Spiritual Bypassing and 25 Stages to Spiritual Maturity

Spirituality is meant to heal, yet too often it becomes a way of hiding. Spiritual Bypassing and the 25 Stages of Spiritual Maturity exposes how practices of prayer, meditation, and devotion can mask unresolved wounds - silencing grief, denying anger, or excusing harm in the name of compassion. Drawing on psychology, wisdom traditions, and lived experience, Jim Berg, MD, reveals how bypassing distorts the path at every stage, and how honesty, shadow work, and integration can transform avoidance into awakening.

Beyond critique, this book offers a map: twenty-five stages that trace the arc of authentic spiritual maturity. From the wide-eyed awe of Innocent Wonder through the turbulence of Crisis of Faith and Encountering Shadow, into the ripening of Authentic Relationship and Compassion with Boundaries, and culminating in the elder stages of Wholeness and Radiant Presence, each stage is described with its tasks, risks, and fruits. Readers will find both mirrors for their own journey and guidance for navigating the inevitable pitfalls of growth.

This is not a manual of shortcuts or promises of perfection. It is a call to deeper honesty, to facing what we most fear to feel, and to discovering freedom in the very places we once tried to escape. Whether you are just beginning or walking as an elder, this book will help you recognize bypassing in yourself and others, cultivate practices of authenticity, and walk the path toward presence that heals not by avoiding life, but by embracing it fully.