How to Coach Yourself and Others Better Coaching Through Visualisation | Page 166

(Heinschel, 2002). Clients do not have something "done" to them,
they live an actual experience during the imagery exercise using the
practitioner (clinician, health care worker, as the guide). While the
eyes are either open (focused on a point in front of them) or closed,
the client is guided through the exercise in the clinical setting
(office, hospital, home, etc.), to be practiced as "prescribed" (i.e. x
times daily) on their own between sessions (one time only, daily for
seven days, or for twenty one days) depending on the presenting
problem and the individual (Shafer & Greenfield, 2002).
11.3 Case Studies
The following case examples illustrate how mental imagery can be
utilized in a variety of health concerns:
Case Example #1
Sandra, a 43-year-old attorney, has been asthmatic since childhood.
Despite using a variety of approaches, she has always felt enslaved
to her disease. She has tried both ignoring her condition and catering
to it. Though everything seems to help for a time, nothing gives her
the release she seeks. She is tired of searching for a solution which
constantly evades her. Feeling drained and confused, she seeks out a
clinician trained in the use of mental imagery as a treatment of last
resort.
The therapist asks Sandra to close her eyes, turns her senses inward,
and does some reverse breathing (exhaling first though her mouth,
then inhaling through her nose). With this simple preparation,
Sandra enters the world of her imagination where anything is
possible – for here there are no rules, no diagnoses or prognoses, in
fact, no limitations of any kind. Using an imagery exercise called
“Liberation From Slavery,” Sandra sees and feels herself chained to
her illness which appears to her as a large beast pressing her down,
its foot planted firmly on her chest. Uncomfortable as this image
may be, once she sees it she has the opportunity to acknowledge it
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