.png)
If you've ever tried to fix something about yourself by focusing on the visible symptoms, the anxiety, the reaction, the pattern you keep falling into. You have probably noticed that it works for a while, and then it doesn’t. Or it takes constant effort to maintain.
Or it shifts into something else that looks different on the surface, but feels strangely familiar underneath. That’s because you’re working on the leaves and branches while the root system stays exactly the same.
Think of it this way: everything you can see about a tree, its size, its strength, whether it’s thriving or struggling, the fruit it produces is determined by what’s happening underground. The roots are doing the foundational work. They draw up nutrients, establish stability, and create the conditions that allow everything above ground to function. If the root system is tangled, shallow, or pulling from the wrong sources, no amount of attention to the visible tree will change that. You’re just managing symptoms while the underlying structure remains untouched.
The roots were built when the tree was young
When you were younger, from early childhood through to young adulthood your subconscious mind was building its root system.
- Learning what was safe and what wasn’t.
- What worked and what didn’t.
- What helped you get through difficult situations, and what left you exposed.
Those patterns made sense at the time. They were the best responses available given the environment you were in, and they kept you functioning. The problem is that those root connections don’t automatically update when your circumstances change.
They stay in place.
So you can be years or even decades on from those early experiences, with a completely different life, and still find yourself responding in ways that belong to an earlier version of you. Your conscious mind has developed. You understand more, you see things differently, you can recognise when something doesn’t match your current reality.
But the root system, your subconscious mind, is still operating on what it learned back then.
So you end up in situations where you know one thing for example this person isn’t a threat, this situation is manageable, this reaction doesn’t fit and yet your body responds anyway.
Because the roots are still pulling from the same place.
Why the roots don’t update on their own
Your subconscious didn’t learn through explanation. It learned through repeated experience.
It doesn’t revise those patterns just because time has passed or because you can now explain where they came from. This is why you can understand your behaviour completely, talk it through, make sense of it yet still find yourself right back in the same response when the situation arises.
The understanding is happening in the tree, where you can see it and think about it. But the response is being generated by the roots, which operate on a completely different system.
Trimming, strengthening, reconnecting
What the roots need is the same thing that created them in the first place: experience.
New experiences that allow the subconscious to build something different. To form new connections that make more sense for who you are now and the life you’re actually living.
Granted some roots can be pruned back, because they were responses to situations that no longer exist. Some need strengthening, because they support you but have been overshadowed by stronger patterns and others need to be built for the first time.
This isn’t something the conscious mind can do on its own, no matter how much you understand or how determined you are, because the roots, the subconscious mind, isn't responding to logic or explanation.
Why I work this way
Most approaches focus on the tree, on what’s visible. They help you manage thoughts, behaviours, and reactions, and that can be useful, understanding has it's place and is useful. But if the root system hasn’t changed, you’re working against something underneath the whole time. Trying to override automatic responses takes effort, and it’s difficult to sustain. I’d genuinely rather work with the roots.
Because when the root system begins to change, the tree doesn’t need forcing. It grows differently from the ground up.
So, if you’ve found yourself stuck in the space between knowing and actually responding differently, it may be that the part of you that learned those patterns hasn’t yet had the chance to learn something new.
Nourish the roots, and the tree will grow. This is how it all fits together
If you're curious about what working at the subconscious level looks like in practice, you can read more about sessions here, or get in touch via the contact form.
If you're curious about what working at the subconscious level looks like in practice, you can read more about sessions here, or get in touch via the contact form.