Guided Imagery Meditation
Easy yet Powerful
Learn to control your energy through guided imagery meditation and transform stress into healthy, creative energy. Once you can learn to direct and control the images that your mind sends to your body, you can help your body to stay healthy and start to heal itself.Guided imagery has been used as a healing tool in many cultures. It is also known as visualization or guided meditation, imagination or even positive thinking. It is used often in the healing process. It is very helpful in bringing about a state of calm or wellness. 
What is Guided Imagery?
What is Guided Imagery?If a picture is worth a thousand words then guided imagery meditation must be very valuable! Guided imagery can be thought of as taking your mind for a walk through a scene to achieve a desired result. You might use guided imagery to lower your blood pressure or to lessen anxiety. Guided imagery relaxation can help you do this faster than you might think. Once you learn some basic techniques you can feel the difference in your body and there are biofeedback devices that you can buy and use which will show you exactly how you are doing while you are doing it. This is science blending with guided imagery. It is a wonderful fact that technology is helping us to visualize what mystics and intuitives have known for centuries. 
Dr Andrew Weil, is an American pioneer in the field of Integrative Medicine and one of our most important leaders in the field of healthy and healing. He says the mind's eye has a special relationship with the healing system. Our society tends to look upon visual imagery as daydreaming in children and that we often de-value the power and use of this. He says you can learn the power of guided imagery therapy by working with specialists like Hypnotherapists, visualization therapists and guided imagery specialists. You will learn methods to take advantage of the mind-body connection through the medium of visual imagination. Once you master a technique then you can practice it on your own. Dr Weil places particular emphasis on images with emotional charge. In Heart Rhythm Meditation you are encouraged to meditate on your heart which is the seat of all emotion. We breathe through the heart in a way that nurtures our emotions and we use our breath to be in control of whatever comes up. It is a gentle, yet powerful process that affects us on an energetic healing level. Dr Weil says that he believes no disease process is beyond the reach of these therapies. His book Spontaneous Healing is a classic that everyone should read. In it he discusses how to enhance your body's natural ability to maintain and heal itself. It is a fantastic resource and I highly recommend it for your personal library. Guided imagery meditation gives us a great opportunity to visualize anything we want or need. It puts us in the perfect frame of mind for attracting what we want to attract, be that healing, wealth, relationships, etc. If you've heard about the Law of Attraction or manifestation or The Secret then you are familiar with the concept of imagery. Our thoughts and feelings influence our lives. What we think about and imagine becomes reality at some point. Einstein said that imagination is more important than knowledge. He should know! So given the importance of our thoughts, how can we best influence what we think?
Guided Imagery Meditation
Guided Imagery Meditation is a process of being both quiet and alert at the same time. It is an expanded state of awareness or consciousness. It is a technique to break addiction to thought. It is directed concentration.By sitting and trying to maintain the focus of concentration on some object like the breath, bodily sensations, or a visual image, you learn to control attention and keep it in one place. There are many types of guided imagery meditations. You should be open to listening to different guides. One practitioner I've enjoyed listening to is Dr. Carol Robin. She says that an effective guide will teach you a simple pathway to a meditative state, as well as help you experience being in that state. Once you have experienced what it feels like to be in the natural state of meditation, and learned the path to it, it is easy for you to take yourself there. I agree with her completely on that. Meditation practice is both simple and difficult: simple because the method is simply maintaining focused attention, and hard because it requires changing lifelong habits of letting the mind wander where it wants, especially into thoughts. I like guided imagery meditation because it seems easy to close my eyes and listen to a guide. I trust myself to the guide and try to do what is suggested in the practices. I can do this and have my own meditation experience at the same time. That is a really cool aspect of guided meditation. I meditate without a guide also because I don't always need a guide. I know how to meditate and enjoy meditating in silence. But I often mix in some guided meditations, including different practices like Buddhist Insight meditation or Universal meditations. The real goal of meditation practice is to do it constantly, to practice meditation in action as you move through the world. Even if you are not ready to undertake that sort of training, you can begin by trying to move your attention to your body or your breath whenever you remember to do so.
Who Uses Guided Imagery?
- Athletes use visualization and breathing techniques to visualize their performance.
- Leaders of any kind use creative visualization to empower and direct their organizations.
- People with ailments or diseases use it for healing or pain management.
- Children and adults can learn to manage stress and anxiety.
Other reasons people choose to work with guided imagery:
• relaxation
• better sleep
• stress reduction, relief, and management
• reduced levels of stress hormones
• pain management and accelerated healing
• improved mental health
• improved physical health
• better focus and concentration
• reduction of anxiety and depression
• reduction of irritability and anger
• grounding and centering
• reduction of blood pressure
• relief from digestive problems
• reduced hormonal imbalances
How to Use Guided Imagery
Most Guided Imagery starts with relaxation exercises of some kind. Often there is relaxing meditation music or a relaxing voice.Guided imagery can be done with just a few minutes once or twice a day in order to benefit. A guided imagery meditation might be from 10-20 minutes.
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