. I had no idea of the origin of it, but when confronted with even the top of a flight of stairs my knees would feel weak and wobbly and I would have butterflies in my stomach. Since I lived in Florida at the time it didn't cause me too much trouble, but when we went on vacation, my husband and children always liked to go to the highest spot around- be it the top of a fire tower, a light house or a mountain. I tried many times to convince myself that I could climb up the stairs or look over the side, but it just seemed to get worse and worse. Often, they would just go on their climbs and mountain hikes without me. While I was studying for my master's degree in Counseling Psychology I was very interested in self- esteem and attended a Self- Esteem conference in Colorado. My husband accompanied me so that he could go hiking in the Rockies while I was attending the conference. Little did we know that I would have such a life changing experience attending a conference. We took a couple of extra days to travel around and one of the places we went in Colorado Springs was to Seven Falls. It was a beautiful spot, but you could only see a small part of the falls from the bottom. To get to the top and see all of the falls, you have to climb up an open stairway with 224 steps. I had studied systematic desensitization and I was sure that I could make it up those stairs if I just tried hard enough. Holding tightly to the hand rail, stepping carefully despite wobbly knees and a squadron of butterflies that had appeared in my stomach, I got about 30 steps up and had to stop. I had my first panic attack. I was paralyzed and could go no further. I insisted my husband go on ahead, not telling him that I wasn't sure if I could make it back down. I sat down on the step for a while, but when I looked down the stairs I thought that they would have to get a crane to come and get me down. When I was able to breathe again I made it down, like a little kid, sitting on my bottom. It was awkward, to say the least, but better than having to be carried down. I can laugh about it now, but at the time it ranked right up there with "life's most embarrassing moments." I wondered how I would get through the rest of the vacation and was glad that I wouldn't have to go with Jim as he explored the Rockies while I was safe in the conference. One of the keynote speakers was Jack Canfield, who was very active in the self-esteem movement at that time. This was before he published his widely known "Chicken Soup for the Soul" books. There were about three hundred people at the conference and he said he wanted us to try something that might appear rather strange. He asked if anyone had a fear or phobia. I was surprised at how many people raised their hands. He asked us to think about a memory of a time when we had experienced the fear and so I thought about what had happened at Seven Falls a few days before. He asked us to rate the intensity of the memory. I was at an 8. Then, he said "Tap under your eyes 35 times while continuing to think about the memory." We all responded with surprised looks and murmurs, but we did it. Encouraging us to use all our senses to remember the event, he counted to 35 while we tapped. Then he asked us to rate the intensity of the fear memory again. I along with many of the group reported that the intensity had dropped to 3 or 4, but some had gone to 0. Most of us laughed as he had us tap on the side of our hand while repeating "Even though I have this fear of ......, I love and accept myself." I thought to myself "How strange!" But when I re-rated the intensity of the memory, it seemed that there was none. Many participants reported the same. Stranger and stranger! The sessions were over for the day and Jim came to pick me up. I said to him "Take me some place high. I think my fear of heights might be gone." So he took me to the Continental Divide and I was able to look over the railing and climb around without any of the sensations I had experienced previously. My fear of heights was gone and has never returned. Several years ago we went back to Seven Falls and I went up the stairs with no problem. But, not only was my fear of heights gone, I found that I could use the "phobia cure" for other things as well and my life expanded. I could drive long distances by myself, which meant that I could meet my sister on the other side of the state. I could travel by myself, which I hadn't been able to do for a long while. That freed me to pursue my doctoral degree in a distance learning program in California, which required several weeks a year residency. I wondered what had happened when I did the phobia cure, but I didn't do much with it. One day my neighbor, Bob, told my husband that his job required him to go up on a crane and he was coming home sick to his stomach every day because of his fear of heights. Jim told him that I knew this weird technique that might help and Bob said that he was was willing to try anything. When I found out that his fear of heights had started when he had fallen two stories through a roof and broken his back, I wasn't sure if the "phobia cure" could help. It seemed to me that his fear was justified. But we tried it, and both of us were amazed when he said that he felt different and that it might be gone. When he got home the next day, I asked if there was a difference and he said that it didn't bother him that day. But he didn't seem surprised. A few weeks later I asked him again and he seemed to have forgotten that he had a fear of heights. I wasn't sure what was going on, but I was glad it helped. As I shared this odd technique with other people I found that it often happened that people got over their fears to such an extent that they seemed to forget that they had ever had them. I later learned that this is called the Apex Effect. I was busy teaching and completing my PhD and occasionally taught this weird tapping technique to students who had test anxiety. I needed continuing education credits for my counseling license and looked for something interesting to take. There was a two day workshop on “Energy Psychology and clinical practice” so I attended it. It was taught by Dr. Gary Peterson, a psychiatrist, and he introduced the group of therapists to the tapping techniques, including Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT). There were similarities to the Phobia Cure that had helped me release my fear of heights. He recommended Gary Craig’s videos, and within a week, I started to learn everything I could about EFT and have been using it successfully ever since. SInce 2003 I have been a Healing Codes Coach as well.