On Sunday 26 June (2022), Gregory Mitchell passed on after a long illness, which he bravely confronted. But finally it was time to move on.
I have worked with and for Greg during most of my adult life. It has been a privilege. He has always been there to give me good advice and we have collaborated over the years in developing the Mind Development Courses, which have helped many thousands of people to raise the quality of their lives. These materials will stay freely available online here on the Trans4mind.com site for as long as I live and I will do my best to ensure that remains the case after I am gone as well.
Bye, Greg, for now, but we'll always be with you.
—Peter Shepherd
| ABOUT THE AUTHOR |
Gregory Mitchell was a Mind Development researcher and practitioner for over 30 years. Born in 1947, in his early childhood he was strongly influenced by his grandfathers who were both inventors and innovators. His maternal grandfather in the 1930s, when he was working with Marconi, invented a radio valve called a Tetrode, and his paternal grandfather, while he was the chief chemist of Burma Oil, invented aviation spirit number one, during The First World War, which gave the British fighters a 10 to 15 miles per hour advantage over the German fighters, thus helping to win the First World War in the air. Gregory grew interested in the subject of mental evolution and development during adolescence. He became convinced that a dim person was only dim because he had a dim script, and that one could learn to throw away that script and expand both intelligence and the power of the mind. Exactly how to best accomplish that task has been the subject of his life's work.
Gregory proceeded to change his script by studying method acting. He later ran a business supplying theatre lighting and special effects. Subsequently his interest in this field led him to qualify as an electronics engineer, obtaining a Bachelors degree in Science & Electrical Engineering. In his studies he began to realize how awareness and behavior could be measured electronically. He started a biofeedback laboratory to build and experiment with various devices designed to produce an expansion of consciousness and invented the Bilateral form of GSR biofeedback monitoring that greatly facilitates therapeutic access to suppressed experiences and ideas. That has been a mainstay of individual Mind Development work and for research into the workings of the mind. He also organized research projects that involved training university students with mind development techniques, many of whom still retain the enhanced abilities he taught them.
Following a Diploma in Psychology, Gregory obtained a Masters Degree in Eclectic Psychology. He then introduced a wide range of techniques to his private practice, including Transactional Analysis, NLP and Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy, plus many of his own innovative techniques.
Gregory ran group courses in Mind Development for 25 years in London and various locations in Germany that successfully applied his research. His students and clients came from many countries around the globe.
Gregory went on to research at the most advanced levels of Mind Development and discovered many further important insights - in particular, original work on mnemonics, artificial languages and logic. The latest research by cognitive scientists is only now beginning to uncover the ideas and methods that Gregory Mitchell had been working with for 30 years!
Before he retired in 1994, Gregory employed Peter Shepherd, founder of Trans4mind, at his company Mental Development Ltd in London. He was mentor to Peter Shepherd for several years and much of the knowledge-base upon which Trans4mind.com was founded in 1997 was derived from this foundation.
Read 'A Prologue to my Life' by Gregory Mitchell - download PDF
Neil Mann, the former Dean of the Royal College of Osteopaths, wrote the following testimonial about Gregory:
I have known Gregory Mitchell for 35 years both professionally and as a friend. I first met Gregory in 1967. At the time he was the stage manager of a night club to support himself through University. As an osteopathic student, I became interested in sports medicine and attended several informal athletics meetings at Crystal Palace, where Gregory ran the 200 and 400 meters, unofficially breaking a couple of records that were not ratified due to the fact the wind speed was too high.
Gregory, then, was experimenting with methods of increasing athletic performance by stimulating the athlete's mental attitude and by the use of other psychological methods. Nowadays, he might be described as a personal trainer. In those days he was a pioneer, trying anything he felt might work. I still have a monologue he wrote at that time, "Zen and the Art of Sprinting."
He attempted to achieve both mental and physical improvement by training his clients to use both hemispheres of their brain, thereby increasing their muscular speed of contraction and doubling their reading speed. His methods included doing exercises under stroboscopic lighting with a special type of stroboscope invented by him: the Chromostrobe.
I did not hear much of Gregory after 1972 until he returned in 1976, because he had purchased a business in Andorra and performed a consular role for the English speaking people who resided in Andorra. When we gain met in 1976, he appeared to be suffering from shell shock, due to, he told me, military action in Africa, where he was a scientific advisor. He was supposed to be far away from the fighting, but because of a strategic retreat, he found himself on the front line where an artillery shell fell nearby, so he was hit by a shell fragment.
Since our last meeting, he had further refined his Mental Development program and was both employed on contract to a London borough and a large Union for Technical Staff, alongside writing both a communication course and a counseling course based on Mental Development, for staff training and the training of the long term unemployed. Unfortunately, due to being hit by a piece of shrapnel, he developed temporal epilepsy, which gradually became worse.
The death of his mother badly affected his health and finances. His mother had been a talented portrait artist and a Royal Academician, and by profession a lawyer. Gregory was awarded the British Empire Medal for his consular work, his work for the Council and other good deeds. Because of his worsening condition in 1992 he went to Belgium with his girlfriend Anne into semi-retirement and to to be near his father. Because his stepmother was dying, since that time he has, for the most part, lived abroad, finally retiring in 1994. We have maintained contact over the years, as friends, but he is seldom in England. In my opinion Gregory has made a significant contribution to society, so I trust that his work will live on.
NOTE by the site owner, Peter Shepherd
For 30 years Gregory Mitchell researched and developed the techniques for developing mental capacities such as memory, speed reading, enhanced intuition and creativity, and increased IQ.
Gregory ran group courses for many years in London that successfully applied his research. I was fortunate to work with him for several years during that time - his wide-ranging teachings are a major influence on the content of my book Transforming the Mind and the resource I have developed at Trans4mind.com.
Gregory Mitchell went on to research at the most advanced levels of Mind Development and discovered many further important insights. The latest research by cognitive scientists is only now beginning to uncover the ideas and methods that Gregory had been working with for 30 years!
The foundation Mind Development Courses 1-8 are available to freely download from this site, for those who recognize the vital importance of intellectual ability in discernment and contemplation, creativity and problem solving.
▶︎ All courses are now free to download in PDF format ◀︎
| MIND DEVELOPMENT COURSES 1-8 |
Many people have bad experiences at school and perhaps later in life, when attempting to study a new subject. It is easy to quickly get bogged down with new terminology, and often, new concepts and procedures seem unclear. This situation can quickly get out of hand as the student gets left behind and the subject either becomes an ongoing struggle or it is abandoned. But none of that is necessary; it is possible to succeed with the study of any subject.
With this course you will learn how to study a subject with maximum comprehension, with excellent recall, and with the ability to apply what you have learned effectively.
You will also learn how to take notes at rapid pace from books or live lectures, and how best to represent that information with key words, mind maps and flow charts that aid memory and understanding.
These abilities will be useful for your home studies, at college or work, and for your study of further Mind Development courses. You will indeed be able to succeed at studying effectively those subjects you are interested in, even those that were difficult before.
Click here to learn more about the Super Student Course...
The first course in the Mind Development system is "Super Vision," a home-study course to improve the mind's capacity for visualization and integration between left and right brain, boosting memory, creativity, natural eyesight and drawing ability. This is a new way of seeing - and being.
The practical exercises offered in this course help to develop visual perception, which is one branch of non-verbal communication, and address the subject of breathing and relaxation. Adequate oxygenation of the brain and a relaxed state of being is necessary for further developing the mind.
The eyes and the ears are the main channels through which one gains information about the world. As with listening skills, training in visualization and looking makes you more aware. When you are more aware, the subconscious mind has less influence. This means you are more relaxed, less anxious, less easily upset, a better memorizer - and your vision is improved.
Click here to learn more about the Super Vision course
This course teaches powerful communication skills that enable you to be more effective at work and in those situations of everyday life where better communication can make all the difference.
The Effective Communication course offers a series of practical exercises which develop the skills of communication and help the student to apply the fruits of his or her learning here and now - both to his or her personal growth and to the practical issues of personal relationships and business.
Improvement in our ability to communicate externally is reflected by a similar gain in communication between parts of the brain. The practice exercises enable development of all areas of the brain, even those which have been long under-used. They affect, particularly, the integration of the right and left hemispheres of the brain. Each hemisphere governs a different way of thinking and seeing the world. By doing the exercises thoroughly, the student can bring both halves of the brain into mutual communication, so that he or she is freer to think holistically and experience the world from an expanded point of view.
Communication is the vehicle for all further techniques, so communications skills are a vital aspect of Mind Development. The Effective Communication course includes practical exercises to enhance the person's capacity to listen attentively and comprehend. Following that, questioning skills are practiced, which have relevance to communication, memory and understanding. This will help the student to maintain control of communication in practical, social and business situations. You will also learn about practical problem solving and how to achieve your goals in life.
Click here to learn more about the Effective Communication course
This course teaches the skills of concentration as a means of educating the will. Often, when we put our mind on something, we think of something else and this, in turn, reminds us of something else. The mind wanders from one thing to another by associations, until the original thing is forgotten. 'Concentration' means putting all one's attention on something, and keeping it there for as long as one wishes to. So if you concentrate on a book, you are aware of the book and you are not thinking, looking or listening to anything else. If you are concentrating you are awake and aware. In much of everyday life, most people are effectively day-dreaming - at worst they are sleep-walking automatons. Their minds flip mechanically from one thing to another, never resting on anything for very long or intentionally. This process may go on for the whole of their lives and they never learn or achieve anything of consequence.
Unless we can wake ourselves up from this mechanicalness and sleep, we cannot begin work on ourselves and we cannot get things done in life. We must learn the mood of concentration - of actually BEING in the Here-and-Now, noticing and observing, and focused on our actions.
Concentration is a means to develop the will, so that life may be lived purposely and creatively, rather than as a reaction to the flow of sensations. Because you will not flit from one thing to another, like a butterfly, you will be able to choose to focus your mind on things, e.g., study or work, and will increase your skills and knowledge in these areas. Most importantly, you will be able to focus more clearly on your vision of what you want to achieve.
In short, your mental life is both intensified and broadened. The ability to concentrate is, therefore, a valuable skill which will enhance all other skills. Almost all the drills and exercises of Mind Development help develop your ability to concentrate. But are there are ways to improve your concentration directly? Yes, and this course teaches the best of them.
Click here to learn more about Concentration: Educating the Will
This home study course can double your reading speed and supercharge your brain's capacity to digest, remember and implement huge amounts of information... essential ingredients to success in your professional and personal life.
We all learn to read at school, after a fashion. But for most of us, this is not an optimal use of our brain power. In this course you will learn to better use the left brain's focused attention combined with the right brain's peripheral attention, in close harmony. Good communication between the brain hemispheres is a prerequisite for creative thinking and also a sense of well-being, where thoughts and feelings are integrated.
Reading may be defined as an individual's total inter-relationship with symbolic information. Reading is a communication process requiring a series of skills. As such reading is a thinking process rather than an exercise in eye movements. Effective reading requires a logical sequence of thought patterns, and these patterns require practice to set them into the mind. The methods currently used in schools do not touch on the issues of speed, comprehension and critical analysis and indeed all those skills which can be described as advanced reading techniques. In short, most of your reading problems have not been dealt with during your initial education. By using appropriate techniques, the limitations of early education can be overcome and reading ability improved by 500% or more.
The course teaches in-depth reading techniques that greatly improve literary intelligence, so that you can clearly perceive the ideas and values that the writer is expressing and relate them to those of other authors and so be better able to make objective conclusions.
Click here to learn more about the Power Reading Course
In most civilized societies the development of language centers in the left hemisphere of the brain will produce dominance on that side, while spatial, visual and intuitive problem-solving skills, which are based on right-hemisphere relational processes, will be underdeveloped.
Though a highly developed memory and intuitive skills are not essential for life in modern society, they were important survival skills for primitive man who had no reference books to look up when he forgot something, no maps to guide him on long journeys, and was often in perilous situations where intuitive insight made the difference between life and death. To further evolve, we need to reclaim this heritage, which depends on the restoration and integration of our right-brain processes.
Without memory there is no knowledge, without knowledge there is no certainty and without certainty there is no will. We need a good memory to be able to orient ourselves in a rich network of all that we know and understand, to make sense of it and to move forward to attain goals that are based in reality and true to our selves.
You will learn advanced memory techniques in the Creative Memory Course that utilize the amazing powers of the right brain, which enable you to "file away" any new piece of information so that it is readily accessible for future immediate access.
As you continue to use the methods of cumulative perception taught in this course, this kind of random access memory begins to become second nature. Many memory experts call this the "soft breakthrough" because it happens almost imperceptibly at first, instead of hitting you like a mental bolt of lightning. Everything you find important is given its own unique mental file. Just like the executive whose desk has been buried in paper for years, who suddenly discovers his computer can do a much better job of storing and arranging information, a filed, organized mind suddenly begins to perform impressive recall tasks on demand.
Click here to learn more about the Creative Memory Course
This course by Gregory Mitchell is on the periphery of Mind Development but nonetheless illustrates how closely mind and body function in co-ordination.
Using these techniques Gregory was able to run 100 meters in a time that nearly matched the then British champion, with relatively little physical fitness preparation (60% or less compared with a typical athlete). You may not personally want to increase your sprinting speed, but the principles described here have many applications both for physical and mental development.
Click here to learn more about Zen & the Art of Sprinting
The Goal of Zen is the state of 'No-Mind'. This is an intuitive way of dealing with the world. The aim of this course is to enable a student to turn on a particular form of 'No-Mind' consciousness that can be applied to a practical task - that of arithmetical calculation. Habitual responses are set up which are the inverse of linearity. Several parts of the calculation have to be handled simultaneously; the result will be obtained about five times as fast, so it appears to be instantaneous.
Click here to learn more about Zen & the Art of Calculation