Last week, some 40 years into developing EBT, the method's greatest gift came to me. I was visiting my son John and his family in Upstate New York. It was an emotion-packed time  and, of course, very "Cycle Worthy."

The morning after our arrival, I had that anxious, disconnected, uncomfortable feeling in my body, a clear sign that I needed to consult my unconscious mind to find a circuit or two that needed updating.

I used the "spiral up" formula and drilled down into my emotional brain, using my feelings. Then, in an instant, up came a basic belief from my unconscious mind to my conscious mind. The words were simple, like a four-year-old was saying them.

If I had been grilled about whether I actually believed that – my conscious mind's reading – I would have said, "Absolutely not!"

The unconscious becomes conscious

Yet, there it was. Some ridiculous belief. As I had witnessed it coming right out of my own unconscious mind, it was irrefutable. Knowing this made some of the things I do – a little anxious about my son, a small tendency to overplease – make sense.

That knowledge made me calm down. That was a good thing, as I had been anxious. Now I was not. The rest of the weekend visit was more peaceful, and even led to me expressing a lot more emotion, not needy, out-of-control emotion, just the kind that comes out directly, straight from the heart.

A new pathway to self-knowledge

Now I think differently about EBT. I always "knew" that the tools were giving us a way to make the unconscious conscious, as we need that "unreasonable expectation" or "false basic belief" to become conscious so we can rewire that faulty circuit and gain more control over our lives.

Yet, this was different.

Since then, I've been more playful in my own EBT Practice. As the unconscious mind is thought of as "what we don't know we know," it became a way of knowing myself better.

I just turned 74 a couple of weeks ago, and as time is so limited, fast-forwarding my ability to know myself seems...fun...and essential to enjoying the time I have left.

If it's not fun, it's not EBT, and to really know ourselves, having that ability to unlock the unconscious mind at will seems like a good idea.