Latest news with #EFT
The Star
6 days ago
- General
- The Star
Human-elephant conflicts cause RM1.1mil losses in Johor
KLUANG: Close to 700 complaints related to human-elephant conflicts have been reported to the Johor Wildlife and National Parks Department (Perhilitan) over the past five years, says state executive councillor Ling Tian Soon. The Johor health and environment committee chairman said the most affected districts included Kluang, Kota Tinggi, Mersing and Segamat. "This is a serious issue in Johor. In the first six months of this year alone, human-elephant conflicts have caused losses amounting to about RM1.1mil. "While Johor Perhilitan has been actively conducting translocation operations annually, the manpower they have is not enough to cope with the high number of complaints. "As such, we have reached out to the Natural Resources and Environmental Sustainability Ministry for assistance, which has led to the launch of a special translocation operation," he said. He said this to reporters after launching the Johor Elephant Translocation Operation here on Monday (July 14). Ling added that the operation, which is being carried out from this month until December, is expected to translocate between 10 and 12 elephants. "In the first six months, Johor Perhilitan managed to relocate five elephants with the limited resources and manpower it has. "With this new operation, which is receiving support from Perhilitan officers from across Peninsular Malaysia, we expect to double that number," he said. To support the effort, Ling said the state government has also channelled RM600,000 from its Ecological Fiscal Transfers (EFT) fund for the operation. "Johor is the only state that has ever made such an allocation, and this shows our commitment to addressing the issue," he said.
New York Times
09-07-2025
- Business
- New York Times
As Truth Social Business Struggles, Trump Media Goes Big on Crypto
Donald J. Trump has reinvented himself many times over, going from real estate developer to TV personality to world leader. Now his social media company, Trump Media & Technology Group, which is the parent of the president's Truth Social site, is undergoing its own metamorphosis, becoming a major player in the crypto industry. In just the past few months, Trump Media has raised $2.5 billion in cash to invest in Bitcoin and is working to bring crypto-related exchange traded funds, or E.T.F.s, to market. Mr. Trump has no official position at Trump Media and does not advise it on corporate policy. But he is the company's largest shareholder, and he and his family have become big crypto boosters over the past year. The pivot to crypto highlights the reality of one of the president's highest-profile business interests. Truth Social may serve as Mr. Trump's online megaphone, which he uses to attack his enemies, praise his allies and announce executive orders, tariffs and cease-fires. But the three-year-old social media platform has struggled to generate advertising revenue. That has made Trump Media, which went public in March 2024, a consistently money-losing company, and its stock has been shedding value since its debut. This year, shares of Trump Media are down 43 percent. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Time of India
08-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Time of India
Vidya Balan says 'if you tell your headache, 'you can leave now', it will go'; the actress opens up on her healing journey
Vidya Balan has been in the industry for two decades now. Her debut film in Hindi, 'Parineeta' had released in 2005. Vidya has broken many stereotypes and the actress is known for her strong roles. Even off screen, Vidya has been quite strong in her choices and also being open about her vulnerabilities. She has always been honest about body-shaming and other issues which women face and inspired women to stand up for themselves. Now, in a recent interview, she has also spoken about her healing process and alchemy. During her appearance on The Something Bigger Show with Rodrigo Canelas, Vidya Balan delved into her personal healing journey, which she revealed began more than a decade ago with the help of someone close to her heart. 'My healer is a gift to me by my mother,' she recalled. 'I was going through a tough time about 14 years ago, and my mother introduced me to the healer. Then I just stayed with it, because I enjoyed this process of understanding so much that I just kept at it. ' VIDYA BALAN TURNS HEADS WITH CASUAL AIRPORT LOOK Speaking about the transformative nature of the experience, Vidya described it as nothing short of magical. 'What she does is actually alchemy,' she said, referring to the ancient practice often associated with turning base metals into gold, discovering the elixir of life, and finding a cure for all ailments. The actress shared that her healing sessions, though conducted entirely over the phone, have been deeply impactful. 'She has taken me through EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques) and access consciousness… All of this happens on the phone. But it's about getting in touch with yourself. It's about not standing in the way of yourself. The only thing standing in our way is ourselves. And I enjoy the process… Healing is a lifelong process, it's like breathing. ' Vidya likened her healing work to therapy and emphasized its consistency, no matter where she is. 'She's given me various tools over the years,' she added, citing one particularly intriguing method. 'She uses something called Saturn's decrease, which just changes the way you think in the moment. For example, if someone has a headache, you can say, 'You can leave now', and you repeated it a few times, you'd be surprised to find that your headache will get better. ' When Canelas asked her to elaborate, she explained, 'So, you have a headache, and you say, 'Headache, you can leave now'. I'm telling you, it changes!' In an earlier conversation with Samdish Bhatia, Vidya had touched on the power of thought and language. 'You can restructure the way you think, and the way you've led your life… the beliefs with which you've led your life, by restructuring the construction of your sentence. Simply put, anxious consciousness helps you access your consciousness, your subconscious, and remove the limitations. It makes sure that you don't stand in your own way,' she reflected.
Indian Express
08-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Indian Express
Vidya Balan can make a headache disappear by just saying ‘you can leave now'; actor opens up about journey with ‘alchemy' and ‘healing'
Actor Vidya Balan opened up about working with a 'healer' for the past 14 years, and said that they are constantly in touch over the phone, regardless of where she is in the world. She said that her mother introduced her to the healer when she was going through a particularly difficult time in her life. Vidya now swears by it. In a new interview, she spoke about concepts such as 'Saturn's decrease' and 'access consciousness', and claimed that she can make a headache go away by just chanting a simple mantra. Appearing on the Something Bigger Show with Rodrigo Canelas, Vidya was asked about her journey with healing, and she said, 'My healer is a gift to me by my mother. I was going through a tough time about 14 years ago, and my mother introduced me to the healer. Then I just stayed with it, because I enjoyed this process of understanding so much that I just kept at it.' Also read – Vidya Balan says women with 'flourishing careers' still hand over cheques to their husbands: 'Why does money have to be controlled by the man?' She compared healing to 'therapy', and said that she speaks to her healer from wherever she is in the world. 'She's given me various tools over the years. She uses something called Saturn's decrease, which just changes the way you think in the moment. For example, if someone has a headache, you can say, 'You can leave now', and you repeated it a few times, you'd be surprised to find that your headache will get better.' The interviewer asked her what she meant, and Vidya explained, 'So, you have a headache, and you say, 'Headache, you can leave now'. I'm telling you, it changes!' Vidya continued, 'What she does is actually alchemy.' The basic definition of alchemy says that it's a mystical form of 'protoscience' that aims to transform materials into gold, extend human lifespan, and find a universal cure for all diseases. 'She has taken me through EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques) and access consciousness… All of this happens on the phone. But it's about getting in touch with yourself. It's about not standing in the way of yourself. The only thing standing in our way is ourselves. And I enjoy the process… Healing is a lifelong process, it's like breathing.' Vidya spoke about her beliefs in an interview with Samdish Bhatia last year. 'You can restructure the way you think, and the way you've led your life… the beliefs with which you've led your life, by restructuring the construction of your sentence. Simply put, anxious consciousness helps you access your consciousness, your subconscious, and remove the limitations. It makes sure that you don't stand in your own way,' she said.
Khaleej Times
29-06-2025
- Health
- Khaleej Times
What is tapping, and can it really improve mental health?
It looks a little goofy. A self-help method called ' tapping,' which involves using the fingertips to perform acupressure while countering negative emotions with breathing exercises and positive affirmations, has elicited eye-rolls from some mental health professionals. 'I'm safe in my car,' a woman on TikTok says as she practices the technique, using a finger to tap the top of her head, then the side of her eyebrow and the middle of her chin. 'I am my safe space.' In the video, she explains that driving by herself is a struggle, but tapping has helped lower her anxiety and refocus her thoughts. Anecdotes like this are easy to find on social media. Over the last 15 years or so, tapping has also popped up on wellness podcasts, TV shows and even the best-seller list. As a result, the practice, also known as the Emotional Freedom Technique or E.F.T., has attracted a devoted following and become a big business. But many experts remain sceptical. Where did tapping come from? Tapping, which falls under the umbrella of energy psychology, originated from a technique called Thought Field Therapy developed by the psychologist Roger Callahan in the 1980s. He conceived of it while working with a patient who had a severe phobia of water, which Dr Callahan tried treating in various ways, including exposure therapy by the pool. One day, when the patient complained that just looking at the water gave her a stomachache, Dr Callahan told her to tap firmly under her eye, an area he knew to be associated with the ' stomach meridian ' in traditional Chinese medicine. According to Dr Callahan, after two minutes of tapping, the patient declared her stomachache had disappeared, along with her fear of the water. Dr Callahan developed Thought Field Therapy from there, contending that some patients required a series of acupressure points to be touched in a specific order. Thought Field Therapy was discredited by psychology experts, in part because there isn't a way to measure energy meridians, nor any evidence that proves they exist. But in the 1990s, Gary Craig, a Stanford graduate who later became an ordained minister, rebranded the technique, creating a simplified version called E.F.T. Proponents suggest that tapping not only relieves stress and anxiety but can also improve symptoms of depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, addiction and chronic pain, among other maladies. Practitioners now pay hundreds of dollars to take E.F.T. courses or pursue an official certification. Does it work? Even though there are more than 200 studies that examine meridian tapping, this body of work is not as robust as it might sound. Research that claims to highlight the effectiveness of E.F.T. has been riddled by conflicts of interest, small sample sizes, statistical errors and a lack of rigor. For these reasons, prominent members of the American Psychological Association have said that the push to popularize E.F.T. is based on pseudoscience. 'When you really look at the evidence, it falls apart,' said Cassandra L. Boness, an assistant professor of psychology at the University of New Mexico and the lead author of a peer-reviewed commentary published in 2024 that raised concerns about the quality of E.F.T. research and questioned the effectiveness of the technique. But that isn't to say that E.F.T. is useless, experts said. Those who try the technique are instructed to think about or do activities they may find scary or uncomfortable — a form of exposure therapy, which is a powerful way of regulating emotions. Tapping also involves taking a moment to explore one's thoughts, which therapists say can help people understand their behavior. In essence, tapping is 'a hodgepodge of interventions, some of which are, I'm sure, quite effective,' said David F. Tolin, the director of the Anxiety Disorders Center at the Institute of Living in Hartford, Conn. But there isn't high-quality research to show that tapping itself is the active ingredient, he added. What's the harm? Despite the lackluster evidence, some patients and therapists insist tapping truly helps. 'It doesn't replace existing best practices for treating PTSD, depression, addictions or other serious conditions,' said David Feinstein, who offers classes and certifications in energy medicine, along with his wife. But, in his opinion, it can make those treatments more effective. Melissa Lester, a psychotherapist in Sandy Springs, Ga., said she found tapping could provide quick benefits, including a calmer, clearer mind. She decided to become certified in the technique because she wanted to give her clients an alternative when methods offered by other therapists, like cognitive behavioral therapy, didn't produce the desired results. Providing an alternative treatment can indeed be useful to patients, Dr Boness said, but she questioned whether it was ethical to do so in the absence of rigorous scientific evidence. Her 'biggest fear,' she added, was that vulnerable people would turn to tapping, and then find that it doesn't work. 'It's not actually a psychological treatment,' she said. (Christina Caron is a New York Times reporter covering mental health.) The article originally appeared in The New York Times.
