NOTE: To better understand this article you should read the article „Auditing“ first. There it is explained how auditing works.

The Bridge is an term for the process of development a person goes through in Scientology to return to his roots and native abilities. It is the result of extensive research in which innumerable auditing sessions were analysed to determine the most effective path for a majority of persons to attain a better state of being.

On the one hand it will be an individual path, but on the other hand it is a plotted path regarding certain points, as there are specific procedures and priorities that tell how to travel this bridge successfully.

In Scientology we assume that you yourself are an immortal being that has lost its individuality through several factors, such as traumatic incidents, and wants to regain it. The bridge is a way back to oneself.

A person who wants to improve himself through auditing gets interviewed at the outset. That means that a trained auditor asks questions of him which have to do with his current and past life. Important are incidents which have a negative or compulsive effect on the behaviour of the person, as well as the description of his current relations toward other people, the family history, diseases, etc.

With the help of the e-meter it is established whether the different areas of life are charged, how strong the charge is and how these areas of charge are connected to each other. From these data a case supervisor creates a first program in which the person and his auditor will take a look at his current situation in life and achieve some initial discharging. To go back to his earlier life and explore it, it is very important that the person gets along with his current life and can master it. If this is not the case, several supporting actions can be taken, such as the improvement of the person’s communication or a program to solve lingering conflicts in close relationships.

Now the person is prepared to move through the steps of the bridge. The first goal is the state of Clear, where the person becomes aware of himself and achieves certainty about himself. This state refers to the person’s first dynamic . The state of Clear is achieved by running through the so-called Grades until the level of Clear. This means that specific abilities are unburdened from charge and thus given back to the individual.

At this point it might be important to mention that in Scientology, the goal is not a „Super-human“ with fixed abilities. Instead the Bridge contains processes and techniques which help the individual going through them to become the being again who he originally was. He develops his abilities as himself. The result a person achieves is individual – it is a being who has found himself again and who can exist in harmony with himself and his environment.

The Grades lay open abilites which were subdued in the past by incidents, repressions and charge. They enable the individual to analyse himself and his relation toward other people and the environment and to free himself from inabilities.

Somewhere along this way the person achieves the above-described state of Clear, and this means for himself just a milestone on the path to himself.

Now the person is ready for the so-called Operating Thetan levels – the levels which unearth his abilities to operate as a free being in this universe. (The abbreviation Operating Thetan stands for „Operating Thetan„.) The person can now do it as a solo-auditor; he does not need an auditor anymore but works alone on his path. Of course the case supervisor is still there to assist him and gives him all the necessary steps at the right time or corrects him if there is a problem.

The further steps on the Bridge help the individual to take more and more responsibility for his games on all other dynamics (see the text on dynamics), for the past, the present and the future.

In order to achieve this, it is necessary that on the different levels the individual clears up all the charge which stems from foreign influences as well as straightening up his own incomplete games with all resulting consequences on himself and others. He can now exist fully and wholly in present time, self-determined and with a high level of responsibility toward himself and the environment.

The content of the Operating Thetan levels is confidential – they are given to the person when he is ready for it. The reason is simply that, according to the key-lock principle, the person will not be able to use the data properly until he is responsive to them in his development. Experience has shown that it is important to keep a certain sequence in working at the charge to get optimum results.

The Bridge as it was described until now is in actual fact just a part of the path, namely the part where the individual gets rid of the influences of the reactive mind by auditing. In addition to that there is training, which is intended to help him use his gained abilities in an optimum way. You can learn more about that in the article „Training in Scientology.“