These developmental stages are a collection of observations by neurofeedback professionals. While no one person experiences all these stages or goes through these stages in this order, this is a list of commonly reported growth phases in the most typical order.
1. Emotional balance / resilience
More good days and fewer bad days. Less easily perturbed, more steady. “Little things don’t bother me the way they used to.” “People have to work harder if they are going to ruin my day.”
2. Increased competence
Others may notice your improvements first. “Work is easier.”
3. Better quality of sleep
Either sooner to sleep, later awakening, fewer interruptions or more restorative sleep. Could be less sleep, if oversleeping. More in sync with natural sleep rhythms. “I’ve been going right to sleep instead of thinking about a million things for hours.”
4. Defragging the hard drive
The realization that “I am not my thoughts.”
5. Changes in perception
Greater clarity of a sense organ or resurgence of a neglected sense. “I hadn’t realized I wasn’t smelling before.” “My eyesight is sharper.”
6. Greater awareness
Heightened states of consciousness may return or become more common. May notice ESP, psi abilities, or synchronicity.
7. A “witnessing” of the sub-text in standard transactions with others.
More ability to observe during conversations.
8. Symptoms fall away
“I forgot to be sick; I forgot to take my meds.” “I was surprised by how much energy I had and how much I got done.”
9. Meds have a stronger potency
Beware of the normal dose having more effect. Consult with your prescriber. Recreational drugs and alcohol decline as tools of escape. “I just don’t need the pot/alcohol anymore.”
10. More attracted to the positive and avoiding the harmful
“I just don’t want to be around those losers anymore.” Achieves escape velocity from certain orbits. “i’ve changed and just can’t go back.”
11. Greater competence and certainty
“I know what I know.” Notice verbal IQ jumps. Reduced impediments. “What used to be problems are now just procedures.”
12. Able to find the calm, clear internal space
The opposite is fogged up or bogged down. “I can tell when I’ve fallen into chaos and I can bring myself back to that inner quiet.”
13. See more relationships in life and connections in natural patterns
Spiritual interest and insights. Notice more nuances in what had been just black and white before. “Everything is in flux.”
14. External resistance to the changes in your new self
Backlash from entrenched interests seeking to preserve the status quo. “They just went off on me about getting back in my place and who did I think I was.”
15. More competent defenses including increased awareness of one’s own shadow or dark side
Less reliance on denial, blame, projection as coping methods.
16. Dreams or remembrances of the good times in your life before stuckness began
“I used to be more free and I knew what I really wanted.”
17. Re-evaluation of the past
Illusions fade. Rear-view mirror quality to understanding your personal history. “What happened to me has lost its old charge.” “I have a past, but I am not my past.”
18. Realization and acceptance that I make my world
“I made that problem and I can make it go away.”
19. Shadow resurgence of old symptoms
These occur in the reverse order they were acquired in life, much like homeopathy. Mini flare ups are quickly resolved. “I had an emotional pimple.”
20. Compelling escape velocity
Time to leave job, habits, relationships. This clear need occurs before finding the next landing zone. Grieving and planning occurs during decreased tolerance for situations. “It is like discomfort with my old clothes with accompanying sadness for the goodbyes.”
21. Expulsion from groups where you no longer belong
“I’m glad they fired me.”
22. Transformation – which is a process
“I’ve never felt more myself, but known less who I really am.”