Guided Imagery:
Mind-Body Medicine With
Types Of Alternative Medicine

The simplest explanation of guided imagery as one of the types of alternative medicine is the principle of using your own positive reinforcement from the mind to improve your health and well-being.

Any person can actually learn to affect your health through the use of visualization. We have all done it as we were growing up in school. You knew you had to give a verbal book report-in front of the class. Or the meeting at the job required you to make the presentation- to the new account. Anytime or anywhere you were feeling butterflies in the stomach, sweaty palms, profuse sweating etc., what was the first thing you tried to do? Of course, it was run through it in your mind, in front of a friend or a mirror. We all assumed if we practiced enough times, somehow we would lose that sensation of panic. So with enough training and practice you can actually learn to influence different body parts, tissues or even down to the cells of our own bodies.

Prior to the turn of the twentieth century, this belief was an inherent part of medicine. But as conventional medicine was introduced and the new ways of treating disease became available, many of these forms of treatment were pushed aside. Now, a century later, disillusion with the ways of conventional medicine has many people returning back to the former treatment options.

Common Objectives Of Guided Imagery

* Emotional conflicts due to negative life experiences can be shed from the conscious mind by teaching the individual to re-train their thoughts and feelings to a peaceful co-existence with the former bad experiences

* Physical and spiritual healing of the mind and body by achieving greater benefits through any of the following means of therapy:

• Meditation
• Prayer
• Breathing Exercises
• Posture techniques
• Visualization techniques

Many doctor's may combine one or more of the above techniques depending on the patient's condition. Also, each of these techniques, although all are trying to achieve the same end results, each is a different treatment program. A study of a patient's habits, beliefs, current health condition, attitudes mental, emotional and spiritual well-being are all taken into consideration before a doctor will decide which method will be used as a better alternative for this particular patient's situation.

So, although guided imagery is not to be considered as a means for a cure for major illness or chronic disease, it has been proven repeatedly that the effects it can produce can lead to a healthier, more pain-free and longer life. In some cases an actual remission of a patient's condition has been reported. For any of these reasons alone, Mind-Body Medicine is now being suggested as a positive treatment plan in many situations, even by conventional medicine as a complementary form of treatment.

Talk to your own doctor and an alternative practitioner first before under-going any new treatment program though. Conventional medicine and alternative therapy can co-exist in many situations to round out a complete recovery program.

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