The Power of Guiding Imagery
Runa's Oracle ♥
“I realize that under the circumstances you have described you feel the need to see clearly. But your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Without, everything seems discordant; only within does it coalesce into unity. Who looks outside dreams; who looks inside awakes.”
~Carl Jung in a letter to a patient.
I love the idea of creative visualization but the word visualization has its potential limitations as many feel that if they have stronger perceptions from senses other than sight. This can immediately raise mental blocks to the power inherent in a visualization practice.
For almost as long as I have worked with imagery, I have also wondered at the limitations inherent in the terms "guided imagery." I have begun to prefer "guiding imagery." My focus with Old Soul Alchemy has always been inner wisdom. I am always looking for powerful ways to help connect people with their own inner authority. You see, that is my wound, and therefore where my own healing lies.
Inner Wisdom | Inner Authority
Outer authority is a dominant force in our modern society. Teachers, priests, doctors, judges, politicians, Hollywood actors, "influencers," and even journalists representing the almighty media often usurp our own abilities to intuit what is best for us and make empowered inner-driven decisions. We are taught to look without.
The quote above, in Runa's Oracle, refers to 'looking without' as dreaming. He is not speaking of nighttime dreams as oracles, because even Jung explores the oracular significance of dreams and their images, but simply as a way to say that to look without was to be out of touch with herself (the patient).
Who looks outside dreams; who looks inside awakes: Come (back) to yourself! In order to reach a harmonious inner state, you need to look inside, to your own individual psyche. An awakened Self requires solitary inward movement, into the depths of one’s own psyche, away from the collective noise. The outside world is but a mere projection of your inner reality; you must withdraw those projections, and utilize your life-force for your own self-exploration and understanding.
~Angeliki Yiassemides, a Jungian Analyst on the context of Jung's quote.
Guided Imagery vs Guiding Imagery
Back to the idea of guided imagery versus Guiding Imagery. "Guided" imagery is generally scripted. When I first began to study the power of meditation, imagery, and creative visualization, I erroneously assumed that the scripts were all close-ended. While incredibly helpful, this close-endedness implied an external source or authority and did not allow for the interaction with one's own inner wisdom.
While this is not entirely true, as many of them are written with pauses and invitations for you to "write in" your own contributions to the script, I still got hung up on the word "guided." This is my own challenge, albeit perhaps trivial, but it is not unlike someone being invited to "visualize" and creating a mental block because their "images" (also primarily a seeing word, incidentally) come from auditory, olfactory, or other sensorial impressions.
Personally, I don't "see" images so much when I do my own work, but I sense them in a way that I could translate my sensory perceptions into a rough drawing or description. This is the power of the imagination, in my mind.
I much prefer the word "guiding," as in Guiding Imagery, thereby giving the imagery itself sovereignty and power. If an image appears to you, it appears for a reason. It has a message. It is up to you to choose whether to explore that message, and how. Of course, you may enlist external help, HOWEVER, a good guide or facilitator will assist you in finding your own wisdom within.
Guiding Imagery is a Rosetta Stone that helps us translate ideas and feelings we haven't yet been able to put into words, whether it is in the form of an open-ended meditation filled with seedling imagery, our own seed imagery, or in the form of nighttime dreams, daydreams, or perhaps even other types of oracles and omens.
*Seedling imagery is imagery that is suggested by others. Seed imagery is your own. The former is like a small nursery plant, you can still care for, enjoy the beauty, and even harvest rewards, but it is different from the latter, seeds you have harvested yourself through your own experiences. These seed images arise from your subconscious in random daydreams, but also with specific kinds of purposeful imagery practices, including Old Soul Oracle, and DayLight Dreaming, Guiding Imagery is useful in a practice of Imagination as Meditation, for Relaxation, Illumination, and Transformation (IAMRIT).
Uses of Guiding Imagery
- solve problems easier
- build skills faster
- boost memory retention and access
- gain insight into people, circumstances, and self
- improve intuition
- increase lucidity and awareness
- enhance dreams and dreamwork
- find more peace and joy in life
- release stress and emotional burdens
- make amazing breakthroughs, personally and professionally
- and more...
Want to find out more? Book your complimentary Soul to Soul with me and we can talk guiding imagery via zoom, or telephone, over a cup of coffee or tea.
♥ Runa
