Early in their lives, from about birth to age twelve, children pass through roughly seven stages of development. These stages have to do with themes such as belonging, trust, safety, empowerment, self-expression, and so on. Typically, some of these stages go well for the child whereas others are more difficult. If a given stage is difficult, the child may not fully learn the psychological tasks of that stage. For example, a child who experiences significant illness in the first year of life is more likely to feel anxiety about need fulfillment than another child who does not have the same experience. (This is because need fulfillment is the theme of roughly the first year, and problems during that year tend to impact that particular theme.)
Everyone is shaped by these developmental stages. In fact, these stages are the single most important factor in determining a person’s character. This is the essential basis of modern psychology, and it’s an idea supported by enough research – a mountain of research – as to be beyond dispute. Essentially, our basic character is formed by the time we are four years old. But our childhood development never unfolds perfectly. Everyone undergoes developmental themes that are less than ideal. When this happens, the child gets through the stage and moves on to the next one. The stage is left unfinished and the theme is incomplete. Children cannot afford to get stuck in one stage too long, so they leave unfinished themes behind and try to catch up with them later.
Adolescence (which now spans from about age 9 to about age 32) is the developmental phase of catching up with and resolving unfinished themes. Starting around age nine – with a process known as brain pruning – children begin to revisit the unfinished themes of their earlier development. (They do this unconsciously, but it manifests as rapid mood cycling.) Because their parents typically are too invested in the child’s future and too biased toward particular outcomes, children often find that their parents are not so good at supporting them through this stage. So, children seek mentors.
A mentor is someone who can assist a child to complete their unfinished childhood themes and to further develop their character. After parenting, it is the most important role a human being can undertake (despite the low status it earns). A good mentor encourages a child to feel safe, to take appropriate risks, to express whatever remains unexpressed. Mentorship does not have to be a long-term intervention. A child can undergo a transformative experience in a single meeting with a good mentor. One outstanding experience is enough to complete the learning for an entire unfinished developmental stage.
Mentoring requires immense sensitivity and interpersonal skill. Just as a good mentor can profoundly influence a child, so can a poor one. An inappropriate mentorship experience can severely damage the psychological development of a child. Mentorship is a trust, a role that is profound and powerful.
The nervous system possess habits of consciousness and action. These are developmental, and might be (somewhat arbitrarily) grouped under four themes:
These imprints are learned in the first few years of life. They control a great deal of our behavior, emotion, and consciousness. The developmental features associated with the nervous system are among the most exhaustively researched aspects of psychology (especially with regard to trauma).
During the first four phases of childhood development, the four states of the nervous system are imprinted and tuned. This happens by way of parenting, immersion in the environment, genetic predisposition, and various other factors (some of which are still unknown).
A note to the research-minded: Since about 1900, the field of research into human development has evolved into a highly complex arena with many models, structures, and themes. For the purposes of this document, I use a model of development based on the Bodynamic system, which is a synthesis of various other models. This model, as with all others, is only one perspective and is subject to the strengths and limitations of all models. It is a map and not the territory.
The correlations between nervous system states, addictions, and developmental stages are my own contribution (and are based on clinical experience).
Belonging
Flight response is correlated with belonging (roughly from birth to one month). If an individual does not experience a sense of belonging, he or she will withdraw (psychologically and physically), and will seek ways of adapting through imagination and inner resourcing. (Cold hands and feet are one symptom of this withdrawal, as is adolescent cutting.) In adolescence, this adaptive mechanism makes such individuals prone to hallucinogen addiction, addiction to the imagination, and addiction to the technologies of fantasy.
Need Fulfilment
Freeze response is correlated with need fulfilment (roughly one month to eight months). If an individual is abused or neglected during this period (any period, really), he or she will adapt by surrendering needs or fixating on specific needs (such as food). Surrender and fixation are two aspects of nervous system freezing. Surrender and fixation are two aspects of opiate addictions, which are developmentally predisposed during this period of development. If individuals with lingering vulnerabilities from this stage go on to develop technology addictions in adolescence, those addictions will be focused toward online shopping, text messaging, image viewing (e.g. pornography) and television watching.
Autonomy
The developmental stage of negotiating the relationship between self and other (which occupies the period roughly from 8 months to 1.5 years) involves significant milestones of movement, exploration, personal challenge, and orienting. If an individual does not receive balanced imprinting at this stage, he or she will tend to become hyper-vigilant and hyperactive (not all hyperactivity is derived from this stage, however). One symptom of this adaptation is a craving for excitement and newness. If such individuals go on to develop addictions in adolescence, those addictions are more likely to involve stimulants. If the addictions involve technology, the individual will likely be drawn to stimulating video games, online gambling, and extreme immersive environments.
Will and Power
Between two and four years of age, individuals negotiate their relationship to their own power. It has been well-established that domestic violence and corporal punishment at this age are highly correlated with developmental and lifespan difficulties. Such difficulties are not only psychological: the risk of adolescent and adult obesity is increased (by fifty per cent) by the experience of childhood neglect. The fight response is developed and tuned at this stage. For those who will develop addictions in adolescence, the experience of neglect and abuse of power in childhood creates the predisposition toward alcoholism. This is why the rates of alcoholism are so high in war-torn countries and in cultures where cultural power has been destroyed. In terms of technology addictions, such predispositions are likely to involve addictions to video games involving fighting.
The Link to Adolescent Addictions
Addiction involves uncompleted impulses and fractured imprinting typically derived from childhood experience (this is not universally the case, but is almost universally the case). The nature of the addiction involves the way in which the addiction completes, temporarily, the unfinished imprinting:
The more childhood difficulty an individual experiences, the more likely the individual is to seek multiple addictions in adolescence.
A Note on Predisposition
Adolescence begins with the brain pruning stage at roughly age eleven and continues until the end of the twenties (for the youth of today). This long period of development involves the integration of previous developmental stages in which the environment is the primary influence (parenting, peers, family, and so on). Incomplete or fragmented childhood imprinting re-emerges as adolescent psychological difficulty. Addiction is one method of easing the stress of such unfinished imprinting – by completing it temporarily. (Another method involves cultural inclusion and group formation; more on these later). In this context, predispositions (such as genetic predispositions) exert a small influence (perhaps ten per cent).
The only way for an adolescent to develop integration, containment, and identity is through mentorship. The impulse of kids to form groups is healthy. In evolutionary terms, groups of young people seek leadership from adult mentors. In the absence of healthy adult mentors, adolescents form a youth gang, which comes to be led by the adolescent among them who is most aggressive, gregarious, or risk-prone. The absence of mentorship for adolescents is the most serious problem in our society today. Absence of mentorship is a primary cause of the addictions problem among both youth and adults, the suicide problem among youth, the homelessness problem in youth and adults, and the depression and anxiety problem of many people.
A mentor is someone who can assist a child to complete their unfinished childhood themes and to further develop their character. After parenting, it is the most important role a human being can undertake (despite the low status it earns). A good mentor encourages an adolescent (or child) to feel safe, to take appropriate risks, to express whatever remains unexpressed. Mentorship does not have to be a long-term intervention. An adolescent can undergo a transformative experience in a single meeting with a good mentor. One outstanding experience is enough to complete the learning for an entire unfinished developmental stage. (This is a possible but not common experience.)
Mentoring requires immense sensitivity and interpersonal skill. Just as a good mentor can profoundly influence a child or adolescent, so can a poor one. An inappropriate mentorship experience can severely damage the psychological development of a child. Mentorship is a trust, a role that is profound and powerful. It is a gift offered to us by children. Usually, parents cannot fulfill the mentorship role, which requires a balance of deep caring and emotional neutrality. Parents possess deep caring, but they cannot be neutral about the choices their children make.
We live within a scientific context that is almost completely brain-centered. In many ways, our hyper-focus on the brain allows us to forget that the brain is only part of the larger nervous system, which in turn is part of the body-mind. Body and mind, as research consistently affirms, cannot be separated. And healthy development, of course, involves the entire body-mind.
One of the ways to simplify the immense complexities of the body-mind system is to use terminologies of the nervous system. These in turn can be grouped into mentorship roles:
Mentorship involves both physical and psychological work. The nervous system of the developing adolescent must be addressed on a physical level, through activity, as well as on an interpersonal level.