NEW is pretty versatile and has many beneficial results, from what I've read.
But, I have to ask, what really are you using to stimulate your energy body? Your sense of touch (tactile sensations) or your awareness?
Could it be that we only use tactile exercises in NEW because we only need it to pinpoint are awareness better? RB did say over time, that you will not need perform any pre-tactile exercises once you got used to the system, since you're awareness would be trained to automatically travel to any place within you.
So, I know the tactile procedures are important and not saying they aren't necessary at all(note key words: At all). But really what lets you progress in NEW, your awareness or how well you can feel (which is not easy for all of us).
from my experience you just need tactile imagination at first to entrain your awareness. once youve done it you can move awareness directly through your body. i dont do anything with the tactile sense any more and NEW still works great.
For me, using the tactile imagination was needed at first to start things up. I couldn't do a whole body circuit without this preparation. But after some time & practice, awareness becomes much easier to center and hold, and now I only use tactile imagining when I feel "stuck" in a certain area.
Remember that awareness is normally centered in the brow at the eyes, but it's focusing your awareness to another part of your body that you want. I think a lot of the "feeling" involved is the fact that you become much more "aware" of the sensations that are already there.
So in reality its actually your awareness that does the stimulating, not your physical, mundane sense of touch?(because that just wouldn't sound right to me?)