This is a key element in the overall process of raising our level of consciousness. The goal is to fully process our entire 'life story' this time around. Using a variety of traditional therapy models, both the positive and the negative experiences are examined. Relationships in our current life from the moment of birth to the present moment are looked at deeply. All of this material is referred to as our 'conditioning' in this life.
Our conditioning has a major impact on our current beliefs, emotions, and opinions about life. Our various behaviors and habits are affected as well. Our level of reactivity, anger, fear, self-doubt, and depression are all largely created by our life's experiences, as is our ability to love, to feel joy, and to be compassionate toward ourselves and others.
All of this is absorbed and incorporated into the body/mind organism that we refer to as 'ME'. Traditional Psychotherapy revisits and processes every aspect of our life story. Doing so enables us to let go of the negative emotional charge still carried by the difficult experiences. Additionally, we more fully integrate into our Being our positive experiences.
Traditional Psychotherapy helps us establish the 'witness'. This means that we become able to step back, out of the muck, and objectively look at our life, getting some distance from the emotional pit that these negative experiences can create in all of us.
Finally, with courage and hard work, we can let go of 'Our Story' and then we are able to live more fully in the present moment. We become able to simply watch what is arising in the 'now moment' without the experience of that moment being diluted by the negative energies from our past. We can drop our reactivity. We become able to respond to what arises in the now moment more skillfully. This enables us to radically increase the quality of our life, regardless of what arises.
Suggested Reading:
No Boundary: Eastern and Western Approaches to Personal Growth.
Ken Wilber, Shambhala/Boston & London: 1985