Guided imagery is a learned technique that teaches patients to guide their minds to more relaxed and focused states. This can directly affect brain and physical functioning as imagining relaxed states (such as sitting calmly on a beach) can have the same physiological effects -including lowered blood pressure and heart rate- as actual relaxation (i.e. actually sitting calmly on a beach.)
Find more natural remedies for depression.
Guided imagery is a learned technique that teaches patients to guide their minds to more relaxed and focused states. This can directly affect brain and physical functioning as imagining relaxed states (such as sitting calmly on a beach) can have the same physiological effects -including lowered blood pressure and heart rate- as actual relaxation (i.e. actually sitting calmly on a beach.)
Find more natural remedies for depression.
Guided Imagery is a gentle but powerful technique that helps guide your imagination towards a specific goal. It engages the unconscious and preconscious mind to help with conscious goals such as achieving fertility. Guided Imagery involves an introduction of images into the mind that can lead it through a positive journey towards a desired goal.
Guided Imagery is a blend of mediation and self-hypnosis. Its appealing because it does not require any experience or skill on the part of the user. One can invent their own imagery or listen to a imagery that has been created by someone else, usually focused on a specific issue such as fertility.
Principles of Guided Imagery
Mind-Body connection is the basis of the guided imagery methodology. In the same way that the picture of a chocolate cake can get us to start salivating, images of relaxation, success and fertility can move the body into achieving those states. The “Altered State” is the state of relaxed focus that one is achieving during guided imagery. This state allows you to command the inner strength and will to achieve your goal. A “locus of control” factor is another key to guided imagery’s success. Since the user is in charge of the guided imagery session and the how and when to use it, it makes one feel that they have a higher sense of control their challenge and the solution. This feeling in itself fosters higher self-esteem and sense of mastery over the environment.
Guided Imagery is a blend of mediation and self-hypnosis. Its appealing because it does not require any experience or skill on the part of the user. One can invent their own imagery or listen to a imagery that has been created by someone else, usually focused on a specific issue such as fertility involves an introduction of images into the mind that can lead it through a positive journey towards a desired goal.
Guided imagery is a learned technique that teaches patients to guide their minds to more relaxed and focused states. This can directly affect brain and physical functioning as imagining relaxed states (such as sitting calmly on a beach) can have the same physiological effects -including lowered blood pressure and heart rate- as actual relaxation (i.e. actually sitting calmly on a beach.)
Guided imagery is defined by the Academy for Guided Imagery as A wide variety of techniques, including simple visualization and direct suggestion using imagery, metaphor and story-telling, fantasy exploration and game playing, dream interpretation, drawing, and active imagination where elements of the unconscious are invited to appear as images that can communicate with the conscious mind. (“What is Guided Imagery,” 2009)
Guided Imagery therapists bring a client to a relaxed state of mind and body, and then focus their client’s attention on the images associated with the issue they are dealing with.
Licensed health care practitioners, educators, and wellness and life coaches are excellent candidates to learn guided imagery techniques. Typically a health practitioner, such as a therapist, would use guided imagery techniques as part of therapy. GI Therapist Terry Reid suggested that clients have at least three guided imagery sessions to be effective (T, Reid, personal communication, August 31, 2009). She also emphasized that guided imagery is not a therapy model; instead it is an educational model. The therapist does not tell the client what to do – the therapist guides the client to discover the answers within oneself. The therapist also does not use “I” statements during an imagery session – she is trying to avoid having the client go into the “cognitive realm” (ibid.).
1 Interactive Guided Imagery Therapy with Medical Patients: Predictors of Health Outcomes (2005). The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine 11(1) 69-83.
2 Gordon, J.S (2008). Unstuck: Your Guide to the Seven-Stage Journey Out of Depression.The Penguin Press.
Guided Imagery can be used to reduce not only depression, but anxiety, stress and other diseases for which these are symptoms.
There are no reported side effects to using guided imagery and thus can be considered safe to be used in conjunction with other depression therapies.
One study exposed 323 medical patients to Interactive Guided Imagery (IGI) in the form of mental images used to cultivate healing intentions for the patients. All patients reported understanding the nature of their health problem through the use of IGI and more than help reported moderate to definite benefits in reducing their symptoms of anxiety and depression.1
Guided imagery is a learned technique that teaches patients to guide their minds to more relaxed and focused states. This can directly affect brain and physical functioning as imagining relaxed states (such as sitting calmly on a beach) can have the same physiological effects -including lowered blood pressure and heart rate- as actual relaxation (i.e. actually sitting calmly on a beach.)
Find more natural remedies for depression.
Guided by an instructor, recorded tapes, or even written literature, patients can mentally walk themselves into a calm, relaxed and focused states. Imagery practices can directly affect the autonomic nervous system and physical functioning. Creating these mentally calm states can decrease factors linked with depression such as stress, pain and anxiety.**Guided Imagery can also affect the immune system.2 The brain centers used for imagery are connected with the hypothalamus, which is responsible in part for controlling the immune system. Physical illnesses are highly correlated with depression. Guided Imagery can bolster against these illnesses by stimulating the immune system.
