In this exclusive interview with Esther Veltheim, the visionary behind the BreakThrough System, we explore her transformative journey from personal struggles to assisting people through theirs. Esther reveals the pivotal moments and insights that shaped her unique approach to healing and personal growth. MysticMag has the pleasure.
Can you give me some insight into your professional journey and the challenges you had to go through to get to where you are today?
My work was really born from my own desperation and battle with myself. Throughout my journey, I had many teachers, from my grandfather to various people I met along the way. I was always searching for another way, a way to help myself. I tried different forms of therapy, but it always felt like something was missing. There were questions I needed to explore for myself.
About 30 years ago, I met Ramesh Balsekar in India, and he said something that profoundly impacted me. He talked about the horizontal functioning of the mind and the vertical functioning of the mind. This concept made so much sense to me. The horizontal mind, or what I call the hand-me-down mind, functions in line with ancestral, collective, and generational ways of thinking and rules for living. It dictates how life should and should not be and who we are and who we need to become. In contrast, when we are very young, we have the vertical functioning mind, which is tabla rasa; clear, spontaneous, and totally curious.
For me, the challenge was understanding how the clarity of a child’s mind becomes the complicated adult mind. Ramesh’s explanation helped me formulate the work I do today.
What is the BreakThrough System?
The BreakThrough System is a process of self-inquiry that is both individual and communal. While we often think of self-inquiry as a solitary activity, the BreakThrough System emphasizes the great value of working together with others, as we always need our catalyst. In our everyday lives, the horizontal functioning of the mind is tricky, sneaky, and complicated. However, when we work together, our explorations become more childlike and curious. The BreakThrough System teaches us to use our minds differently, employing what Sherlock Holmes referred to as “backwards reasoning.”
In our goal-oriented society, we are conditioned to reason forwards and conditionally: we are convinced that certain conditions must be met before we can feel safe or happy. “Before I can feel safe such-and-such must happen!” “Until I have such-and-such I will not be happy!” This creates a life focused on achieving specific experiences and avoiding others. Our whole orientation is anti-life, anti-change, anti ups and downs, anti what is natural to us.
In the BreakThrough System, we start from a place of struggling with ourselves and then move backwards. Instead of trying to fix problems by moving forward, we question if the problem is a problem at all. For instance, rather than assuming something is a problem, we ask, “What if this isn’t a problem?” This process involves asking simple questions that reveal the contradictory beliefs and circular reasoning in our minds.
For example, we might say, “I want to be free!” but in hand-me-down mind logic we have the condition, “Before I can be free I must have financial stability!” In other words ‘Control is a prerequisite to freedom.” As we explore, ask questions, and investigate our connotations, again and again, we realize that the mind is at war with itself. As we explore and question and see the totally contradictory nature of the mind, it becomes blatantly obvious that we spend our whole lives blaming ‘out there’ when, in fact, the battle within our own mind pre-exists any person, event or circumstance that comes our way. We also become very clear on the fact that we did not cause the mind to think this way and neither did anyone else. This insight brings deep compassion and, together, the understanding, and the compassion give way to more and more clarity. We notice our behavior and our thinking in a very different, non-intellectual, non-analytical way, and this ‘noticing’ registers in the myelin sheath of the nervous system, where the conditioning is stored. Increasingly, the nervous system self-adjusts in response to different life situations. This allows the childlike mind – curious, spontaneous, and free – to flourish again. Using this childlike mind is akin to exercising a long-unused muscle, gradually regaining its strength.
Curiosity becomes a central part of this exploration, leading to greater understanding and a flourishing of our innate curiosity. In essence, the BreakThrough System is an exploration in that sense.
Can you walk me through one of your sessions?
It’s challenging to describe a typical session because each one is highly spontaneous and unplanned. The nature of this work means that no two sessions are alike, as they depend entirely on the individual I’m working with at the time.
Unlike traditional therapeutic approaches, we don’t go into sessions with predetermined expectations or specific agendas. Instead, we address whatever arises in the moment. This method contrasts sharply with analytical approaches that might delve into a person’s past or childhood experiences.
Our sessions employ backwards deductive reasoning, which means we work backwards from the current struggle or issue rather than trying to fix problems through forward-thinking solutions. This involves asking simple, insightful questions that help uncover the root of the issue, revealing the contradictory nature of the hand-me-down functioning of the mind.
The process is fluid and responsive to the immediate needs and circumstances of the person I’m working with, making each session a unique and deeply personal journey.
What classes do you offer and what can people hope to learn through them?
In our Breakthrough 1 class, we have a unique 7-step process. We begin by asking participants to identify a situation they’re struggling with and refine it down to just 3 sentences, and then even more than that. This process itself teaches them to use their minds in a different way.
We then explore these 7 steps, each one deducted backwards from the previous one. By the time they reach the 7th step, the specific incident, person, or circumstance becomes irrelevant. This is because they’ve come to understand the real problem; deeply held convictions about life that they brought into the conflict.
Many of us spend our lives blaming external factors for our feelings. “You made me feel…” “Life makes me feel…” This exploration helps participants understand that it’s impossible to directly cause a person to feel a specific feeling. The universal hand-me-down conviction that life and other people cause us to feel a certain way, is the real issue. But just understanding this intellectually does nothing. We have to explore, to discover, to see with our own eyes. This is the only way these understandings go from head to heart.
The Breakthrough system empowers participants to take their own life into their own hands. And, paradoxically, this happens the more the realization deepens, that life happens all by itself.
What motivates you to keep doing the work you’re doing?
Well, I developed it for myself, so I continue doing it for myself, as well, because it’s a process of self-inquiry. That’s what keeps me motivated to continue with it.
Can you share a memorable success story?
BreakThrough is a big word and there’s no final point. That understanding of success would be in line with the goal-oriented mind. In the BreakThrough system, our work just takes us deeper and deeper. What is always very evident are shifts in perspective.
One recent example is a lady whom I worked with for the first time a few days ago. When she came back to me the next time, she told me “I can’t explain what happened intellectually, but everything seems to have shifted. How I see my mother now and how I interact with her is so different.”
There is a completely different way of seeing the world, which is very energetic and works at a neurological level. All this hand-me-down mind stuff is in a way locked in the myelin sheath of the nerves. The more we shed light on it, the more the system self-adjusts, quite spontaneously. We are not working to fix anything, but rather to shed light on what’s actually happening here and now, instead of on what we assume is happening.
In BreakThrough the goal is to shed light on all our limiting goals. We are not seeking to fix something. In BreakThrough, we begin from a place of curiosity and that just deepens and deepens. Where there is curiosity there is no blame, no assuming, just receptivity to anything that is possible.
To learn more about Esther and her work, you can visit www.breakthroughiba.com
