About Guided Imagery

Guided Imagery Exercises

Guided Imagery Exercises are short inductions given by the imagery guide to the dreamer. These inductions lead the dreamer into waking dreams whose images are often as intense and clear visually as the most intense night dreams.

Waking dreams occur in a waking state which is neither hypnotic nor trancelike. The dreamer is fully conscious; he is alert to what is happening to him. He enters this level of visual thinking by means of a simple and very quick relaxation. He is then able to explore and move in the world of his dreams and images which lie hidden behind his rational thought processes.

Waking dreams stimulate the imagination to become more active. They greatly enhance the creative process. They also serve to focus the dreamer's awareness on what is happening to him at the subconscious level. The images which emerge in him illustrate his actual state of being and his attitude towards problems confronting him.

The dreamer may choose to describe what he sees to the group. This permits an interaction of left and right brain activities. It also serves to 'socialize' the dream process and brings it into focus and into the concrete world of reality.

As the images unfold they speak for themselves and serve as tools of diagnosis to the dreamer. Often an image is both the diagnosis and the healing when the dreamer finds a resolution to a difficult image through the unfolding of the process of dreaming.

In other cases the guide might suggest the image which will serve to unblock or to transform a situation illustrated by the images of the dream. The act of moving into a new configuration becomes the healing process of the waking dream.

The aim of Guided Imagery Group sessions is to explore and experience in rapid succession many different aspects of life in an imaginal and sensory mode. Waking dreams are the events from which emerge a deeper understanding of oneself and of the world.