Positive visualization and mental imagery

Positive visualization is a tool of sophrology which consists of projecting positive mental images.
Mental imagery is a powerful lever on our mind and body.

The goal of this therapeutic method is to combine it with our senses (sight, hearing, kinesthetics, smell and tastes) to create new positive emotions and generate beneficial changes in our lives. Mental visualization can help us control our emotions, we then call it positive visualization.

Imagine: you mentally see a pleasant scene from a happy memory, then you experience what is called positive visualization. This technique is a major tool of sophrology, which allows you to better manage your emotions or to understand the future.

Between a lived experience and an imaginary mental representation, the same areas of the cerebral cortex are activated. For example, when you imagine yourself drinking a glass of water or actually do it, your brain doesn't know the difference.

 

The mental image in art therapy

At the origin of any work of art, in painting, in sculpture, or for cinema and, to a lesser extent, music, images pre-exist in the brain of the artist. It is even a part of his most important work.

Alexandre Castant, doctor in aesthetics (Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne), is a professor at the École nationale supérieure d'art de Bourges where he teaches aesthetics and the history of contemporary arts. In his book “ Mapping the Senses ”, he addresses this subject of the mental image in art.

 

See reality or imagine it?

With the imagination, we form and make images and situations interact. This distancing from reality does not imply its negation. It is a detachment that remains in touch with experience. Reality relates to what we perceive, and imagination relates to inspiration and creativity.

To perceive is to remain in contact with reality; perception is the interface with the real world. If there was no reality, if there was nothing to perceive, there would be no perception.

Visualization, unlike perception, allows us to detach ourselves from this reality, to free ourselves from it. As a result, visualization creates a world that belongs to everyone. The imagery of one is not the imagery of others. In the same way, mental visualization is one of the approaches to mental preparation which is individual in nature. It is an exercise in oneself where the images we create are above all at our service.

The principle of positive visualization

We all have this mental capacity to represent a situation, a scene, a landscape, a street and any other event. This is the mental representation. Like a dream, the body and all our emotions are mobilized in our brain which interprets the stimulus as belonging to reality. It then mobilizes the same biochemical and hormonal reactions as if it were a real-life situation.

This process can cause psychological suffering if what is felt is a recollection of painful or traumatic memories. The unconscious also finds a way out to disturb your life.

With this technique, the objective is to provoke imagery of well-being. This is positive visualization.

Some caregivers had the idea of ​​using it to improve psychotherapies. Repeated regularly, this exercise would have a conditioning effect, a bit like resetting faulty software. Without going that far, this technique diverts the annoying emotions that disrupt daily life. For a shy person, for example, clearly visualizing a situation they will have to experience prepares them and reduces their anxiety. In sophrology, positive visualization seeks a state of extreme relaxation. It is practiced like self-hypnosis which leads to a state between sleep and consciousness, like at the precise moment when one falls asleep. Positive visualization and mental imagery are also very popular in the field of “personal development”. It is a support that helps you achieve your life.

It's a truth, positive visualization is very powerful, because it activates our mirror neurons. Mirror neurons are involved in the execution of an action or gesture. They are also activated by seeing someone who acts in the same way as if we were acting ourselves. This is a very effective learning principle.

From a psychological point of view, the process is identical. Seeing yourself positively in a hoped-for situation also stimulates our mirror neurons. Our belief in the future strengthens and our confidence increases.

 

What is mental visualization for?

Whatever the technique, the visualization exercise is ideal for planning your success. Changing your life involves putting yourself in a favorable situation, and imagining it first makes it possible, then conceivable and highly probable.

  • Relieve: it can help relieve stress, insomnia and also physical pain.
  • Improve motor skills: through a mental representation exercise, the muscles can prepare themselves for future effort. This technique is particularly beneficial for elderly people who have lost motor skills.
  • Learning: it is well known, we learn above all by watching. The improvement of a technical gesture is greatly favored through the vision of the “perfect gesture”. Top athletes still use this exercise.
  • Memorizing a trajectory: high-level athletes are familiar with it. They use it frequently in their physical and mental preparation. The goal is to consolidate a situation that will be experienced later. For aerobatic pilots, practicing mental imagery is essential before each flight. The same goes for competitive skiers. The technique allows you to put bad thoughts at bay by creating a favorable environment. Furthermore, it helps to raise awareness of an objective reality by positing successes, however minimal they may be.

The therapeutic effects act as a complement to other treatment methods.

In Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) we talk about a mental map to visualize the assembly of our thoughts, our feelings, our values, our weaknesses. The mental map is a method that promotes the graphic display of information for reflection or the development of a project. Seeing it mentally allows you to keep the memory of an overall relationship.

Visualization board

Do you imagine goals in life that you want to see come true?

Change jobs, find a partner, travel, etc. The first thing to do is to focus on your true desires. The ones you think are achievable. Everything is often mixed up in your head and you just dream rather than move on to an active phase of taking charge of your life.

Before realizing your goal of a new life. Let your imagination run wild and visualize the new context. A house, for example, with blue shutters. These images, materialized by collages of magazine photos, drawings, maps, will form a painting that you will hang in your home.

An original painting by an artist can also be your support. You will thus have before your eyes a positive support for your imagination which can encourage you to change something in your life.

Active visualization

In the 1980s, cancer specialist Carl Simonton popularized active visualization techniques for therapeutic purposes. He found that, despite an identical diagnosis, some of his patients recovered while others died quickly. He wondered about the role of the mind in the healing process.

He noticed that his patients, who believed in their recovery, fared much better than others. He deciphered this mechanism not as a simple belief, but as a process worth analyzing. For him, one of the keys is modeling his beliefs through positive visualization practices.

An experiment that proved beneficial was to ask the patient to imagine small fictional beings, in this case, “Pac-Man” (at the time of the first video games) devouring the cancer cells. Obviously, the Simonton method did not replace cancer treatments, but provided a psychological complement which proved to be quite effective.

Carl Simonton-Matthews-Simonton S. & Creighton J. (1990). Book “Heal against all odds”, The daily guide for patients and their loved ones to overcome cancer.

A practical exercise in positive visualization.

The exercise location should be quiet and calm. Make yourself comfortable. Then take a deep breath, visualizing the scene you have chosen. You need to focus on the smallest details.

It is important to be physically present. A bit like a movie actor. You look at the result of your mental construction head-on with empathy.

Look carefully at your double. It must be consistent with what is happening in the scene. The atmosphere is pleasant.

Then enrich the situation by adding elements that you would like to see.

Next, look at your back double.

You now enter the stage and take the place of your double.

You begin to experience the scene. You have confidence in yourself.

You must want to stay in this reassuring cocoon where you feel free without anyone's judgment.

When you leave your visualization, the present should not be a break in time.

This exercise must be repeated many times with ever more details that seem necessary to you. The scene will seem familiar and will give you confidence in the future.

Creative visualization

In many areas, visualizing pleasant situations has positive effects on stress, anxiety and improved cognitive abilities. Visualization allows you to project yourself into a reassuring, pleasant universe, in order to mobilize your resources. This is particularly true for a creative activity such as for artists.

Whether it concerns the visual arts, cinema, music or literature, a mental image is lodged in the artist's brain.

To read: “creative visualization” book by Shakti Gawain (New Age and personal development author).

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