How to Use Guided Imagery for Stress
Guided imagery is a technique you can use at home to help you relax and rid your mind and body of stress. Guided imagery is safe and effective, and everyone from children to seniors can benefit from its stress-relieving effects. Follow these steps to use guided imagery for stress relief to gain optimum mental, physical and emotional health.
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Instructions
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Find a quiet, comfortable place to sit, recline or lie down. Stretch out with your arms and legs comfortably away from your body.
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Take deep breaths. Breath in slowly through your nose. Hold each breath for several seconds. Release slowly through your mouth, while making an "ah" sound. Imagine cool, clean blue air being taken in through your nose, and dirty brown air releasing stress and impurities as you exhale.
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Starting at your scalp, focus on relaxing the muscles in each area of your body. Relax your forehead, eyes, cheeks, jaw and so on, all the way down to your toes.
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When you have relaxed your entire body, picture the most peaceful surrounding you can fabricate. This place will be your ideal space. It might be a grassy bank alongside a stream, a luxurious hotel suite, or a fluffy cloud floating high above the earth. It does not matter what you choose, as long as it is the most stress-free place imaginable for you.
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Try and use all of your senses as you enjoy your guided imagery-created surroundings. Feel the cool, silky hotel sheets caress your skin. Listen to the bubbling stream. Smell the vanilla of your grandma's kitchen. The more real you can make the experience, the less stress you will feel when you are finished.
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Stay in your guided imagery-induced surroundings for as long as you wish. When you are ready to come back to reality, count backwards from 30, awakening a bit more as you count, until you get to 1. You will feel rested, refreshed and so stress-free!
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Tips & Warnings
Don't worry if you have trouble relaxing at first. With practice and patience, guided imagery will become an easy, delightful exercise.
If you are worried about taking too much time during guided imagery, set a clock to let you know when you need to start counting back.
- Photo Credit www.morguefile.com / Iván Melenchón Serrano
