IMAGERY

Jeanne Archterberg (1985). Imagery in Healing: 

                                            Shamanism and Modern Medicine.


Archterberg has a PhD in psychology and is a researcher--the book, as of 2023, is 38 years old, yet it is very applicable today...the book reads more like a scholarly treatise than a how to book for everyday living. 

I appreciate the attempts to acknowledge and connect Shamanistic wisdom and practices to modern medicine throughout. Archterberg explains that shamans journey via nonordinary consciousness to bring back medicine for the people, holistic healing for the soul and the body via practices like: sweat lodge, sensory deprivation, sacred plants, and sonic methods (drums, rattles, and chants). 

The role of healing imagery in facilitating physiological changes in the body is well documented...to some extent, we can imagine ourselves un/healthy.


The use of autogenic training to facilitate deep relaxation is a process that most people can learn on their own with minimal instruction and practice. There are a number of online sites that explain this process which involve repeating a word or phrase while directing attention and imagining a particular part of the body relaxing and warming in a systematic fashion. McMaster University, at the time of this writing, has free mp3 guided imagery sessions for autogenic training:  https://campusmentalhealth.ca/resource/mcmaster-guided-relaxation-cd/ 

One might also search the internet or ask the AI (artifical intelligence bot) for instruction on autogenic training.




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