In psycho-spiritual psychotherapy guided imagery is a powerful tool for transforming the inner world. Through suggestions, images, sometimes sketching narratives, the therapist guides and facilitates the client or the group through a journey, a process of inner discovery that is unique and magical. A guided imagery is always a close intimate personal experience that gives you a new experience of yourself and reveals unrealized potential.

Here is how you do it.

In some ways it is easier in a group. If there are two of you, one can read the guided imagery to the other slowly and evenly, gently and compassionately with frequent pauses. Then you can reverse roles and do it the other way round. Alternatively one of you can read the guided imagery on to a recording device and play it back. This is the best way if you are doing it alone. Whether you are preparing to do a guided imagery on your own, in a group or with one other person make the conditions conducive to a meditation space. Disconnect telephones and other noisy devices that may disturb you. Close doors and tell any other people in the space that you are not to be interrupted. The room you are doing the guided imagery in should be clean and tidy, devoid of clutter, plain and preferably spacious, with peaceful images and ornamentation. The temperature should be comfortable for you to sit or lie down relaxed and unhindered for a medium to long period of time. Breathing consciously through the body, from your feet up to the top of your head can help you attain a more profound feeling of relaxation. When all this is done, take a little time to breathe consciously before you begin.

Close your eyes and relax.

Here is a basic guided imagery for you to experience.

Take yourself back to childhood. Follow your memories to early innocence and naivety, to a complex world with people, animals, colors, trust, weather, mystery, wind and nature. Recall your earliest experiences when all this and more begins to arise in your conscious awareness, when you start to be open and receive stimuli from the outside world. For a while it is not separate from you because you are a part of it all. But I would like you now to bring yourself to the point where there is you and all this 'other', the world as it impinges upon your senses. You see it, touch, feel, smell and taste it and it is surrounding you, coming to you through your senses. You are involved somehow and there comes a point where you need to make sense of it. This is what we call the "organization of experience", because human beings have a compulsion to organize and if you think about it it's true. Simply being here now you can see what you have done to organize yourself, your sitting or lying arrangement, with your equipment around you. All of this you have learned.

Spend a little time now remembering how you organized your early life experiences...

Now consider how all this learned organization and behavior influences you today. In some cases it may limit you; in other cases it may add to you life and benefit you. Try not to be judgmental either way.

Take a deep breath, roll over on your left side and, bringing your knees up to your chest, relax for at least ten minutes to finish.

BLOG entry #127

This article by Richard Harvey was originally published at http://www.therapyandspirituality.com/articles/  and it is part of an ongoing retrospective series of blogs. ‘A Guided Imagery: The Organization of Experience’ was first published in 2011.