Cycles of Development: A Journey Through Your Stages

Developmental cycles theory, first set out by Pamela Levin and developed for parents by Jean Illsley Clarke, gives us a map — not a prescriptive one, not a chart that tells you where you went wrong, but a compassionate framework for understanding how we became who we are (Clarke, 1978).

The core idea: each stage of development carries specific psychological tasks. When we move through those stages with enough support, we internalise the beliefs and capacities that stage was built to provide. When we don't — because of circumstances, trauma, illness, or simply a lack of attuned caregiving — we carry those unmet needs forward.

In Transactional Analysis, these developmental tasks map closely onto the formation of the life script — the unconscious conclusions we drew about ourselves, others, and the world (Stewart & Joines, TA Today, Lifespace, 2012). The stage of "Being" is where the most fundamental script decisions get made: I exist and I'm welcome here — or not. Everything else builds on that foundation.

The stages don't close when childhood ends. They cycle back. Therapy, and the specific kind of inner child work that TA makes possible, offers a second chance at the tasks.

The Cycles of Development at a Glance

Clarke's cycles of development run through six stages from birth to adolescence, and each stage has its own developmental task. She later set them out with Connie Dawson in Growing Up Again (Clarke & Dawson, 1998).

The cycle doesn't stop at adolescence. Clarke's model carries on into adult stages she calls Interdependence and, at the end of life, Integration (Bredehoft, 2023).

Being (0–6 months): Am I safe? Do I exist? Will my needs be met?

The first task is simply to be. Infants who are held, responded to, and welcomed learn early on that the world is safe enough and that their existence has value. This is the foundation of what TA calls basic OKness — the felt sense of "I'm OK."

Doing (6–18 months): Can I explore? Is it okay to be curious?

As mobility arrives, the task becomes exploration. Children encouraged to move, touch, and discover build confidence in their capacity to engage. Those who were over-restricted, or left without enough supervision, may carry a quiet uncertainty about whether venturing out is safe.

Thinking (18 months – 3 years): Can I think for myself? Are my ideas okay?

Language arrives, and with it the beginnings of autonomous thought. The child begins to say "no," to assert preferences, to form their own view of things. This is not defiance — it is development. Support here builds trust in one's own mind. Its absence creates adults who frequently defer to others, even when something feels wrong.

Identity and Power (3–6 years): Who am I? Can I be powerful and still be loved?

Play, imagination, and social identity come to the foreground. Children need to discover who they are, distinct from their caregivers, and to know that this separateness doesn't threaten belonging.

Structure (6–12 years): Can I learn? Do rules make sense? Am I competent?

The task is learning to function in the wider world — school, rules, peers, responsibilities. Children need clear, consistent structure and genuine recognition of their growing competencies.

Identity, Sexuality, and Separation (adolescence): Who am I becoming? Is my body okay? Can I belong and still be myself?

The adolescent reworks all previous stages at a deeper level and adds the tasks of sexual identity and genuine separation from caregivers. This is one of the most vulnerable periods for unmet needs to surface — particularly around the self-esteem tasks left incomplete earlier.

A Reflective Questionnaire

Take a moment with each question. There are no correct answers, only honest ones.

Being

• When I'm distressed, can I allow myself to be comforted — by a friend, a therapist, or even myself?
• Do I fundamentally believe I deserve to take up space in the world?

Doing

• Do I feel free to explore new ideas, places, or ways of being without excessive fear?
• When I make a mistake, is it evidence of incompetence — or just part of learning?

Thinking

• Do I trust my own perceptions, or do I frequently defer to others even when something feels off?
• Can I hold an opinion without needing it validated by the people around me?

Identity and Power

• Can I be assertive — express a need, hold a limit, disagree — without fearing it will destroy the relationship?
• Do I have a reasonably clear sense of who I am, separate from my roles and responsibilities?

Structure

• Do I have healthy internal structure — can I begin tasks, follow through, manage time — or do I rely heavily on external pressure?
• Can I follow reasonable rules without resentment, and question unreasonable ones without guilt?

Identity, Sexuality, and Separation

• Do I have a relationship with my body that feels, on most days, like one of respect?
• Can I be close to the people I love without losing track of myself?

What to Do With What Arises

If this questionnaire surfaces something — a recognition, a discomfort, a question you've been circling for years — that's information, not a problem.

The developmental lens is not about assigning blame. Caregivers were doing what they could with what they had. The point is not to trace every difficulty back to a childhood wound and leave it there.

The point is to see clearly where unmet needs still live — and to decide, consciously, to tend to them. Through therapy, through practice, through the kinds of relationships that allow us to complete what was left unfinished. This is the territory that attachment-focused therapy and Transactional Analysis are specifically designed to address.

Levin and Clarke call this recycling: not regression, but return. The stages aren't closed when childhood ends. They're waiting.

How Recycling Works in Therapy

Recycling is one of the most hopeful ideas in TA. People keep forming new patterns, new relational expectations and new beliefs about what is safe throughout adulthood. What was not received in childhood can, in part, be received later through consistent, attuned relational experience.

Therapy is one context where this kind of recycling can happen. The therapeutic relationship provides, over time, the consistent attunement, non-reactive presence, and honest engagement that certain developmental stages needed and didn't get. You don't go back to being an infant — but the Adapted Child does get to encounter something different, and something different can gradually become felt as true rather than intellectually affirmed.

In practice, this looks different for different stages. For the "Being" stage, recycling often happens through the simple experience of being held in the relationship — the therapist's consistent presence, their warmth, their continued engagement even when sessions are difficult. For the "Thinking" stage, it happens when your perceptions are taken seriously, when you're invited to think for yourself rather than guided toward a predetermined interpretation.

The Permission, Protection, and Potency triad in TA describes what the therapist provides to make recycling possible: permission to have the needs that were originally denied, protection in the process of surfacing them, and the potency (skill and presence) to actually hold the work.

This is not quick work, and it doesn't work the same way for everyone. For many people, though, it shifts the script beliefs themselves instead of adding new behaviour on top of old patterns.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do developmental cycles relate to Transactional Analysis?

Clarke's framework and TA describe overlapping territory. In TA, the life script — the unconscious life plan formed in childhood — reflects exactly which developmental tasks were and weren't supported. The "Being" stage maps onto the most fundamental script decision: whether basic OKness was established. Transactional Analysis therapy often works directly with these early layers.

What if I recognise multiple unmet needs across several stages?

That's more common than people expect. Needs rarely go unmet in isolation — if the emotional environment was difficult, multiple stages will show traces of it. Therapy doesn't require you to address everything at once. It usually begins where the most present pain is and works from there.

Can adults really rework developmental tasks?

Yes, in part. People keep forming new patterns throughout life, and what was not received in childhood can, in part, be received later through consistent, attuned relationships. Therapy is one place where this can happen. Inner child work is specifically designed to address developmental gaps.

How is this different from childhood trauma therapy?

Not every developmental gap constitutes trauma. Sometimes needs simply weren't met due to circumstances, a parent's own limitations, or unavoidable life events. The developmental lens is gentler than the trauma lens for exactly this reason — it asks "what was needed and wasn't available?" rather than "what went wrong?" Both questions can be useful; the right one depends on the person and the experience.

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