Imagery is a simple yet effective tool for transforming the emotional states of your mind. When you imagine or recall an uplifting life experience, you can bring back the same feelings you once felt. The feelings you remember and then experience again can be controlled by thoughts and images that you focus on. Simply put, think of something positive and your emotions will be led in that direction.

If you imagine a sense of threat, your body’s stress reaction (the fight-or-flight-or-frozen response) is automatically triggered, whether that threat is real or just in your mind. Receiving the diagnosis of lung cancer is a threat, but to worry about treatment side effects or recurrence before treatment has begun is something you can strive to control in your mind and emotions. To excessively worry about problems before they occur may bring about detrimental changes in your physical, emotional, and mental states that make it even more difficult to cope with the cancer experience.

For the purpose of enhancing recovery or maintaining health and wellness during or after treatment for lung cancer, it is important to bring about a positive emotional state when using imagery practices. By imagining a state of happiness, your body’s functioning will be encouraged in a positive direction.

Begin With a Few Moments of Breathing and Relaxation.

Once you are relaxed, give yourself some time to let your imagination flow, and remember a series of situations in which you experienced love or peacefulness. Perhaps you might choose happiness or experiences of compassion and caring. Other positive experiences might also come to mind. Be open to all that arises spontaneously in your imagination—as long as it is consistent with your intention to bring up a positive emotional state.

After a few moments of thinking about some special images in your mind, choose one of the loving or positive experiences that came to you. As you hold this imagery, allow all of your senses to help intensify your experience. That is, imagine what you heard during this experience, what you smelled, tasted, and saw and how it felt to be in your body. Take your time and enjoy this imagery practice.

When your imagery is clear and vivid, let it bring back the emotions you originally felt. Allow those emotions to fill you, especially in the localized area of your heart. During this type of inner work, it is all right to allow yourself to become filled with positive emotion.

Now, as you breathe in, let your breath join with the positive quality of your feelings and feel it spread through your body. If you choose love, then let yourself be filled with a loving feeling. If you choose happiness, let that emotional energy radiate throughout your body. Enjoy! That is the point of using imagery for wellness!

When it is time to end, let your imagery practice slowly dissolve away and sit quietly, releasing tension every time you breathe in and out. Sit for a moment before rising and returning to normal activity.

—Gabriel Rocco, MA ©2001