How to stop the pain from a minor burn

Wow, what a beautiful day in my garden! We've had temps up in the 70s the past few days, and the plants are loving it. I'm still getting tomatoes, which for mid-November up here in the mountains is truly amazing. We've also had over 9¡å of rain, so the hills are turning the most exquisite shade of green.

While strolling through the garden, I noticed a pile of plant debris that I had stacked during the summer, including dried artichoke flowers, sunflower heads and stems, burdock stalks and seeds, Blackberry vines and various other things I didn't want in my compost pile. With barely a whisper of breeze, I decided it would be a good day to burn the pile.

After I started the fire, I used a pitchfork to toss pieces back onto the smoldering pile. In the middle of the burn, the business end of the decrepit pitchfork fell off. Impatient to get on with it, I picked up some small pieces with my bare hands and threw them back onto the fire. I burnt my hand. I wasn't paying close enough attention, and one of those pieces turned out to be red-hot. Ouch! I burned the palm of my hand. After expressing my feelings with a few well-chosen expletives, I decided to use EFT to see if I could lessen the searing pain in my palm. I didn't bother coming up with a number for the pain's intensity, I just started tapping on the karate chop point immediately, saying:

"Even though:nn....."It was really stupid for me to pick up that burning branch with my bare hand, I deeply and completely love and accept myselfn.....It really hurt where I got burnt on my palm...n.....I wish I would've been so stupid to pick up that burning branch with my bare hands..."

Tapping on my body, my first round, I enthusiastically used "really stupid" as my reminder phrase. My second, third and fourth rounds included ranting about how stupid I felt for picking up a hot branch with my bare hand.

Within two hours after I burned my palm, though I could still see a red mark on my hand, the intensity of the pain was down to about a "one." Five hours after the incident, the intensity was less than a "half" and the red mark was barely visible. So far, there has been no sign of a blister.

So, how can you use this information? Let's say you hurt yourself, perhaps a cut, a scratch, pulling a muscle gardening ¨C whatever. Of course, if it's a significant injury, seek professional medical assistance immediately. Otherwise, you can ask yourself, "How do I feel about what just happened?" Many times when we hurt ourselves, we feel stupid or embarrassed. Get in touch with how you feel and start tapping.

If you feel embarrassed because people are watching you tap, you may choose to go somewhere private: a bathroom stall, your bedroom, your car. The important thing is to tap and release any emotions you may be feeling so you can speed up the healing process. Just start with your setup phrase, which is in this formula:

Even though_____________________( include how you feel) I deeply and completely love and accept myself. You repeat your setup phrase three times while tapping on your karate chop point (which is on the side of your hand).

Then, start tapping on the points on your body. You can use a reminder phrase, so you remember why you are tapping. After a round of tapping, continue tapping and rant about how you feel about what just happened.