Before you do a session, it is recommended that you record in your journal what you want to release and then rate your emotional reaction to the trauma on a scale of one to ten. One on the scale is no emotional reaction at all, and ten is a response on the level of a panic attack.
After you’ve completed a session, record the change in your emotional response by assigning it a new number. Then write down your comments about the experience and what came up for you as you completed the process.
Why will this be helpful to you? Well, this may be the last time you can fully recall the events and you may lose the details of the memories. This process may result in the loss of — or decrease in the clarity of — the memory of the trauma you just released, especially after you’ve slept and as time goes by.
In trial tests, 94 percent of respondents immediately had less of a emotional response, and of these, 88 percent had an emotional response improvement of two or more points in one session. Some comments were:
“I’m having to think harder to bring up the memory.”
“Harder to hold in my mind.”
“It felt like someone else’s story.”
“I’m having a hard time bringing it up.”
You may also experience insights and additional information about your trauma during the release. For example, you may be releasing your fear of speaking in front of people — and specifically working on your school days when you were called on in class and nearly had a panic attack trying to stand up and answer the teacher. Your mind might even flash back to times when you were humiliated and told to shut up as a child.
Three days later, the next release you would perform would be focusing on childhood memories and what it felt like to be shamed and silenced in your home. Traumatic memories may be webbed together in your brain, so recalling one set of memories may bring up another set.
This journaling process also works great in coordination with counseling or coaching. Writing down your responses will allow you to share helpful information with the professional assisting you. Your counselor may even be able to give you insight into what they would like you to release next.
Journaling also lets you see your progress. Because this process results in the disarming of your traumatic memories, it may be easy for you to forget that once upon a time you suffered with that reaction. It’s rewarding to go back and review your journal entries — and verify that those prior events now create no emotional reaction. If, upon reviewing your journal entries, you still have fear responses, you simply repeat the release. You can work on an issue over and over until it is completely cleared in your brain.
This process is private and confidential — only you will have to know what you released or what happened to you. But it is your story, and it made you who you are today, so your journey can be honored in a journal of walking away from what hurt you.