Dear All

 First, thank you so very much Eric for setting up this forum.

I have been working with EFT for over 4 years and wondered if anyone out there could give me their opinion on the Don Blackerby course to become a 'practitioner' with the 'Joy of Learning'.

I'm a Dutch mum with a son (12 year old) who 5 years ago was diagnosed with Executive Dysfunctioning (Frontal Lobe problem) and as such has problems with concentration, coordination, organisation, amongst others.  We moved 5 years ago from the UK back to the Netherlands and upon entering Dutch school it became obvious that Ben needed 'different' help than was offered. Because of his 'ways' he has had problems with being bullied and not 'fitting in', he has tremendous problems with spelling (not dyslexic) but is very good in Maths. Having seen Don on the Specialty DVD and having read through his website (http://www.rediscoverthejoyoflearning.com) I am desperate to find out if this could be something which I could help my son with.  I have been in contact with Don himself - but as this all is relating to Dutch schools and spelling etc I'm not sure how it would work (and neither is he?)

Ben is quite willing to work with 'tapping' (asks for it; 'Mum, I need to tap this afternoon..')  Is there anyone out there who is working with Don's JfL? Do you think I could adapt it to work for Dutch kids/schools?

Thanks so much to everyone out there who is willing to reply.

 Kind regards

Groetjes

Herma Drees, Dordrecht, The Netherlands

Hi,

I also read and listened a few of his CD-s and the book. I started to work with some of the task together with kids.

It works. All his idea based on NLP, Which is very important in the EFT as well. The way of learning is the same in the NLP world. It does not matter if you are Duch, American or Hungarian- as I am.

But I am not a Joy trainer. My personal opinion is that Don created a great stuff, together with EFT and NLP can do "wonders" with a plenty of practice. I am just a beginer, maybe someone will show up who is more experienced with the Joy Training.

Regards

Peter

 Hi Herma,

I'm not a trained joy-practitioner, but I work with children on learning problems since 7 years.

Using NLP for learning strategies and EFT (recently) to clear emotional blockades. Roughly

 a year ago I contacted Don  about an NLP procedure I use to work with attentional problems.

It turned out he uses it too. So we have a lot in common. Don is one of the

reasons why I am into EFT and on that board. Thanks and blessings go out to Don. 

The schools in (southern) germany where I live and work tend to be even more conservative and close minded

than in holland. Yet there is a desperate need for my work. My successes tell me I am on the right track.

Sometimes its a bumpy road though.

Your son already does EFT on himself ? Cool kid, tell him he already has a fan. Maybe they missed something

when they diagnosed this frontal thing ?  EFT is good fo all those emotional Issues involved including bullying.

Bullying means somebody feels like a failure and cannot stand it. So he or she picks (almost randomly) somebody to

project those feelings on to feel better about him or herself. Kids who feel good and competent don't have to bully anybody.

This has to be told both parties in certain terms. That would be the job of the school. If the school ist not cooperative this

could be a reason to change schools. Yet EFT can get a child out of the line of fire by making it harder to project.

Sadly often this is the only thing you could do for kids who get bullied. In an ideal world mediation at school would take place

the offenders would be confronted with their feelings and responseabilities and both parties would be offered EFT or whatever

to deal with their emotions. 

The NLP-Spelling Strategy could help your son with reading and writing. Basicly that means visualizing words. You

can get an idea of that by looking at my homepage:

www.didaktikus.com/blicks.htm (copy and paste)

Dont't bother the page is in german, just go for the links next to the pictures ('strawberry' is a good start). You need a flash player installed

to see the animations. The Spelling-Strategy means doing something similar in your imagination.

If you want to contact me on any of those matters, please feel  free to do so. There must be contact link I think.

Keep in touch with the board.

Best Wishes to you and your son.

Dirk   

Dear Peter

 Thanks very much for your reply, much appreciated.  Seeing what you say,  I think I will first get Don's book before I take the leap and start the practitioners course.

Again, thanks!

Herma

Dear Dirk

I will contact you to talk further about this, I'm very interested in working in this field (besides with Ben) with other kids. Don's work in this has been 'in the back of my mind' for a long time now and as there seems to be no particular interest from the school(s) in Holland to pursue different avenues I really feel there is a 'wide open field' to play on and start something that might actually help these kids?  Thanks for your reply, I have looked at your site and it gives me some idea of what to expect.

Kind regards

Herma

Dear Till

Thanks so much for your reply.  I do realise that it's 'easy' to put a label on a child - and have something to 'blame' for 'the way he is'.  However, as much as I know that the diagnoses is true - I also know that my boy is a wonderful chap, who is amazingly sensitive (tries to hide that very hard...:-)) and is only just starting to develop into the wonderful man he is gonna be for sure.  I want to support him into becoming the best person he can be.  I have recently 'discovered' as you so rightly point out that the first place to start is myself - and found out (through a system called ho'oponopono) how to 'clear' my 'memories' and by helping myself - helping Ben.  As a result he feels much more positive about himself, he doesn't spend every lunch time on the phone to me crying anymore and fits in ok with his class (most of the time.) 

However, unfortunately to 'get on' in this world (in Holland) today, you still have to fit 'the system' - and with Ben's result in Dutch Language (he's brilliant in maths) he will have difficulty in getting into 'the right schools'  - i.e. those schools which would support him in all areas. (Its hard to explain, you need to be aware of the Dutch schooling system, but particularly his lack of organisation would really play him up when he is in there ad with low grades in language he wouldn't even get a chance to get in)  In my efforts to support him as best I can I've tried all sorts of avenues and looked into all sorts of different ways of 'helping' him.  As I said EFT is 1 of those (and he's quite happy to do the tapping) Another one is that he is a member of Krav Maga - an Israelian Self Defence Sport - which he enjoys. 

I've been tapping with him on the spelling issues - ' Eventhough my dutch spelling is bad - I'm a great kid and my mum and dad love me.  Eventhough I hate Dutch spenlling, I don't get it, I think its stupid and I don't want to do it - I'm a great kid and I choose for Dutch spelling to come easily to me and my mum and dad love me lots. Etc. In relation to Don's work - I am really curious to see what type of system he uses to improve kids spelling/reading/writing skills - as I'm at a loss what the block in Ben is to this, I hope that by tapping we might discover a reason and once we break it down with more tapping he would be alright? Same goes for his organisational skills - and that would be a real breakthrough for him cause it causes him lots of difficulties in his day to day life and he gets frustrated with himself. (Again: Eventhough I get frustrated....etc). 

 I was reading Dirk's copy pasted remark in 'Adolescent Kid':  Howard Gardners multiple intelligences are useful here. If they find flow many things fall in place naturally. EFT is a great tool to clear the  roadblocks  to those experiences. Often it's  lack of self-esteem, thinking they are  too stupid or they are a failure or  'nothing works'  and they play cool about it. 

I want to investigate this as I think this could well be something which could be of interest to me with regard to Ben - he can be really down on himself but only reveals this when he is 'in a state' - he normally does play 'very cool' (I'm ok..) 

Please understand, Ben is doing so much better than he has been, he loves Scouting - will be going to Sailing camp this summer - it's just those areas where (at the moment) it's not working for him - I want to raise his self-esteem and support him in anyway possible.

 Again, thanks very much  for your reply.

Groeten

Herma

The beauty of a Forum lies in that many different life path’s cross and each one of us brings their own experience and shares it.
I was most touched by your last post and know that Ben is blessed by having you.  I tend to over mention it, but perseverance is always a good ingredient to have at hand.  

Love and perseverance are a magical combination.

Maybe look at the issues you were quite adamant about. Even though I am not familiar with the Dutch system, I know the German one and I can tell you that the path that my parents chose for me was,..      not good,..    not bad,..    but the pressure I was put under to make the upper level (Gymnasium) was intense. A friend of mine went the “easy” route and wound up just as well a professional as I did. He eventually even got his engineering degree after making it through the meat grinding one way thinking system of being a “technician” obtaining his master first and then moving on to a Diploma. He excelled because he was clear on how he wanted to get there.

So sensing your anxiety, as to the ‘best’ way, I suggest you open up to the possibility that whatever happens, it will be OK.  I am not asking you to give up your hopes, just to consider the fact that either way it will be OK.  Tap on that and observe what moves on a subconscious level.

Blessings

Till

 Dear Herma and Till,

do I remember that right, holland is the only country besides germany that sorts children to different school types ?

 People in other countries tend to not understand that, because it makes no sense at all, it's just a habit. A habit

that drives students, parents and teachers crazy. There are two basic reactions towards that crazyness. Statet in their

extremes: "We do whatever it takes, to get our child to a higher schooltyp" or "Whatever may be, may be". 

You both strike middleground concerning those extremes, which is a good sign. 

I agree with you Till, I met people like your friend, there are always ways to excell despite many odds, I see

that in my students too. Yet you have to survive emotionaly and know what you are good at and what you want.

There is a delicate balance with every student between "She/He will make her/his way" and "What does she/he need

in order to make it". Tapping on myself helps me a lot in balancing those out which can be tricky business at times.

Herma, may I suggest that you send me three dutch words with their english translations. I can turn them into flash-animations

you can use with your son to improve his spelling. I'll give you instructions on how to do that. It takes only minutes to set these

words up (leaving out the pictures), because I have templates for that. Use slashes to indicate how those words break up in different parts

(e.g. frid/ge, tab/le).

Blessings

Dirk.

Dear Dirk (and Till)

Thanks so much for your interest and helpful replies to my messages!  Indeed Holland has got this 'different school types for kids' - This has been the case since I was a child (feels like a long long time ago...:-)) and we called it then: The Mammoth System  - as it is HUGE.  Since I left Holland and in the 20 years I've been away they have made changes though and now there is 'just'  a distinction between (as a quick rundown) lower college, middle college, higher college, where kids with lower abilities attend lower college (etc.) they used to split this into other abilities as well (lower technical, lower general, lower administrative etc.) There is the possibility to go from one to the other (so move 'up' or 'down' a level of college and this can be done at any stage in your education. But this is very convuluted to explain in detail here. One of the major problems though is that they've messed about with the way children are taught in college. It basically means that the responsibility for 'studying' is totally in the hands of the child. The teacher just gives out what they have to study and the child has to go through all the material and if he/she doesn't understand he has to ask the teacher. This requires high levels of organisational skills and high levels of motivation from the children as they spent at least 3 hours per day in a 'study house' where they decide in which area of the curriculum they need to study, at what tempo they need to do this and how thorough their knowledge of a certain subject needs to be... Not until they get a test do they know if they knowledge they have acquired is the right amount/enough depth etc. As you can tell from my previous messages - Ben has problems with organisation - so this would be a total drama and he would not cope well.  Because of his excellence in Maths he would probably go to Higher college, but would not have the skills to manage his time or plan his study by himself. At the moment it is even very difficult for him to keep track of his homework (which is near to nothing...)!

Typical words Be has problems with are words with open vowel sounds:

 Verbs:

Geven (To Give)        Ik geef    Zij geeft       Wij geven 

In particular he has a problem with the use of double ee, aa, oo, uu  opposed to double/single use of rr, tt, bb, ss etc.  As the pronounciation of the words is the same with use of double vowel or single consonant. (waar, waren, beer, beren, geef, geven).

So three words would be:  

Beren (Bears) -  (Singular Dutch Beer)   (Ben will write Beeren or Berren)

Horen (to hear) - (Ik hoor - I hear) (Ben will write Hooren or Horren)

 Kantoor/Kantoren - (Office/Offices) (Ben will write Kantor or Kantooren or Kantorren)

Of course there are 'grammar rules' voor these words and he knows these well, but doesn't seem to be able to apply them correctly.

I hope this is what you had in mind - if not let me know and I will do my best to give you the right info.

Again - Thanks so much for your help!

Met vriendelijke groet

Herma

Dear Till

Thanks agan for your interest in my trying to help my son. I will do as you say and tap on 'letting go', however I wondered if you would consider it worth my while to tap with Ben for his organisational skills as well.  He is quite keen to tap himself and beliefs that it helps him - and (as I've explained in my mail to Dirk and you) organisational skills (in whatever 'level' school in Holland) are essential to get by in the Dutch educational system.

If so - could you give me some hints on what type of phrases I could use? I already have some deas of course but know that 'objective' input can sometimes be very helpful indeed.

Again - thank you for your insights.

Met vriendelijke groet

Herma

 Dear Herma,

I had a delightful time learning some dutch words. Those double vowels are tricky, I had to double check

for them a few times. You can find the 3 words on my homepage now:

http://www.didaktikus.com/blicks.htm

Scroll down to the dutch flag.

For starters just let him look at the words until he feels, he could probably spell them.

Let him spell the word forward. If there are mistakes keep your cool and show the word again.

If he has some confidence in spelling forward, let him spell backward.  Don't overdo this

10-15 Minutes is enough, this is an intense exercise. It will help him learn to visualize words

(you can't hear those double/single vowels).

I will post detailed instructions about spelling and how it relates to EFT in another thread,

as it might be of general interest. See you there.

Best wishes

Dirk
 

Dear Dirk

Thanks so much for your kind efforts on behalf of Ben!   I have taken a look at the words and wondered if it is correct that I see only the words appear - there are no pictures (as far as I can see?)  I have checked through all your other links (for French, English and German) and see that with each word there is a picture - am I doing something wrong so that they don't appear in Ben's words?

I am keen to read your other thread on EFT and spelling - and will make sure I read it as soon as you've put it on.

Thanks again for all your help.

Kind regards

Herma

Dear Herma,.

You aks for organizational skills,..I personally was helped a lot by this link,.

Dirk,. thanks for your assitance.

Blesings to both of you! 

Till

 Dear Herma,

 I left the pictures out, so that I could set this up faster. As strange as it seems

finding the right pictures is the part that takes the most time. Because of

copyright issues they have to be not only public domain but in my

case you have to also have the right to use the commercialy.

Using the wrong pictures on a german website can indeed

result in a costly lawsuit. Unfortunatly the site I got the

pictures from 'opencliparts' is down. You can use the words anyways with Ben.

I will see what I can do about it.

Kind regards

Dirk