Abstract
The author reports her experience of the est training and her Adult understanding of how it works. It is argued that the essence of the training consists of the systematic escalation and discounting of each trainee's Adapted Child, which eventually forces each trainee into the original Free Child pain which pre-dated and justified the formation of his or her Adapted Child. By this means a previously energetically avoided gestalt closure is forcibly achieved and a large amount of bound energy is released.