One of the problems with methods like traditional EFT, Focus Blocks and others is the need to label your problem belief with words.

The way these belief-change methods work is that you experience a negative emotion that causes you to act/react in a certain way, then you sum up in words what you think the underlying problem belief is, then you apply the method to change what you have identified.

This works fine when you can accurately uncover the "underlying root belief".

Let me explain first what I mean by that phrase.

Consider a limiting belief to be like a tower of playing cards. When the tower collapses, the limiting belief is gone in an instant.

So how do you make the tower collapse most effectively?

Simple. You take a single card away from the bottom that all the other cards are supported by...and the tower collapses immediately. That single card can be considered to the underlying root belief.

The tricky thing though is that it is not always clear what that belief is, especially if you are trying to sum it up in words to then clear out using EFT, Focus Blocks etc.

If you don't identify it correctly, you could just be picking off a card from the top of the tower but the overall limiting belief is still firmly in place. This is where I think people have problems with most belief-change methods. The method they are using is usually highly effective at changing beliefs but they have not identified the right belief to change!

There are some excellent ways though to verbally identify those root beliefs. Take a look at:

• My financial abundance is not manifesting - what should I do?

• What to do if there is one desire for which the doubt doesnt seem to go away?

• What are your best methods for uncovering limiting beliefs?

...for some ideas.

But there is however a shortcut method I've been playing with more and more for surfacing and dealing with these root beliefs, especially when I'm having trouble verbalizing them.

The clue is in the second paragraph of this answer in the sentence in bold text i.e. "then you sum up in words what you think the underlying problem belief is"

If you remove that sentence from the paragraph, you have your shortcut.

The idea is that you don't even try to uncover the root beliefs (or "aspects") of the problem - you just deal directly with the negative emotion.

So to take your example of approaching women...try and vividly imagine how it makes you feel when you are approaching women and as those negative feelings surface, just tap them away using the method I've outlined in the answer and comments to Does the release technique work better than EFT? and Eft: What do you do whilst tapping?

You'll find this to be much more effective than trying to label and identify the beliefs themselves in words and then trying to deal with soothing those word labels.

A further tip that is especially useful in conjunction with events - like approaching women or going out on dates etc - is to split your focus over three main areas as you vividly imagine yourself engaging in the event.

Those areas are:

1. How do you feel before the event?
2. How do you feel during the event?
3. How do you feel after the event?

I think many people only concentrate on changing how they feel during the event itself when, in fact, much of their fear may be related to preparation for the event, or worries about how they are going to feel after the event if it doesn't go as intended (e.g. feelings of rejection)

Hope that gives you some ideas.