While we are all unique, life imposes certain facts upon us. We are born, grow, learn, create and relate to those around us. Each opportunity builds upon those that come earlier.

For the fortunate, life becomes deeper and richer with age. For others, life is a rut that can’t be escaped. In either case, just as a map guides a mountain climber, so a basic map of personal development guides our growth to maturity.

This blog series builds a road map around the relationship between the conscious and subconscious mind – the relationship managed most directly through hypnotherapy. The mind divides in childhood to soften conflict between the self and the world. Unfortunately, that division generates internal conflicts. Which creates conflict with the world, leading to conflict with the self, and on and on until we realize that we need to include others in our circle of concern. As harmony is rebuilt, the mind reunites, and we enter the realm of spiritual experience.

Part 1: Change Matters – Unlike most animals, humans make their most important changes in the mind.
Part 2: Theory of Mind – Explaining why the mind is divided between conscious and subconscious.
Part 3: Path to Maturity – Laying out the steps toward maturity and the roles characteristic to each stage.
Part 4: Survival (dependent) – We are social creatures: survival depends upon partnership. The first partnership is with our parents. When family experience is painful, hypnotherapy can help limit the impact on our adult lives.
Part 5: Sex (hedonist) – The sexual urge drives us out of the home and into peer relationships. Again, many of us have work to do as adults to heal the damage caused in those chaotic years.
Part 6: Exchange (consumer) – Euphoria and fear control our preferences, but also bias our behavior when we expect one more than the other. That bias arises in infancy, making it hard for us to adjust our patterns when they cause problems.
Part 7: Healing and Trust (healer) – When we come to accept that our bias is our problem, sympathy for ourselves extends to include others, and we begin the work of building relationships around trust. This is the sweet-spot for hypnotherapy.
Part 8: Truth (partner) – Life involves many relationships, and only in honoring the truth are we able to sustain true partnerships. Hypnotherapy allows us to smooth over any rough edges carried forward from the past.
Part 9: Creativity (inventor) – In the security of partnerships, we get to choose both who we want to be and what we wish to accomplish. Sustaining harmony is the challenge, as trauma disrupts everyone’s plans. Hypnotherapy helps both with harmony and healing.
Part 10: Imagination (liberator) – This final post looks (somewhat speculatively) at the final step into maturity. The barrier between conscious and subconscious dissolves, and we enter a realm of spiritual development that is qualified by our ability to sustain harmony in the realm of ideas.