Unit 8 Loving Kindness and visualization exercises

I found the Loving Kindness and visualization exercises to be the most useful. The loving kindness exercise makes us re-think how we might respond to something. It also helps us start with the perspective of love and kindness. If we start with that perspective, then we create a positive environment, which is beneficial for both us and others. This mean we actively make our lives better by making others’ lives better. This makes sense, because the variable we always control to some degree is ourselves, but sometimes we have to notice what we are automatically doing. Below is a summary of the visualization exercise I did for this week.

Find a comfortable spot, relax, then close your eyes and remember or imagine a time with a significant amount of happiness. Remember or imagine this experience as vividly as possible. Allow the feelings to intensify. Pay close attention to all the details, like what would you smell, what would you see, how would it sounds, how would it feel and did you not notice anything else in it yet? Now, bring up an experience or imagine a time where you felt a sense of wholeness, connection, and flow. Pay close attention to all the details, like what would you smell, what would you see, how would it sounds, how would it feel and did you not notice anything else in it yet? Allow the feelings to intensify. Last, but not least recall or imagine a time where you experienced vitality, radiant health, and well-being. Recall or imagine a time where you are filled with energy and life. Pay close attention to all the details, like what would you smell, what would you see, how would it sounds, how would it feel and did you not notice anything else in it yet? Then allow all three of these experiences to come together so they become a single experience, but a new experience (Dacher, 2006). How does this affect what you bring to others in this world?

I can imagine using these along with my normal daily meditation and self-hypnosis exercises I do. I know what I already do helps, but I also know going out into doing something slightly different than what you are used to as something that is useful and is sometimes exactly what one needs to do. As for being specific, I do not know how I can be any more specific than I already am, because otherwise it would speculation. I do know that I will include it at-least once a week specifically the way it is without any alteration. However, I have a modified version to use as a way to combine the feeling, which I find to be more useful. Below I will give an idea about how this modification works. I pick some sense and create a metaphor for each feeling. For instance, a normal practice is to associate some color or colors with a feeling or even a sound or a word, then associate it until it triggers some of that feeling. Then we amplify it until it is at-least as strong as the original feeling or more. If you are interested in learning more about this method, then research submodalities.

References

Dacher, E. (2006). Integral Health: The path to human flourishing. Laguna Beach,CA: Basic Health Publishers,Inc.