What is The Insight Project?
By Peter Shepherd
INSIGHT:
- The ability to perceive and understand the true nature of something.
- Knowledge obtained by this. [Oxford Senior Dictionary]
The Insight Project is based on emancipation through the direct experience of knowledge, i.e. through insight. The knowledge that sincere application of the procedures contained in The Insight Project will bring you, is all that is necessary for you to experience your own truth, your immortal identity, freedom from limitation, and genuine happiness.
Surely, you may say, we are in the midst of a "knowledge explosion" today. But this has not eliminated war, fear, poverty, anxiety or Man's daily inhumanity to man. Nor has it given man any legitimate knowledge of his make-up. It has only been "knowing about", not knowledge acquired from direct experience, from looking within.
Thus it is that man drifts aimlessly through a world seemingly without meaning or purpose - a world he created but over which he no longer exercises conscious control or power. Man today has lost his identity and his purpose for existing. He has lost his sense of the Game of Life. He is an unknowing and unwilling game-player. Never before has man been so much of a problem to himself.
Why does man, with all his intelligence, allow this situation to exist? Is there a practical answer?
Man does not know himself. The task now before you is to begin to know yourself. To possess self-knowledge you must first become free of illusions about yourself, the people around you, and the Universe. Until you begin to understand your illusions you will never be free to see the truth about yourself or anything else. That is, as intuitive knowingness, not "knowing about".
Illusions consist of all sorts of mistaken ideas you hold about yourself, false assumptions as to your abilities, erroneous concepts about your place and purpose in the world, and so forth. It is difficult to break-up these illusions because they have become deeply ingrained habit patterns. To be able to change, which is the only way to gain self-knowledge and freedom, you must do things you have never done before, and recognize that viewpoints that you were determined must be right, may possibly be wrong.
As Ouspensky says, "The greatest barrier to consciousness is the belief that one is already conscious." Just considering the matter, one for an instant wakes-up, then returns to slumber in the illusion that, yes, he is conscious. The truth of the matter is that 99% of the time, man is behaving mechanically - he is determined by external influences.
Nearly all of Man's thoughts, ideas, emotions, aspirations, words and moods are triggered by external influences. These trigger him automatically according to his previous conditioning, upbringing, education and experiences, and his innate human nature, instincts and drives. Creative work, the application of free will, is only possible if vision is unhindered by pre-conceived fixed ideas or reverence to singular ideologies.
The mind, while operating subjectively as one mind, can be differentiated into several levels of function:
- Higher consciousness. This non-physical mind is the knowing of the Being: the Higher Self. It is non-verbal and therefore can only communicate to the other functions of mind through intuitive channels. This is direct, fully awakened perception and insight. It is an abstract quality, not a quantity; it is implicit, not explicit. It functions increasingly as the "ego-defenses" (protection of the self-image) of the conscious and subconscious mind are broken down. This mind of the spiritual essence of Being consists of the Being's considerations, postulates, opinions, evaluations, purposes, intentions and goals. It is the essence that is aware of being aware. It is free choice and creativity, what makes Man rise above the animal, the essence of life, love and truth.
- Intuitive. This is a higher level of awareness that is non-verbal. It relates diverse sources of information to create a holistic picture. It functions through the right cortical hemisphere of the brain as its intermediary with the left hemisphere "ego" and the body. ESP is the "release" of intuition into your conscious experience.
- Conscious. This is the level of awareness of Man in our left-brain oriented culture when he is not functioning automatically. It is verbalized thinking, reasoning and analysis. It is "knowing about". It is sequential and time-based. It uses the left cortical hemisphere of the brain as its intermediary with the body. It gives a sense of "ego" personality or self-identity, though this is transitory and shifts constantly and unknowingly through many ego-states or sub-personalities in response to changes of circumstances.
- Preconscious. This contains all the things you know about and can recall but aren't examining at this moment. It is like the area of mind that the searchlight of consciousness can readily illuminate.
- Subconscious. This level of mind contains decisions that have been made consciously at one time and that later became forgotten, though they are still active and effective. Also it contains the memories that at one time were experienced but which the conscious ego wants well out of the way of the Preconscious, i.e. they are suppressed, though they frequently emerge in dreams. The subconscious functions beneath the surface, and the decisions that accompany suppressed memories act as programming and are re-enacted unknowingly, through a reactive stimulus-response mechanism. Thus the mind becomes conditioned. Subconscious decisions are a left-brain function and subconscious emotional content is a right-brain function. The harmful split between left and right brain is a result of the conscious ego defending itself against painful memories and painful reality by the act of suppression, and the construction of rationalising beliefs and fixed ideas. It is necessary to break down these barriers and re-integrate the brain, so that the intuitive function of insight is possible. This is achieved by the method of analysis used on The Insight Project.
- Unconscious. The unconscious mind is never brought into consciousness. It contains the most basic programming, the innate genetic blueprint of the human organism - the survival, sexual and aggressive drives and instincts, and the "body knowledge" of sensory and motor skills, innate and acquired. It automatically performs the millions of simultaneous directives that are essential for the human being to function. It also contains the "unexperienced experience" of traumatic incidents that caused unconsciousness or were unconfrontable and repressed at the time, and therefore were never absorbed into the database of the conscious mind. Nevertheless they are stored in every detail at this level of mind, and their contents continue to have an effect on the person in a stimulus-response manner.
Thus The Insight Project seeks to re-orient your basic unconscious concepts by changing your normal reactions and responses to life's everyday occurrences, in the light of insight by the higher consciousness, intuitively perceived.
Finding the Inner Self
All spiritual roads lead to that uncomfortable destination where the examination and acceptance of the inner self must take place. The first step is to realize our judgments and fears are self-created and limit our scope to deal with the present. They are the surface manifestations that capture our attention and keep us from focusing on the real blocks, deep in our psyche - the unconscious patterns.
So well have they been hidden, covered by justifications and illusory beliefs, which few have had the strength to break through them. They are the backbone of duality - the rigid "black and white" thinking that makes understanding of holistic truth impossible. But we are oblivious to this situation because we have protective shields - we hold on to the past or hide in the future. We have consuming interests, worries about our status or our possessions. Such shields are both a great help and a great hindrance to us. They pacify us and at the same time fool us, giving us a false sense of security.
Wholeness, or being totally in the present, is dependant on breaking the patterns, of erasing their duality; only then can new states of consciousness become possible. It's been known since ancient times in Eastern religions and philosophies and among some Western mystics, that one's resistance to the events and forces of life lead to one's imprisonment in a smaller viewpoint, an isolation from perception, participation and enjoyment of life.
It's only when a Being considers that he can't safely experience something, that he puts force out to stop it. That wouldn't be so bad, but as time goes by, he forgets what exactly he was trying to avoid and begins to generalize it. Eventually this resistance is occurring on an undifferentiated basis, and his intentions form blocks against much of the life and flows of energy of others around him. He has locked himself into a cocoon of his own making.
The procedures of The Insight Project, layer by layer, strip away the cocoon, leaving the Being in a sense quite naked, ridgeless and free. Those who have experienced these techniques talk of feeling reborn, that their life is starting anew, or that it is really starting for the first time. It removes the reasons why a Being restrains himself, releasing the energy and purposes to participate in all of life causatively - with CHOICE regained.
The Approach of The Insight Project
There is a difference between a viewpoint and an identity as we define them. A viewpoint is simply a point from which one perceives. A Being, in order to operate in this universe, needs to assume a viewpoint. He can then receive inflow and create outflow.
An identity contains a viewpoint, but it is more than that. An identity is a way one decides to be in order to deal with a situation or in order to manifest an intention. So it contains a viewpoint, but it's also an intention to accomplish something, with accompanying decisions, beliefs, considerations, evaluations and agreements. It's a package of rules and laws passed by the person of how to be in given circumstances.
Everyone has many such identities, necessary to participate in life. The ones that we give attention to on The Insight Project are ones the person gets stuck in - that are imprinted on his or her personality.
There are as many other fixed identifications as there are personality-types and the different masks people put on for all the varying social situations of their life. And there are very many more subtle ones relating to a person's complex belief-system, the affects of personal trauma, sympathies and bad actions plus the myriad affects of cultural conditioning (shoulds and shouldn'ts necessary to be acceptable to parents, teachers, employers, friends, lovers and society).
All of these identities have an accompanying intention - what the person wanted to achieve by that behavior. If he has formulated an intention and has not achieved or unmade it, then he is still in the middle of that action cycle and that cycle remains part of his perceived here and now, taking up his attention, i.e. his energy and power. He is, to that extent, "not all there" in present time. This tends to happen with an identification that the person is not conscious of, because it is such a familiar part of his life or because it is painful or uncomfortable to view and awareness of it is avoided - it becomes unconscious.
Most people have many frustrated intentions that are emotionally charged in this way, and are very adept at justifying and rationalising any manifestations of these "sub-personalities" so they are not recognized.
The Insight Project has many cunning techniques to awaken the Being, so that these debilitating trapped viewpoints can be freed, and the Being can come more and more into the HERE AND NOW, realizing the incredible resources that each one of us intrinsically possess. Previously perceived limitations dissolve away and new horizons appear. Life goals that seemed impossible then become an exciting new challenge.
The eternal question "Who am I?" is finally answered by turning the scientific method in on oneself to objectively determine one's true nature. With the tools of The Insight Project one looks at the goals, identities, roles and ways of being that are being assumed. Right now, not in the past. Usually these are being re-enacted unknowingly, rather than by conscious decision, and therefore no responsibility is taken for the identification. The reasons why one is compulsively playing a role, and therefore behaving reactively and unconsciously, have not been confronted. A network of rationalizations have been put in place to avoid having to make this confront. It is a network of safe solutions to the trials and tribulations of life. It is also the destroyer of awareness, and the preventer of insight.
The Insight Project examines the area of mental functioning that causes these survival computations to stick together, to form barrier against that which cannot be truly perceived. At a subconscious level, the responsibility that perceiving the truth would demand, is considered too much to take on.
The techniques taught on The Insight Project take down this barrier by questioning - with the aid of the Biofeedback Monitor - the validity or closeness to the objective truth, of one's every mental consideration.
The Being - YOU - knows, which is why the Biofeedback Monitor can work, but the mind hides this knowingness behind a fog of confusions, fixed ideas and "ways of being right". All of them are safe solutions that are being grasped onto, despite the fact that many of them conflict.
As one strips these away, gradually increasing one's awareness, responsibility and ability to face up to reality, new and previously unseen layers of rationalization and self-deceit become available to inspect. The view constantly changes and opens up, until finally, in the particular area that is being inspected, the truth is seen, and the breakthrough to insight obtained.
The technical procedures of The Insight Project involve examining the current viewpoint of the Being. This present time pole is what the past is hooked onto. There is a finite amount of current mental functioning but an infinity of past experiences that would take forever to resolve. By taking down the present time pole, the mass of the past falls away.
One is always looking for truth - something you didn't realize before - although at a deep level you already know it. But one's view is always conditional upon the degree of awareness, responsibility and confront you are adopting, for survival purposes or for purpose of game (the need to have challenges, interest, excitement). The way you see something is always conditional in this way, like colored glasses through which you view past, present and future - unless the subject has been released of all charged conflict.
Normal, human, perceptions are - as a rule - reactive or "stimulus-response", the result of the conditioning of a lifetime and even of previous lifetimes. Psychotic perceptions are, of course crazy; neurotic perceptions are illogical; but even normal human perceptions are still determined by others and far below the knowingness of a fully realized Being.
Realizing that what one had previously thought or decided was actually inappropriate, exaggerated, inaccurate, self-defeating or a false assumption will cause a release of charge - i.e. the emotional energy that had been bound up by frustration. But on The Insight Project one goes beyond that, digging up the lies, misconceptions and misattributed ownership of concepts or viewpoints - the source of the irrationality - to get to the actual truth of the matter, your OWN viewpoint, and this gives not just a release but a permanent erasure of charge. Then it's really handled for good, and you won't be re-creating problematic feelings as soon as the session ends, or troubled times re-occur.
In actuality, YOU KNOW. The Biofeedback Monitor helps to reveal your intuitive knowingness, and eventually, layer by layer, this truth is revealed, like a painting being cleaned of centuries of grime. YOU are revealed. Gradually you differentiate the Higher Self from the Composite body-mind of the human being.
The human animal is a sophisticated (highly evolved) combination of both its genes and the body-mind conditioned from conception by traumatic stimuli and parental and cultural influence. From this programming the personality-mask or "ego" develops, and this is multi-faceted, as different masks and different egos come into play in all the many and varying circumstances of life. The Being identifies with these multiple sub-personalities and the archetypal drives and survival instincts this earthly vehicle dramatizes.
Thus forms the Composite. However, the Composite is in conflict. The Being is not, essentially, of this world, and has no innate concerns with survival - he is interested in Game (involvements in scenarios that provide the opportunity for him to exercise creativity and have fun) and his considerations concern that. The human, genetic entity is primarily concerned with survival. What results is a mass of safe solutions to this conundrum.
When energy flows meet from opposite directions they impact and form massy blocks. Similarly, the conflict of intentions within the Composite being, form the mass of the Composite mental structure, and this mass of intention-counter-intention effectively acts as an "Imprint" or imposition upon the Being. It is the "unconfrontable" charge that causes the being to shut down drastically his awareness and responsibility for causation, to be "asleep" while the conditioning takes control. It is a primary purpose of The Insight Project to erase this Imprint.
The Imprint is the blockage that results from the spiritual and material intentions being identified as one, although they conflict in basic purpose. Subjectively it is the mass one feels that restricts one's awareness and limits one's space. It is the barriers, the impacted energy flows, the "ridges" between oneself and others, which make one feel alone and unconnected.The spiritual or non-physical element is trying to play games, but they have become unknowing (like actually becoming a piece on the chess board) and hence trap him. The physical element is programmed through evolution to survive, again without choice.
The Higher Self is not of this world, but adopts a viewpoint within it. Adopting a human body, its mind operates through the "via" of the human brain, to control the body and to perceive through the body. The behavioral instincts of the human are contained in the primitive "reptilian" brain, but this of course interacts with the highly evolved human cortex of the brain, the seat of "thinking consciousness".
The left half of the cortex works with verbal, sequential and analytical processes, while the right side deals with intuitive, emotional and synthesising processes. Both may be inappropriate. The left may adopt misconceptions, defensive rationalizations and survival computations - the fixed ideas of belief systems, which attach to the various assumed identities or ways of being. These are stimulated (usually unknowingly) by life circumstances.
In the right brain, distortion takes the form of suppressed feelings, emotions, attitudes, pains and experience - truth that is withheld. The Being communicates through the intuitive non-verbal right side (via a crystallized link from the pineal gland) and if right-brain awareness is detached from the left-brain conscious ego, the Being may become detached from mental consciousness - asleep behind a smoke screen of words.
Insights and practical ideas are useless if just "known about" - they are for everyone that can act, to test out empirically for themselves. All belief systems are just another potential trap and all the ideas described within the Project materials will either be discovered or not on your own venture into self-knowledge. The truth lies within you, no-one else can provide it for you. The Insight Project procedure completely eschews any type of evaluation - where you look and what you find are up to you, the course simply provides you with a set of powerful tools.
A Paradigm Shift
Just in the last few years there has been the start of a paradigm shift, or a new way of looking at things, in the area of science, metaphysics, information systems, psychology, medicine and ecology. These and many other subjects have become integrated by advanced thinkers (who recognized the dangers of blinkered specialization) into an holistic world-view, where the disciplines do not just exist independently but relate inter-actively.
It may be the only hope for our planet that this progress continues, since the radical new policies required for survival of this eco-system, will be ineffective if not allied with an holistic view of man, which recognizes his spiritual, mental, physical and social needs and problems.
This new holistic paradigm helps to connect many data of comparable magnitude from different fields of knowledge. Perhaps the most inspiring is the link between the new physics of quantum mechanics and the mystical study of metaphysics. The mathematics of quantum theory postulates a zero-point, a "static" outside of space-time. Further, changes to one particle may also incur simultaneous changes to other particles in that field - a synchronous communication of information that is outside of Einstein's laws of space-time.
This is an "information field", i.e. information itself has existence independent of space and time. For example, if Beethoven's 9th Symphony had only existed within the composer's mind, would it "exist" any less than it does today, on manuscripts and records around the world?
It may be said that this "creative-vacuum" is of a spiritual nature, or it is the nature of spirit. Physicist-philosopher David Bohm has postulated an extension of these principles from the micro-cosmic to the macro-cosmic, to explain the metaphysical causation by consciousness of matter, energy, space and time, in terms of physics. The results closely match both the findings of Eastern philosophers and the hypotheses of The Insight Project, so that the mystery of universal consciousness is now brought into the objective sphere, causing endless potential for further advancement of our understanding and for the humanisation of science.
There is a point in applied metaphysics, however, where personal experience of consciousness is essential to progress further, and where only a profound change in consciousness can effectively prove the hypothesis, that man is part of the spiritual causation of the material universe and that his considerations affect the universe, both as a single Being and as part of the whole Causative Order. Science lacks a technology for such change and the mystical techniques are hit-and-miss and require a life-time or more of training.
The techniques of The Insight Project however are proving to be a most effective method for each of us to discover our full potential. The Insight Project works to realize and integrate the Higher Self, the true spiritual Being. We can be at rest in this awareness, like the eye of a storm. The world whirls all around, in the field of consciousness. This "I" is both an observer and a constant center of all the activity. It is only at this center, having dis-identified from the many controlling forces, that the person achieves freedom, to master, direct and utilize them. Being at the center, the observer can also be seen as the experiencer, able to more fully experience inner and outer events and to become unafraid of living. The free person can move around in his personality and in the world, instead of being locked into fixed and safe patterns, and in that way can be in touch with unlimited potential for experience
The The Insight Project course contains the fundamental principles and techniques. You learn to apply the Biofeedback Monitor in the context of profound personal development procedures. On a well-proven gradient you gradually become skilled in working on your own with the techniques; in addition at all times you have as much support as you require by e-mail correspondence.
Starting The Insight Project
Pre-requisite for starting work on The Insight Project is either having made good progress with previous personal development such that you feel emotionally stable yet spontaneous and with a clear sense of spiritual identity - the practical exercises (Explorations) given in Transforming the Mind help to provide a preparation for The Insight Project.
The Insight Project is a set of analytical procedures that you apply to yourself, with the aid of biofeedback monitoring, in order to differentiate the spiritual part of your being from the mental and physical. Discover your Higher Self and its capability of Full Realization.
The Insight Project courses cover everything you need to know, from learning to do basic procedures in self-administered sessions, through to the most advanced techniques for spiritual self-realization available in the world at this time.
You can purchase Part I - Meta-Programming, work through it over a couple of years, then purchase the subsequent Parts II-V, which will typically provide five years of intensive spiritual development in total, plus remain as a wonderful resource for ever after. Alternatively you can buy the whole package of insight Parts I-V Complete and save $488. See this page for more information about the five Parts and the special package.
After your online purchase, you download the course in PDF format, which you can view in the freely available Adobe Acrobat Reader. Or you may like to print out a copy - or print the pages you need as you go along.
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Order the Part I - Meta-Programming course with a payment of US$ 297.00  |
Part I is likely to take at least 12 months of regular sessions to complete, and the whole project typically 5 years. The payment includes personal email support by Peter Shepherd throughout your studies and work on the project. Your purchase is made in your local language and currency. We will confirm your purchase by email and supply the download link for all the materials.
The recommended ThetaMeter™ is a small, hand held device that measures subtle changes in the electrical resistance of the body that occur in the presence of stress and emotional arousal, including changes that are below the awareness of the client, i.e. subconscious stimulations. Therefore it is a form of Galvanic Skin Response (GSR) biofeedback monitor. It is carefully designed to serve as a valuable guide in a remarkable number of healing modalities--from EFT, TFT and EMDR to traumatic incident reduction-- and is ideal for use on The Insight Project. It allows one to detect and pinpoint the presence of emotional "charge," and verify the progress of its resolution - a tremendous advantage for the practitioner. Note: on The Insight Project you are both the practitioner and the client at the same time, i.e. it is a self-delivered method of personal development.
The ThetaMeter™ will detect the presence of, and measure the progressive release of, suppressed emotions. This makes it invaluable for guiding the practitioner through the successive steps of any effective therapy or application of positive psychology. Furthermore, with skill - and full training is provided as part of the Insight Project - the Emotional Response Indicator can be used to assess a number of likely or possible issues, and ascertain the one with the most "emotional charge" at the moment that is most accessible to be effectively handled. It will also show when you - the client - is upset; and it will indicate when you are "released" from the issue being handled.
"In my view, The Insight Project is without doubt the safest, soundest and most powerful method of self-development available. After searching for countless years and unsuccessfully trying many different approaches, I've finally found my path. Peter's personal coaching has made possible for me to achieve in a few months what I thought would take a lifetime."
If you feel this path may be for you, please contact Peter Shepherd, Supervisor of The Insight Project.
Q: What I am really looking for is a way to tap into the real me without opening up doors that can possibly send me into some mental institution. Is this possible?
A: The Insight Project techniques are 'light' - you never get into traumatic incidents because you stay in present time and the questions are oriented that way. It's enlightening, like meditation but more directed and effective.
Q: What about this spiritual business. Out of body, telepathy and so on. It seems to me that we are not just a being inside a skull that is trapped but rather very human also, any comments?
A: The spiritual aspect of self is relatively abstract, it is non-verbal and can only be accessed intuitively. One can project a remote viewpoint from the body, and telepathy happens all the time for everyone, though usually not noticed (again because it is non-verbal and right-brain accessed and we live in a left-brain culture). The brain holds our experience and behavior patterns and we could not function as humans without it, of course. The human also comes, as with any animal, with a genetic inheritance, sexual and survival drives, and lots more. Humans are like speaking, reasoning chimps - i.e. very intelligent, with or without the 'spirit' or higher consciousness. Most-times we are asleep spiritually anyway and live our lives largely on this human level. The Insight Project aims to transcend our animal and cultural as well as our mental and spiritual conditioning.
Q: I would like to clarify something about the Insight Project course you offer. If a person decides not to use Emotional Response Indicator then how much benefit can he get by using the course? Please specify in percentage, like 80%, 90% or whatever, and you might add anything else as well that is useful in this context.
A: The danger of not using a meter is that the procedures would most likely be done in a purely intellectual manner. If we could work out our case intellectually, we would have done so already! The meter exposes when one's rationalizations are in error, in relation to inner knowing and suppressed emotional content. It would be possible for somebody who is keenly aware of their body biofeedback and is able to use their emotional awareness as a source of intuitive wisdom - that's really what the meter does - but such a state is normally achieved by doing The Insight Project, so it's chicken and egg. But yes, it's therefore possible. For a typical person, however, I'd expect only maybe 40% of gains compared with using a meter, and that mainly from using the information to help in reassessment of many life issues, if done in an objective and honest manner. That is, the information itself is of value, not just the techniques that require the use of a meter.
Q: What other approaches towards enlightenment do you recommend?
A: I recommend the methods described on our free Love is All You Need program, which helps you experience the state of unconditional love - key to lasting joy and fulfillment in your life.
Q: How long does The Insight Project take?
A: Working straight through the Part I The Insight Project course will take at east a year in most cases, but that isn't really the point. As you go you build up a collection of tools that can be used as appropriate at any time to handle the issues that you are dealing with right now, rather than on a preset agenda. So these are tools for life. The Insight Project offers a structured and continuing process of profound learning - here in this life rather than through many lifetimes of trial and error.
Remember though, it's a gradient thing, the insights come along the way, not just at the end, so life will get continually better for you and you'll carry the benefits into your following existence too.
Q: What exactly is the 'imprint phenomena'? Is it things we have taken from a source other than our own that have led to us getting stuck in this whole ball of wool in the first place?
A: Yes, it is misattributed ideas, beliefs, intentions and purposes, which have been accepted and identified with as though they were one's own. They may be valid or stupid or whatever, but the point is they are not yours and they are not applied consciously, leading to bypassed charge surrounding them.
Q: Is the 'Substitute Beingness' comprised purely of this imprint phenomena?
A: It may be a directly imprinted goal (through conditioning, heavy enforcement, etc) or a goal that is yours but heavily influenced by another's viewpoint or by prior imprinting/conditioning. The thing is, it's a biggie, it rules your life and awareness, and it's very heavily identified with and therefore is not visible to you. It's who you are that everyone else can see, but you're blissfully unaware that you're playing the role of this identity in every aspect of your life.
Q: If we are just recognizing things as imprinted, which seems to have the effect of disentangling us from that influence, then where does all the heavy attached charge go to? Does this also need to be handled so it doesn't hang around and have the chance of coming back to us?
A: Charge is erased by finding the truth. Charge is lies, alterations, negations, anything but the truth, and those lies are held in place by imprinted ideas accepted by a particular identity (sub-personality). When you realize and indicate the truth, or it becomes clear to you that something is not what it seemed, the charge has no more hold and the connection drops away. This includes all the trauma and frustrations (bypassed charge) that is experienced whenever that identity is in reactivation and being enacted.
Q: How much of The Insight Project is done with a meter and how much is just reading, affirmations, journaling or other non-metered work?
A: It's all done with a meter, after you have read the Introduction and studied the various methods that are applied. Affirmations and journaling are not part of the course.
Q: If done on a regular basis, how much time would be needed to get best results?
A: Daily session of about an hour, Mon-Fri say, about a year for each of the five Parts. It's a big project but you'll get gains and insights from the beginning, and they build up.
Q: Would the results be easily noticeable or would any change be so gradual such that progress would be un-noticed by the average user till months or years later?
A: When you get a big insight into your beliefs and way of being, which makes a big difference, both subjectively and other people who know you would notice. Little insights, too, add up, then you get the big ones. Feelings derive from beliefs and The Insight Project techniques therefore make a big difference in the way that you feel and act.
Q: Is The Insight Project fool-proof? does it require deep training or expensive coaching agreements after the fact to obtain a level of competence?
A: You need to be a reasonably intelligent and emotionally stable person - this is an advanced course. It requires a period of study, to understand the principles, and some time playing with the techniques and the meter to get the hang of what to do, until it comes easy... like riding a bike. There's no additional coaching expense, that's what you pay for really: my assistance all along the way, to help you understand and give you guidance if you don't know what to do next. I don't see your session notes, it's you who is responsible for your progress, but I do advise you whenever you need it.
Q: Does the meter need to be of a particular make or does it need to have particular controls?
A: It needs to be either the ThetaMeter™ Emotional Response Indicator, in our opinion the best value, which uses LEDs - or something similar (such as Clarity Meter, Ability Meter, Mindwalker, etc), which use a needle meter movement. You'll need adjustment for sensitivity and balance (to keep the needle on the dial).
Q: Is The Insight Project a full course in itself, i.e. having a beginning, middle, and ending?
A: Yes; though it's in five Parts, each Part has a clear end point where you know that it's finished, then you go on to the next Part.
Q: Are the results predictable or is it different for everyone?
A: Specific insights different for everyone, but overall progress of resolution of case is predictable and same for everyone. The project is organized in a very specific sequence to match that predictable unravelling of case (i.e. the mental and emotion blocks that obscure insight have a clear and certain structure).
Q: Would The Insight Project be effective in removing/resolving issues with money or abundance in general?
A: Whatever issues you have, which is where it's different for everyone in the specifics, are automatically addressed in the course, as you work through. Particular issues may have many different elements that make up the problem, and those elements would likely be addressed at different points of the course, so you get more and further progress with a specific issue as you progress. A very basic issue like havingness has many elements, and some are addressed early on. The Insight Project gets you to see the truth of things, at the level of awareness, responsibility and confront you have at the particular stage of your development, so you may have insights about havingness, and then later on, further and deeper insights.
Q: Does one work on specifics with The Insight Project or is it some kind of auto-whatever-comes-up-in-the-moment kind of thing?
A: It's both: each Level of the course deals with a specific 'angle' on your case. At the same time, what comes up next for you is what you deal with. When you get some way into the project and have learned and practiced the main techniques, there are tools for finding the next thing to run, corresponding to the most charged issue at present on your case, so you may move around the Levels, going back to previous ones when necessary.
Q: Is The Insight Project useful in stress management?
A: Yes, since internal conflicts between goals, identities and beliefs are what make up the subjective structure of stressful problems. The more basic course, the New Life Course, addresses life skills, such as stress management that deal with more objective, in the world issues. You can if you wish work through that course in parallel.
Q: Where do I start?
A: Well, if you've been viewing the site for a while now, I guess you've read at least some of 'Transforming the Mind'. That's the area that the Insight Project takes off from. It's a personal development course based on the principles of rational-emotive psychology, with elements of NLP as well. It helps to get a person thinking clearly and emotionally stable, which one needs to be before going on to the Insight Project. Part I is an in-depth, advanced course that moves into the area of transpersonal psychology and spiritual development, and includes the use of a Emotional Response Indicator, which is essential.
When you get onto The Insight Project, you'll need regular time to devote to that, preferably a session (15-90 minutes) every day.
Note that these courses are personal and spiritual development, they are not a substitute for one-to-one psychotherapy or medical treatment, when these are needed. Though there is certainly a therapeutic element, because they are home-study these courses are for normally happy, healthy and stable individuals looking to enhance their quality of life further.
Q: Where does the name "Meta-Programming" come from?
A: In NLP a metaprogram is the particular way experience is filtered and perceived by an individual; this isn't hard wired, it can be revised. Meta-Programming is the process of creating a model of the structural patterns an individual uses to construct, maintain and reinforce their subjective reality. Metaprogramming is also a term used in computer programming and organizational management, referring to programs that supervise other programs, or to an objective designer and directorial role.
I use the word because it is appropriate to the course I designed, which encourages an external and directorial viewpoint toward the mind and its existing programs; to "go beyond" one's existing programming or life conditioning; to view, understand and transcend their structure and limitations. The higher consciousness being the programmer, established cognitive programs being the software, the cerebellum being the CPU. Metaprogramming, then, is a metacognitive function of mind, developing mindfulness or a witness viewpoint. Recently NLP itself is adopting that view - see here.
Can The Insight Project aid me in my journey? Yes, for sure, if you feel motivated to work hard at sorting out the real and deep issues that underlie your view of the world. The Insight Project exposes the conflicting intentions one is holding subconsciously that are resistant to your awareness. It clarifies your identity, beliefs and goals and leads to many insights of truth that would not otherwise be obtained, short of years of intensive meditation done well.
~ Questions & Answers ~
the Project developer and supervisor, Peter Shepherd...
(Please email me) if you have another question.
Also, see the FAQ on the Peter Shepherd biography page.
Further Information
Transforming the Mind is a discussion of the philosophical and psychological context of The Insight Project. It contains valuable information and many useful practical exercises, which serve as preparation for those interested in the spiritual path.
The Introduction to The Insight Project is excerpted from the introductory course materials, giving a detailed description of the principles on which the Insight Project techniques are based.
Part I of The Insight Project is presented in 10 Levels. Level 1 includes the necessary GSR biofeedback monitor training and Level 2 teaches the basic skills of the Project on which the more advanced Levels are based, including Indicator Technique.
The Insight Project includes incredibly effective ways of discovering the previously obscured truth underlying any issue - your truth, based on your intuitive insight, newly visible when all conditioned programming is stripped away. It requires familiarity with a Biofeedback Monitor. You can get some fantastic insights by learning and applying these initial materials, and then go on to the full course with considerable confidence.
A good idea of what we are dealing with on The Insight Project may be obtained from the article A Crazy World But a Great Game Too! by Peter Shepherd.
What is the Higher Self? The article Enlightenment Explained by George A Lareau is a beautifully accurate description of what I would call the Higher Self, one's source awareness. To be enlightened is to have ready access to this state of knowing, and life never again seems so serious or limiting. The fixed ideas, identities and solutions of the past are gradually stripped away with The Insight Project techniques so that one is no longer carrying the burden of Time but nevertheless has all the benefit of life's experience.
Persuasion and evaluation are no part of The Insight Project; quite the opposite in fact. A good description of the subtle and not so subtle techniques of overt persuasion and brainwashing that are being used on the public today is this article: The Battle For Your Mind, by Dick Sutphen.
Cultural conditioning comes in many forms, however, and is not necessarily intended to be manipulative. Our everyday language - its definitions and habitual syntax - tends to blinker our thinking so that we hold fixed ideas and do not look at the world objectively and with an open mind.
Why the Insight Project is a unique way of self-development
By Erick Espinar-Mick
Contrary to most religions, movements and philosophies, The Insight Project presents us with ideas that don't require the adoption of new beliefs. Specially of those which cannot be verified by oneself or that are not backed up by rationality and science. The Cognitive Sciences and Transformational Psychology provide the Insight Project with sound principles and tools that can be trusted by their objectivity until they can be verified by the practitioner himself.
The Insight Project contains no bullshit or wild promises about spiritual states to be attained. Nor does it try to explain reality by creating a new cosmology (that would invariable be refuted in the future as knowledge evolves). In that sense The Insight Project deals primarily with the here and now, striving towards the acknowledgment of reality as it is.
This grasping of reality as it is, beyond all pre-conditioned ideas as how it should be, is what provides the firm possibility of results, since only now are we facing the real problem. The Insight Project doesn't provide an escape from the world, like many "spiritual" disciplines, rather it affords the means to face the demons of imprintedness and irrationality. By remaining in the world and challenging its views under the light of rationality, the practitioner achieves freedom from the barriers that hindered his experience (and enjoyment) of reality.
A further benefit of this down-to-earth approach is that it could be of benefit to everyone, not only those interested in spiritual development. Everybody wants to be happy, and in this time of media-conditioned superman expectations, almost everyone has difficulty with self-acceptance and frustrated intentions. The Insight Project's lack of religious flavor and its eschewal of pseudo-spirituality gives it a universal appeal, capable of reaching a wide array of people with different purposes and backgrounds.
Some of the key ideas contained in The Insight Project, which make it a uniquely workable path are:
- The all-important role of the Subconscious in determining our psychology.
- The multiplicity of identities (or masks) within us, and the possibility of transcending them and reaching our real self.
- The acknowledgment of our self-created conundrum and its safe-solutions to the problems of survival.
- The acknowledgment of the imprint phenomena as one of the main enemies of self-realization.
The Path of Love
Peter Shepherd is interviewed by Dr. Keith Scott-Mumby, who asks about his background, how and why Trans4mind was founded, what spiritual growth means in practice, and the heights that can be reached with The Insight Project, an advanced course which Peter developed and supervises. Here is the audio (1 hour)...
The Insight Project Home Page | Trans4mind | Email Peter Shepherd