If you are just learning it may be better to place the supplement in your mouth before testing, this will insure your body knows what you are testing.
Disclamer: I use these testing methods myself since 78. At first I had to put the supplement in my mouth and have someone test me that knew what they were doing. I'm not a Doc or anything, I just hope to give you some pointers so you don't take something that you can't tolerate. If you get a headache from some herb or something it's a good bet you don't need it right now or your taking too much.
By taking a supplement, food, etc. into your aura, or holding it close to the solar plexus, or heart, or putting it in your mouth. Then holding out your arm to your side while someone else using one finger pushes down on your arm. You can test if you get stronger or weaker with the supplement, herb, etc.
A Naturopath Doc. first showed me how to make loops with my fingers to muscle test. Using my pointer finger and thumb to make two loops linked together. Don't pull to hard! If it's good for you, you will be strong. If it's bad you get weak. When you get good at it you will notice sometimes it's stronger sometimes it weaker. You can also hold a herb pill in your hand close to the heart and test how many you can do. It may test strong for one, stronger for two, then not as strong for 3, and weak at 4. This means do 2. I think you should always test and not just blindly follow some label's suggestion. You may need to skip some supplement a month or more sometimes. Herbs are drugs so treat them with respect.
This file contains parts of four posted messages which describe a experience using muscle testing, several different muscle testing techniques you can try, and some miscellaneous pointers.
My NAET practitioner's partner said that muscle-testing is only a tool which can be used to "listen to your body?" for lack of a better way of phrasing it. She used a pendulum to ask questions and I was surprised to find that she was pretty intuitive as the whole thing seemed kind of odd. She said that once you get adept at listening to your body (sort of like gut feeling, intuition, inner sense type of thing) you don't need to bother with using the tools. I did find, strangely enough, that the longer I used the muscle-testing the more I would find thoughts popping into my head, or I would get a feeling about something. When I used the muscle-testing, it would corroborate my thought or feeling. For example, I might say to myself "I wonder what I should eat" and a few seconds later a thought of some food would pop into my mind. Then I would muscle-test if X was the best thing for me to eat right now and I would get a yes response. Sounds pretty strange, I know...if I hadn't experienced it I would have trouble believing it myself. I think it might have been Deepak Chopra who said that thoughts are really vibrations....energy.
-------- There are several different ways to do muscle testing. If someone (kinesiologist) tests you they may use your arm or hands. When you do it on yourself, you can use your arm, fingers, or hand. I suspect it might not matter too much which muscle you do the muscle-testing on...whatever is convenient and can give you a reading. Surrogate testing can even be done on someone else, such as a baby or very ill person, where an adult can touch the baby and the adult's arm can indicate the results for the baby. I think the reason for this is that by touching, you connect the energetic or electromagnetic fields...sort of like electricity, perhaps, where you have a circuit.
I started by using my arm as I found it easier to distinguish between a yes and no response. As I was laying down (was bedridden at this time), I would raise my left forearm up to about a 45 degree angle. I would use a finger or two from my right hand to press on my wrist. Then I would ask a question and see whether I got a yes or no response.
You have to play with the amount of tension, both in the muscle being tested and the amount of pressure used to push down on your arm or whatever. I held my left arm up with enough tension just to keep it at 45 a degree angle. The amount of pushing I did was just enough to tell the difference between a yes and no response. This is where all the practice comes in!
When I went to the specialized kinesiologist I saw her start out by asking whether she had permission to muscle test. This is something that is often done...occasionally your body indicates that you do not have permission to test (for some reason..don't know why) and your results will be invalid if you try to continue. The other thing she did was first ask "Show me a yes", then "Show me a no". She used this to get a feel for the difference in how a yes response felt and how a no response felt. So that's what I practiced on...saying show me a yes....show me a no...and experimenting with different tensions and pushing pressure. You will feel a little resistance when you get a yes response, and you will feel your muscle go a little weak or have more "give" to it when you get a no response.
After I had been using my arm for awhile to do the muscle testing (you could also do it sitting up, by resting your arm on a table or something as if you were going to arm wrestle but have your palm face you), I switched to using my fingers. You can make a circle with your thumb and ring finger of say, your left hand. You put the index finger of your right hand into the circle created by the fingers of your left hand, and try to break the circle by pressing your index finger against where your left thumb and ring finger meet. The muscle you are using to test is in your left ring finger. You would do the same practicing to get a feel for the amount of tension and pressure to use, using the show me yes/show me no to distinguish the responses. Another way to do the muscle testing is to use your middle finger to press down on your index finger or your ring finger. There are probably a lot of other ways also. One thing to make sure when you do the muscle testing is that you are straight...don't cross legs or feet as it will give you the opposite result.
If you want to test whether something (a food, supplement, etc) is good for you rather than just asking a question, you hold the food in your hand or touch it. While you are in contact with the food, you muscle test yourself using one of the ways I mention above. If the food is good for you, you will get a yes response (which is also called a strong response). If the food is bad for you, you will get a no/weak response. This is the method used to test whether you are allergic to a food or any other substance. I have a web address which has an article on Dr. Nambudripad using this method to detect allergies and using acupressure to clear them. That is where I first learned of this whole muscle testing idea. I also have a blurb (fascinating, of course) explaining a bit more on my experiences with her technique. The idea of muscle testing when touching the food is that if the food is bad for you (the energetics or electromagnetic energy of the food upsets your body's energetics or electromagnetic energy), it will cause repulsion. As a result, energy (chi) blockages occur in your acupuncture meridians resulting in stagnation and imbalances, preventing your body from functioning properly. This results in symptoms and illness.
A word of caution: It can be difficult to differentiate between a yes and no response. Also the manner in which you ask or phrase a question is *extremely* important. So it is best to use your judgement when evaluating your results...do *not* rely on them 100%. It is probably best, if you can manage it, to go to a kinesiologist and see how this technique is done. At the beginning, I used two different practitioners and compared their results with mine.
I think muscle testing is referred to as tapping into your body's intelligence. Instruments can be used to measure the electrical charge at acupuncuture points in your hands and feet, thereby testing your body's response in a more mechanical manner...perhaps similar to biofeedback.
-------------- I looked in my MAP (Medical Assistance Program) book by Small Wright as I knew there was a chapter on muscle testing there. Her interpretation:
The body has within in and surrounding it an electrical network or grid. If a negative energy (that is any physical object or energy vibration that does not maintain or enhance health and balance) is introduced into a person's overall energy field, his muscles, when having physical pressure applied, are unable to hold their strength (be able to resist the pressure) as the negative energy causes the electrical system to overload or short-circuit. If positive energy is introduced, muscle strength will be maintained. The ability to hold muscle power is directly linked to the balance of the electrical system. [A reason why living under power lines is not such a hot idea..and why it is best to be careful of other sources of electrical energy.]
She says to muscle test by touching the thumb to the tip of the little finger, palm up. Take the thumb and index finger of the other hand (don't make a circle with these two fingers however), the finger pads of each can be touching, and place them in the circle created by your thumb and little finger. Your index and thumb should be resting at the top of the circle near where your thumb and little finger join. The testing part is done by separating your index finger and thumb in a horizontal manner (sort of like scissors opening), thereby trying to break apart the thumb and little finger. Your thumb tries to push your thumb apart/away and your index finger tries to push your little finger apart/away. She says to apply the same tension holding the circle together as you use to try to break the circle.
One thing I forgot to specify is that when you ask a question, it should be a simple question with a yes or no answer. Also, you should focus on the question, because the answer has more to do with what you are thinking of than with what words you use. She also mentioned that if you ask a question and you want the answer to be yes, the test result will not be valid. You must keep yourself neutral.
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Well, I don't think muscle testing is one of those things that you can put in the "fake it til you make it" catagory. The results should be clear, once you get to the point where you can recognize the difference. Oftentimes at the beginning, you will get a "mushy" or "definite maybe" response. Some of the reasons for that are listed below.
I find that it is important to do the testing in a neutral way where you are concentrating on it in a sort of emotionally detacted manner. Sort of like you were watching a bee buzzing around a flower or something...mildly curious and you're focusing your attention on it, but you don't really care which flower the bee lands on. The clear focusing is important as I find if I ask one question and am thinking of something else or a couple of things at the same time, the response is either incorrect or ambiguous.
Sometimes if I am unsure of the response, I will double-check my response. I will ask the question and then ask it's opposite. For example: "It is best that I eat rice now"...response = yes. "It is *not* best that I eat rice now"..response=*no*. (Double negative means a positive.) Or I may adjust the phrasing of the question to be more accurate.
Another thing is that it may not be the best time for you to test now..you may not have permission for some reason. It's best to stop and try again later.
Don't give up! I think it very likely that you will be able to muscle test. Some people can pick it up faster than others. Like many techniques, it just takes practice.
Another thing...it may be helpful if you can manage to see a kinesiologist. You can see how they do it and how your body responds during the muscle testing. It may give you some additional insight that can be helpful. I couldn't do it with the instructions and just watching my NAET dr. When I went to another woman, a specialized kinesiologist, I got some additional information from watching how she did it and asking her a few questions. After that I was able to detect the difference in the responses and just needed to learn to refine my questions and tell when I shouldn't test.
Here are a few things that Small Wright says:
- If you are having trouble, try switching hands or arms; right-handers can usually get better results using their left hand but not always.
- Set aside some quiet time to practice and play with it.
- Another problem is that you might want to learn it so much that you become overly anxious and tense about it and you get "blocked". If you think you might be "blocking", one way to trick yourself is to pick a time when you could care less about whether you learn how to muscle test or not, and start to play with it again. Approach it as if it were a game.
- It is best to start with the show me a yes/show me a no to get a feel for what a yes and no response is.
- External distractions can cause you to lose concentration. Focus or concentrate on what you are asking.
- Check how you are feeling; if you are very tired or hungry or something, it may affect your ablility to focus.
- Make sure the question is clear and only needs a yes/no answer.
- Focus on the question you are asking and don't think of anything else or your fingers won't know which thing to answer. Match your intent with how you word your question...the wording of the question is important so you may want to try to be more specific and accurate in the wording.
- You must want to accept the results of the test as your emotions and will/can override the test. Also do not ask questions which have a great emotional charge for you or if you are in a very emotional situation. Wait until you can be more neutral.
- Sometimes it may not be right for you to do the testing; it is often good to ask whether you have permission to test now.
-You may need to drink some water. If you are dehydrated your electrical system will feel weak during testing.
- It is helpful at the beginning to literally verbalize your questions out loud and not just think about them.
-Practice. You will develop clarity in your testing and you'll learn your own personal pitfalls.
- Give yourself a year to develop a strong confidence with the muscle testing. This just takes sticking with your initial efforts until you get those first feelings of positive strength and negative weakness in your circuit fingers. She feels it takes about a year to fully get the art of asking questions accurately.
Well, that's about all I can think of and find at the moment. If you have any other questions or are running into problems, let me know and maybe I can give you some more suggestions. I think if you keep the above things in mind and practice, you will eventually be successful.
Rub your thumb pad and index finger pad lightly up and back against each other. Tell your body to use a smooth feeling to mean "yes" or "positive" or "open flow of energy" or "no problem."
Then tell your body to show a sticky feeling as you rub your fingers together to indicate "no" or "negative" or "stagnant energy" or "problem."
Some people may find they need to use a different finger than the index finger. The ring finger is an "emotional" point and sometimes our traumas are emotional in origin. Allergies to food can happen when a trauma occurs and there is food being eaten or even just food in your stomach. So sometimes you can rub the pads of your ring finger and thumb.
Now ask your body (silently or out loud) to show you a "yes" as you rub your fingers together. If it is smooth, that is a "yes" signal to you. Then ask it to show you a "no". Feel how it is sticky. That's a "no" signal to you.
I usually hold the nutrient, food, or item in my hand and ask my body if it is a problem for me. It will answer yes or no. If it is no, I will ask if I can clear it now? If it is a "yes" I do the TAT pose for it. If it is "no" then I wait a few minutes and ask again, or I ask later. Then I will ask my body if I need this substance (usually if it's a supplement) and depending on the answer I take it or not.
If at a restaurant, I will run my finger down the menu and with the other hand do the BFT and it will tell me what I should and shouldn't eat at that time.
I can point to an object and ask if it's a problem for me then focus on the item in my mind. The brain sees and knows and remembers all and this is just as good as holding it in your hand. Sometimes it helps me to concentrate or focus on the item if I do have it in my hand, or to say the name of the item either out loud or to myself. But that's just my problem of concentration at the time.
I have found that a person's energy field can be a problem and so you "clear" that person! You can also clear other people by putting your hands on them in the specific acupoints. You must just ask the questions for them such as "Is this a problem for him/her?" and you can use your own hand for the biofeedback technique. I have done this many times for children. I cleared one child's allergy to cats; also his problem with eczema. It was extremely gratifying.
It's just a matter of setting up a system with your body. However way you set it up is how your body will respond. Your body WANTS to heal. You just need to set up a clear system of communication.
TAT (the TAT pose) and BFT is completely explained in Dr. Fleming's workbook and I encourage everyone to get it.
To order the workbook, send a check or money order for $15 plus $4 shipping and handling (California residents add $1.29 sales tax) to:
Tapas Fleming 5031 Pacific Coast Hwy. #76, Torrance, CA 90505.