ABSTRACT
Current life imagery refers to all forms of imagery work that involve recent past, present, or future scenes. These can be aimed at raising mode awareness, developing the patient’s Healthy Adult, deepening reparenting capacities for child modes and rehearsing behaviour change.
Five types of current life imagery are outlined: (1) imagery to rescript a recent schema-triggering scene, so that the Healthy Adult can ensure that the emotional needs of the Vulnerable Child are met; (2) imagery to rehearse a desired behaviour change and to provide mental preparation for specific situations (such as job interviews, etc.); (3) imagery to summon awareness of qualities and strengths of the Healthy Adult; (4) preparing for high-risk, emotionally charged situations, such as a rise in suicidality/self-harm, an increase in other-harming intentions, or a rise in a felt need to abuse substances; (5) imagery exercises to connect with, and nurture, the Vulnerable Child in the moment.
Special attention is given to parameters that merit attention when working on current life issues, such as: differentiation between capacities for assertive anger and explosive rage (and other aspects of emotion regulation), differentiation between internal experience and outside behaviour (and other aspects of reality-testing), patient’s dangerousness to self and/or others, etc.
