Guided Imagery Quotes

The shadow has become the substance.

There is no cure for illusions. There is only the opportunity for discovery.

The word passion means basically “to be affected,” and passion is the essential energy of the soul. The poet Rilke describes this passive power in the imagery of the flower’s structure, when he calls it a “muscle of infinite reception.” We don’t often think of the capacity to be affected as strength and as the work of a powerful muscle, and yet for the soul, as for the flower, this is its toughest work and its main role in our lives. Things

unlock hidden memories. Some trauma is just too much for the conscious mind to handle and you have to go in through a back door to access it. So I reluctantly submitted to a few sessions. It wasn’t what I thought it would be. No swinging amulet, no metronome. It was more like those guided imagery exercises they’d sometimes have us do at camp.

Chapter 7: Visualization - Mental Imagery IS Mental Toughness “Mental will is a muscle that needs exercise, just like the muscles of the body” (Lynn Jennings)

There is no cure for illusion. There is only the opportunity for discovery.

The sweat stood out cold on Ford Prefect’s brow, and slid round the electrodes strapped to his temples. These were attached to a battery of electronic equipment—imagery intensifiers, rhythmic modulators, alliterative residulators and simile dumpers—all designed to heighten the experience of the poem and make sure that not a single nuance of the poet’s thought was lost.

Reverence for the natural environment, and experiencing the interconnectedness between all things has long guided me to create watercolor paintings of beauty and spirit. Life's continuing adventure has led me into an exciting exploration into the wisdom and symbolic imagery of Sacred Geometry. These paintings act as a bridge between this reality and a metaphorical world of healing, continuity, and transformation. I use multiple transparent watercolor glazes coupled with image overlapping techniques, and sacred geometry to produce visions of a multi-dimensional reality. It is my intention to create art that embodies the vibration of Universal Love and expresses the joy and gratitude I feel for the honor of being part of this earthwalk." ~Blessings, Francene~

Much of what we have been doing to improve the world's opinion of us has had the contrary effect. Audio-visual aids which we have sent over the world are primary aids to the belief in the irrelevance, the arrogance, the rigidity, and the conceit of America. Not because they are poorly made. On the contrary, because they are well made and vividly projected. Not because they are favorable images or unfavorable images, but because they are images.

Hari Seldon called Trantor 'Star's End,' he whispered, 'and why not that bit of poetic imagery? All the universe was once guided from this rock; all the apron strings of the stars led here. 'All roads lead to Trantor,' says the old proverb, 'and that is where all stars end.

Coupling the relaxation and sense of safety associated with that imagery with the sensations of the body can ground a person in the visceral reality of tranquility and clarity. It is this grounded place that can serve as a vital resource of safety and strength during the explorations ahead.

The mind cannot differentiate between past, present and future events with regards to imagery in the mind. If you attached enough emotional context and feeling to what you are playing in your minds eye I.e. a past memory or projected future event, the body elicits exactly the same biochemical response, as if that experience was happening right now. It’s a clever trick which can convince the mind into believing that you have already achieved these things. The subconscious will then go to work in serving up additional and similar opportunities to bring into your physical reality.

Everything you need to heal is inside yourself. You only need support and encouragement to listen to yourself—to your thoughts, feelings, imagery, and inner spiritual urgings. A book, like a therapist or group, can only guide you, helping you to say out loud what you dared not say even to yourself.

Arthur said brightly, “Actually I quite liked it.” Ford turned and gaped. Here was an approach that had quite simply not occurred to him. The Vogon raised a surprised eyebrow that effectively obscured his nose and was therefore no bad thing. “Oh good …” he whirred, in considerable astonishment. “Oh yes,” said Arthur, “I thought that some of the metaphysical imagery was really particularly effective.” Ford continued to stare at him, slowly organizing his thoughts around this totally new concept. Were they really going to be able to bareface their way out of this? “Yes, do continue …” invited the Vogon. “Oh … and, er … interesting rhythmic devices too,” continued Arthur, “which seemed to counterpoint the … er … er …” he floundered. Ford leaped to his rescue, hazarding “… counterpoint the surrealism of the underlying metaphor of the … er …” He floundered too, but Arthur was ready again. “… humanity of the …” “Vogonity,” Ford hissed at him. “Ah yes, Vogonity—sorry—of the poet’s compassionate soul”—Arthur felt he was on the homestretch now—“which contrives through the medium of the verse structure to sublimate this, transcend that, and come to terms with the fundamental dichotomies of the other”—he was reaching a triumphant crescendo—“and one is left with a profound and vivid insight into … into … er …” (which suddenly gave out on him). Ford leaped in with the coup de grace: “Into whatever it was the poem was about!” he yelled. Out of the corner of his mouth: “Well done, Arthur, that was very good.” The Vogon perused them. For a moment his embittered racial soul had been touched, but he thought no—too little too late. His voice took on the quality of a cat snagging brushed nylon. “So what you’re saying is that I write poetry because underneath my mean callous heartless exterior I really just want to be loved,” he said. He paused, “Is that right?” Ford laughed a nervous laugh. “Well, I mean, yes,” he said, “don’t we all, deep down, you know … er …” The Vogon stood up. “No, well, you’re completely wrong,” he said, “I just write poetry to throw my mean callous heartless exterior into sharp relief. I’m going to throw you off the ship anyway. Guard! Take the prisoners to number three airlock and throw them out!” “What?” shouted Ford. A huge young Vogon guard stepped forward and yanked them out of their straps with his huge blubbery arms. “You can’t throw us into space,” yelled Ford, “we’re trying to write a book.” “Resistance is useless!” shouted the Vogon guard back at him. It was the first phrase he’d learned when he joined the Vogon Guard Corps.

Knowing how you want to use music is extremely important, as is understanding the potential psychological and physiological effects that are inherent in the music. Slow pulsed New Age music is excellent, of course, for relaxation but it’s not ideal for dancing. Yet, if dancing (and the extraordinary energy release found by dancing) is desired, slow New Age music is not ideal. What is your purpose for using a specific piece of music? Is it for meditation, guided imagery, dance, deep recollection, or for emotional release? Realizing that every type of music has the ability to resonate with us on many different levels, it is possible that any type of music can have positive results. We should be open-minded about all music and the possible transformative and therapeutic results that can occur from it.

It was very important to me to maintain the classic imagery in the stories by the Brothers Grimm, Charles Perrault, and Hans Christian Anderson, but even more important to have diversity - which doesn't always exist in fairy-tale adaptations. The Fairy Council was the perfect way to feature characters of different ethnicities, LGBTQIA characters, and characters with disabilities in the series who could play a vital role in the plot of each book.

It should be clear by now that I believe mental imagery to be a key factor in determining mental toughness. In fact, your own perception of yourself will dictate all of your subsequent behaviors, as well as what you’ll get out of life. You can’t do anything without a lot of psychological stress, when this image isn’t aligned with the picture you have in your mind. This will largely be a consequence of your past programming and environmental experiences.

Yet if mere Israeli survival was going to evoke Arab anger, Dayan then warned both his listeners and his entire newborn nation, Israelis had better be prepared to live by the sword. In language filled with biblical imagery, as if to remind his listeners that the battle to stay in the land was not new but was a story that had begun thousands of years earlier, Dayan continued, “We mustn’t flinch from the hatred that accompanies and fills the lives of hundreds of thousands of Arabs, who live around us and are waiting for the moment when their hands may claim our blood. We mustn’t avert our eyes, lest our hands be weakened. That is the decree of our generation. That is the choice of our lives—to be willing and armed, strong and unyielding, lest the sword be knocked from our fists, and our lives severed.”17 It was a worldview that would guide not only Dayan, but the country he was helping to found, for decades to come. AS

Message traffic indicated that IUSS (Integrated Undersea Surveillance System) had sniffs of a number of the newest operational class of Russian SSNs, the Akula II, heading south from the Sea of Okhotsk area toward the South China Sea—and the numbers did not match naval intelligence’s initial expectations. Satellite imagery of Vladivostok showed three submarines missing, and data from Petropavlosk added another missing sub, for a total of four, but IUSS was picking up seven different Akula class SSNs. New data, however, showed three more missing from the Russian base in the Kola Peninsula. Naval intelligence had been concentrating on the Pacific theater and had missed the departure of the North Fleet Akula II SSNs the week before. These Akulas had completed an under-ice transfer through the Bering Straits before they were detected in the Bering Sea, and had rendezvoused with the PACFLT Akulas east of the Kurile Islands.

The inscape is an autohypnotic internal landscape populated by the patient's alters (Young, 1994). The alters typically have distinct bodies in the inscape, with inter-alter consensus as to what each one looks like. Some DID patients have reported having access to such inscapes (presumably through autohypnosis) prior to any treatment. If a dissociative patient seems to have no inscape, guided hypnosis or guided imagery may provide one, for example, as developed by George Fraser (1991) in his Dissociative Table Technique. But in my experience even this therapist initiative typically arrives in a space connecting to a seemingly "ready-made" extended inscape, simple or elaborate, whose "inhabitants" (alters) claim that it preexisted the hypnotic intervention. The space and extended inscape will also have idiosyncratic features, perplexing to the patient and therapist, which later (even years later) prove to have dynamic significance.

​​I thought that some of the metaphysical imagery was really particularly effective. Interesting rhythmic devices too, which seemed to counterpoint the surrealism of the underlying metaphor of the humanity of the author's compassionate soul, which contrives through the medium of the prose structure to sublimate this, transcend that, and come to terms with the fundamental dichotomies of the other, and one is left with a profound and vivid insight into whatever it was the book was about.

We do not want merely to see beauty, though, God knows, even that is bounty enough. We want something else which can hardly be put into words-to be united with the beauty we see, to pass into it, to receive it into ourselves, to bathe in it, to become part of it. That is why we have peopled air and earth and water with gods and goddesses and nymphs and elves-that, though we cannot, yet these projections can, enjoy in themselves that beauty grace, and power of which Nature is the image. That is why the poets tell us such lovely falsehoods. They talk as if the west wind could really sweep into a human soul; but it can’t. They tell us that ‘beauty born of murmuring sound’ will pass into a human face; but it won’t. Or not yet. For if we take the imagery of Scripture seriously, if we believe that God will one day give us the Morning Star and cause us to put on the splendour of the sun, then we may surmise that both the ancient myths and the modern poetry, so false as history, may be very near the truth as prophecy. At present we are on the outside of the world, the wrong side of the door. We discern the freshness and purity of morning, but they do not make us fresh and pure. We cannot mingle with the splendours we see. But all the leaves of the New Testament are rustling with the rumour that it will not always be so. Someday, God willing, we shall get in.

The authors of the four passages share a number of practices: an insistence on fresh wording and concrete imagery over familiar verbiage and abstract summary; an attention to the readers' vantage point and the target of their gaze; the judicious placement of an uncommon word or idiom against a backdrop of simple nouns and verbs; the use of parallel syntax; the occasional planned surprise; the presentation of a telling detail that obviates an explicit pronouncement; the use of meter and sound that resonate with the meaning and mood. The authors also share an attitude: they do not hide the passion and relish that drive them to tell us about their subjects. They write as if they have something important to say. But no, that doesn't capture it. They write as if they have something important to show. And that, we shall see, is a key ingredient in the sense of style.

The authors’ prior experience in clinical research4 had amply convinced us of the possibility of long-term performance enhancement using psychedelic agents in a safe, supportive setting. Though not deliberately sought, there were numerous spontaneous incidents of what appeared to be temporarily enhanced performance during the drug experience itself. These observations led us to postulate the following: Any human function can be performed more effectively. We do not function at our full capacity. Psychedelics appear to temporarily inhibit censors that ordinarily limit what is available to conscious awareness. Participants may, for example, discover a latent ability to form colorful and complex imagery, to recall forgotten experiences of early childhood, or to generate meaningful symbolic presentations. By leading participants to expect enhancement of other types of performance—creative problem solving, learning manual or verbal skills, manipulating logical or mathematical symbols, acquiring sensory or extrasensory perception, memory, and recall—and by providing favorable preparatory and environmental conditions, it may be possible to improve any desired aspect of mental functioning.

Heightened capacity for visual imagery and fantasy “Was able to move imaginary parts in relation to each other.” “It was the non-specific fantasy that triggered the idea.” “The next insight came as an image of an oyster shell, with the mother-of-pearl shining in different colors. I translated that in the idea of an interferometer—two layers separated by a gap equal to the wavelength it is desired to reflect.” “As soon as I began to visualize the problem, one possibility immediately occurred. A few problems with that concept occurred, which seemed to solve themselves rather quickly…. Visualizing the required cross section was instantaneous.” “Somewhere along in here, I began to see an image of the circuit. The gates themselves were little silver cones linked together by lines. I watched the circuit flipping through its paces….” “I began visualizing all the properties known to me that a photon possesses and attempted to make a model for a photon…. The photon was comprised of an electron and a positron cloud moving together in an intermeshed synchronized helical orbit…. This model was reduced for visualizing purposes to a black-and-white ball propagating in a screwlike fashion through space. I kept putting the model through all sorts of known tests.” 5. Increased ability to concentrate “Was able to shut out virtually all distracting influences.” “I was easily able to follow a train of thought to a conclusion where normally I would have been distracted many times.” “I was impressed with the intensity of concentration, the forcefulness and exuberance with which I could proceed toward the solution.” “I considered the process of photoconductivity…. I kept asking myself, ‘What is light? and subsequently, ‘What is a photon?’ The latter question I repeated to myself several hundred times till it was being said automatically in synchronism with each breath. I probably never in my life pressured myself as intently with a question as I did this one.” “It is hard to estimate how long this problem might have taken without the psychedelic agent, but it was the type of problem that might never have been solved. It would have taken a great deal of effort and racking of the brains to arrive at what seemed to come more easily during the session.” 6. Heightened empathy with external processes and objects “…the sense of the problem as a living thing that is growing toward its inherent solution.” “First I somehow considered being the needle and being bounced around in the groove.” “I spent a productive period …climbing down on my retina, walking around and thinking about certain problems relating to the mechanism of vision.” “Ability to grasp the problem in its entirety, to ‘dive’ into it without reservations, almost like becoming the problem.” “Awareness of the problem itself rather than the ‘I’ that is trying to solve it.” 7. Heightened empathy with people “It was also felt that group performance was affected in …subtle ways. This may be evidence that some sort of group action was going on all the time.” “Only at intervals did I become aware of the music. Sometimes, when I felt the other guys listening to it, it was a physical feeling of them listening to it.” “Sometimes we even had the feeling of having the same thoughts or ideas.” 8. Subconscious data more accessible “…brought about almost total recall of a course that I had had in thermodynamics; something that I had never given any thought about in years.” “I was in my early teens and wandering through the gardens where I actually grew up. I felt all my prior emotions in relation to my surroundings.

It was truly eye-opening. Rigorous randomized trials have shown that biofeedback, acupuncture, hypnosis, and guided imagery can lead to better outcomes.29 The first two techniques, for example, can lead to control or better management of high blood pressure, particularly for mild cases, and reduced frequency or severity of migraine headaches for many individuals.

This New Jerusalem imagery illustrates the same point the Guide is making: the Landlord contains the blackness in the black hole so it will no longer be allowed to infringe upon the flourishing of his good world. God contains evil so that it will not be allowed to do violence to the peace of his new creation. When God’s kingdom is established, no longer will any evil aggressor be allowed to bring bloodshed to God’s planet. Hell is not a place God creates to torture people, but a power that God contains to protect the overflowing life of his new creation.

As Dr. Bernard Siegel, a cancer surgeon at Yale says, “In the absence of certainty, there is nothing wrong with hope.

In 1988 Robert Byrd published a study in the Southern Journal of Medicine showing that people recovering from heart attacks in the coronary care unit in one of the hospitals at the University of California, San Francisco, recovered faster if they were being prayed for, even from a distance, by people they didn’t know, and without knowing that anyone was praying for them.

The important thing is to give yourself endless chances, whatever imagery you choose to use.

Step 2: Understand the childhood origins or your lifetrap. Fee the wounded child inside of you: To feel your lifetrap, you will need to remember your childhood. We will ask you to close your eyes and let the images come. DO not force the images - just let one rise to the top of mind. Get into each one as deeply as you can. Try to picture these early memories as vividly as possible. If you do this a few times, you will begin to remember what you felt as a child. You will feel the pain or emotions connected with your lifetrap. This kind of imagery is painful. If you feel completely overwhelmed or frightened by the experience, that is a sign you need therapy. Your childhood was so painful that you should not remember it alone. You need a guide, an ally. A therapist can be this for you. Giving comfort to your inner child, offering guidance and advice, and empathizing with how the child feels are some of the things we will ask you to do. Even though these exercises may seem silly or uncomfortable to you at first, we have found that most people benefit enormously from them.

Step 2: Understand the childhood origins of your lifetrap and feel the wounded child inside of you: To feel your lifetrap, you will need to remember your childhood. We will ask you to close your eyes and let the images come. Do not force the images – just let one rise to the top of your mind. Get into each one as deeply as you can. Try to picture these early memories as vividly as possible. If you do this a few times, you will begin to remember what you felt as a child. You will feel the pain or emotions connected with your lifetrap. This kind of imagery is painful. If you feel completely overwhelmed or frightened by the experience, that is a sign you need therapy. Your childhood was so painful that you should not remember it alone. You need a guide, an ally. A therapist can be this for you. Giving comfort to your inner child, offering guidance and advice, and empathizing with how the child feels are some of the things we will ask you to do. Even though these exercises may seem silly or uncomfortable to you at first, we have found that most people benefit enormously from them.

Mind/body interventions are key in autoimmune disease, because the ups and downs of these diseases often correlate with emotional ups and downs, and because we know that mental factors influence immune responses. Psychotherapy, hypnotherapy, and guided imagery therapy are all useful and worth exploring

A catch-22 for many who are Crashed, however, is that they know stress reduction techniques could help them, but they often lack the mental energy to take on anything new. Guided imagery is a perfect fit because it requires no mental exertion on the part of the participant.

Skip table Area Description Desirable features Key benefits eg Youth Services Organization Purpose ​–​Why do we exist beyond financial gain? ​–​Emotional appeal ​–​The emphasis shouldn’t change over time ​–​Calls for a togetherness ​–​Grabs attention ​–​Memorable ​–​Benefits selected stakeholders (eg employees, customers, society) ​–​Heart then head appeal ​–​Inspires selflessness ​–​Creates belonging ​–​Catalyst for collaboration ​–​Helps people find meaning ​–​Attracts followers ​–​Creates advocates ​–​To give hope to vulnerable young people Vision ​–​What would success look, feel and sound like? ​–​Brings purpose to life ​–​Evokes imagery ​–​Takes a long-term view ​–​Increases clarity ​–​Has uniqueness ​–​Presents a challenge ​–​Commercial reference ​–​Provides an impetus for and inspires action ​–​Creates focus beyond the day-to-day activities ​–​Provides a benchmark to measure progress against ​–​To become the most respected, innovative and sustainably funded youth services provider in xx countries

For the TL;DR (too long; didn’t read), generation dating is just one more arena vying for our headspace. The days of introspection and developing relationships have been replaced with instant, curated imagery, all intended to get to the point of selling our sexual market brand in the best picture before the swipe. Image and perception are king.

Chapter 5: Relaxation, Visualization, and Guided Imagery: Alternatives to Meditation It’s

Guided imagery is like intentional daydreaming, but it uses the power of the mind for stress relief, relaxation, healing, behavior change, and sparking intuition. Guided imagery can be experienced in many ways. Some people can visualize and see images. Having an inner sense, impression, or mental concept comes easier to others. Feeling, hearing, and tasting are other ways guided imagery can be experienced. Use whatever comes easiest for you, whether it uses a combination or a single method.

Relaxation exercises, breathing techniques, meditations, guided imagery techniques, and visualizations are simply the tools used to experience yoga nidra. A

Some excellent reference works already exist on both of these topics, a few of which are mentioned in the bibliography at the end of this book. Not only are there a variety of books that cover digital painting, modeling, animation, and rendering from a generalized perspective, but there are also specific "how-to" guides for many of the more common software packages. The third source of imagery-scanned/digitized "live-action" footage-is still probably the most common source with which we deal in digital compositing. There are a myriad of different formats that this source imagery can come from, some of them discussed in greater detail in Chapter 10 and Appendix D.

Dante, as you might know, had originally titled his book The Comedy of Dante Alighieri, A Florentine by birth but not in character. The title Divine Comedy only came later, when the book became regarded as a masterpiece. It’s a work that can be approached in a thousand different ways, and over the centuries it has been,” he said, his voice gaining strength once he was on firm and familiar ground. “But what we’re going to focus on today is the use of natural imagery in the poem. And this Florentine edition which was recently donated to the Newberry collection—and which I think most of you have now seen in the central display case—is a particularly good way to do that.” He touched a button on the lectern’s electronic panel and the first image—an etching of a deep forest, with a lone figure, head bent, entering a narrow path—appeared on the screen. “ ‘In the middle of the journey of our life,’ ” he recited from memory, “ ‘I came to myself in a dark wood where the straight way was lost.’ ” Looking up, he said, “With the possible exception of ‘Jack and Jill went up the hill,’ there is probably no line of poetry more famous and easily identifiable than that. And you will notice that right here, at the very start of the epic that is to follow, we have a glimpse of the natural world that is both realistic—Dante spends a terrible night in that wood—and metaphorical.” Turning to the etching, he elaborated on several of its most salient features, including the animals that animated its border—a leopard with a spotted coat, a lion, and a skulking wolf with distended jaws. “Confronted by these creatures, Dante pretty much turns tail and runs, until he bumps into a figure—who turns out of course to be the Roman poet Virgil—who offers to guide him ‘through an eternal place where thou shalt hear the hopeless shrieks, shalt see the ancient spirits in pain so that each calls for a second death.’ ” A new image flashed on the screen, of a wide river—Acheron with mobs of the dead huddled on its shores, and a shrouded Charon in the foreground, pointing with one bony finger at a long boat. It was a particularly well-done image and David noted several heads nodding with interest and a low hum of comments. He had thought there might be. This edition of the Divine Comedy was one of the most powerful he had ever seen, and he was making it his mission to find out who the illustrator had been. The title pages of the book had sustained such significant water and smoke damage that no names could be discerned. The book had also had to be intensively treated for mold, and many of the plates bore ineradicable green and blue spots the circumference of a pencil eraser.

When most individuals think of witchcraft they usually picture a very old unpleasant, lump-ridden women clad in black robes, soaring over a cauldron that contains a mysterious, bubbly potion while chanting an incantation in a bizarre form of speech. Or possibly you may also easily think of the contemporary Hollywood imageries of young witches as sensual teenagers in gothic apparel and black lipstick, wearing huge silver pentacles, having unbearable attitudes.

A guided imagery meditation is something like a controlled, planned dream through which someone else leads you.

The reason visual imagery works lies in the fact that when you imagine yourself performing to perfection and doing precisely what you want, you are in turn physiologically creating neural patterns in your brain, just as if you had physical performed the action. These patterns are similar to small tracks engraved in the brain cells that can ultimately enable an athlete to perform physical feats by simply mentally practicing the move. Hence, mental imagery is intended to train our minds and create the neural patterns in our brain to teach our muscles to do exactly what we want them to do.”3

This is how reason really works: through framing, metaphors, emotion, narratives, and imagery.

The visual-spatial learner thinks primarily with images, learns concepts all at once, sees the big picture, learns best by seeing relationships, and learns complex concepts easily but struggles with easy skills. One possible explanation for dyslexia is that some children who are right-brained learners find it much easier to think about new information and solve problems using their visual-spatial strategies. Over time, they reinforce their own tendencies toward relying on imagery and intuitive thought processes, and fail to develop strong brain pathways for thinking with the sounds of language. Thus,

As Belleruth Naparstek, the author of Staying Well with Guided Imagery, says, “There are many right ways to experience guided imagery.” Therefore, use whatever naturally works for you.

At the lab my professor suggested that, since it was such an amazing day, perhaps I could take the exam outside in the wetland wilderness reserve that surrounded the lab. The view of the swamp was stunning! Somehow it had never seemed beautiful to me before. She asked that I take my notebook and pencil out. “Please draw for me the complete development of the chick from fertilization to hatching. That is the only question.” I gasped, “But that is the entire course!” “Yes, I suppose it is, but make-up exams are supposed to be harder than the original, aren’t they?” I couldn’t imagine being able to regurgitate the entire course. As I sat there despondently, I closed my eyes and was flooded with grief. Then I noticed that my inner visual field was undulating like a blanket that was being shaken at one end. I began to see a movie of fertilization! When I opened my eyes a few minutes later, I realized that the movie could be run forward and back and was clear as a bell in my mind’s eye, even with my physical eyes open. Hesitantly, I drew the formation of the blastula, a hollow ball of cells that develops out of the zygote (fertilized egg). As I carefully drew frame after frame of my inner movie, it was her turn to gape! The tiny heart blossomed. The formation of the notochord, the neural groove, and the beginnings of the nervous system were flowing out of my enhanced imagery and onto the pages. A stupendous event—the animated wonder of embryonic growth and the differentiation of cells—continued at a rapid pace. I drew as quickly as I could. To my utter amazement, I was able to carefully and completely replicate the content of the entire course, drawing after drawing, like the frames of animation that I was seeing as a completed film! It took me about an hour and a quarter drawing as fast as I could to reproduce the twenty-one-day miracle of chick formation. Clearly impressed, my now suddenly lovely professor smiled and said, “Well, I suppose you deserve an A!” The sunlight twinkled on the water, the cattails waved in the gentle breeze, and the gentle wonder of life was everywhere. Reports:

Close your eyes, what do you think about? Not all dreams happen with your eyes closed, but the ones that do are the ones that have the most imagery, the most hope. Hope can be a dreadful thing but it can be a beautiful thing. There have been many great philosophers who have said that hope and dreams have this false sense of themselves, that they are only fragments of the real or true. They may be right about being fragments, but that does not make them any less true. Dreams send us guiding towards ideas, that are true themselves, if only ideals, of goals that we should strive towards. It is cliche and commonplace to call dreams fantasies of the mind, wishful thinking of fading things. Yet there are things that philosophers cannot explain, that reason leaves, all philosophers believe themselves poets but leave the soul out of their writing. The mind and its reason, that is truth. That is the belief. Yet anyone who has looked at a view that has left them without breath has known of something more.

Given the fact that our laboratory studies have revealed a high correlation between dream behavior and physiological responses, it seems justifiable to hope that healing imagery during lucid dreaming might be even more effective. You could conceivably carry out actions in your lucid dreams specifically designed to accomplish whatever precise physiological consequences you desire. That leaves some fascinating possibilities for future research to explore: Can you initiate self-healing processes by consciously envisioning your dream body as perfectly healthy? If in lucid dreams you “heal” your dream body, to what extent will you also heal your physical body?

Escaping from a nightmare by awakening only suppresses your conscious awareness of the anxiety-provoking imagery.

The most powerful way to use the mind-body connection to improve your physical and mental health is through guiding your autonomic nervous system (ANS). Every time you calm the ANS through stimulating the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS), you tilt your body, brain, and mind increasingly toward inner peace and well-being. You can activate the PNS in many ways, including relaxation, big exhalations, touching the lips, mindfulness of the body, imagery, balancing your heartbeat, and meditation. Meditation increases gray matter in brain regions that handle attention, compassion, and empathy. It also helps a variety of medical conditions, strengthens the immune system, and improves psychological functioning. Deliberately feeling safer helps control the hardwired tendency to look for and overreact to threats. Feel safer by relaxing, using imagery, connecting with others, being mindful of fear itself, evoking inner protectors, being realistic, and increasing your sense of secure attachment. Find refuge in whatever is a sanctuary and refueling station for you. Potential refuges include people, activities, places, and intangible things like reason, a sense of your innermost being, or truth.

In the stories of the founding of Mecca, the patriarch Abraham was guided on his journey by the Shekinah, who directed him where to build.  Significantly the Shekinah was said to have marked the spot for Abraham by curling up like a serpent.[191]  The serpent imagery here is reminiscent of the Egyptian Goddess Qudshu, the Gnostic Edem as well as the serpent of wisdom or temptation in the Garden of Eden.

If you’d like to learn more about the power of visualization, check out Creative Visualization: Use the Power of Your Imagination to Create What You Want in Your Life by Shakti Gawain. We also recommend Healing Visualizations: Creating Health Through Imagery by Gerald Epstein, MD, and The Art of Mental Training - A Guide to Performance Excellence by DC Gonzalez.