Introduction to Mindfulness - Dean Amory

During the process of transformation, emotions literally dissolve into
many small parts, which can be more readily digested and reintegrated
by the psyche and our innate intelligence into something
more stable.
Besides the differentiation of feelings and associated memories,
people will frequently encounter some form of experiential imagery.
It may be in the form of a memory image, a picture from the past.
Experiential imagery often takes on a more abstract form of shifting
colors and shapes. Whatever form the imagery takes, the approach is
always to sit with the present experience and felt sense associated
with the imagery and allow it to unfold and change in its own unique
way. One person focusing on anger first notices a red color, which
takes on the form of a hard, rough rock. With continued mindfulness,
the rock begins to change shape and color and dissolves into a pile of
white sand. This is not visualization, because there was no deliberate
effort to create the imagery; they arose experientially.
The process of unfolding and transformation of experiential imagery
is one of the most powerful events that can occur during MMT and is
one of the most effective means of producing change at the deepest
level of our emotional suffering. How this works is not well
understood, but it is generally agreed that the mind thinks in pictures
and organizes memory and particularly the affective dimension of
memory through visual imagery. Why the anger took on the form of a
red colored rock is interesting and of course red is often associated
with anger, as is hardness. Why it changed into white sand is also
interesting and similarly we can make interpretations of what it
means: white sand symbolizes tranquility and fluidity. However,
interpretation is not the purpose of MMT; what is important is the
full conscious experience of this process of change in the inner
structure of our experience. It is this conscious awareness of the
process that is transformational, not an understanding of the contents
that arise.
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