Music Imagery Psychotherapy is an offshoot of the powerful Guided Imagery in Music modality, originally created by the renowned American music therapist Helen Bonny. These sessions are carefully structured and seek to integrate into your life the natural healing, imaginary capacities of music.

In the first session I do an intake questionnaire and then there is an opportunity for us to try out the process, to explore how it may best benefit you going forwards.

In the following sessions, the basic structure is:

Although using prerecorded music may sound uninspiring, the music which will feel ‘right’ for you in this setting may become powerfully transformational. This is because as research suggests, music which speaks personally to you will tap very quickly into deeper areas of your mind, cutting through superficial busyness, engaging right-brained parts of you which existed before you learnt to speak, the source of your imagination and creativity. It may also have subtle but powerful effects upon your body and healthy, parasympathetic, nervous system, evoking deeper calming feelings of wellbeing.

The music choice therefore is an important point in the session. It is done collaboratively; for while you make the choice, my training enables me to guide you towards the fertile possibilities. Often, the ‘right’ music becomes a change agent, beginning an inner process from which may emerge new positive feelings and perspectives.

Although these sessions do typically appeal to people with artistic backgrounds, no artistic ability whatsoever is required to benefit, as it taps into your natural human responses to music and imagination. Recent neuroscience has described the healing effects of cross-hemispheric links, using our left-brained language to make sense of right-brained non-verbal processes. This is something I sense often happens during the closing discussion when people share about new feelings, and ideas which help change their outlook. The power of music means that these sessions are completely bespoke; the right music within this setting from whatever genre, speaking personally to each being, regardless of age or background.

Given the stresses and strains of modern living, I believe most people would benefit from this cutting-edge therapy, given the flexibility with which it is implemented. It is especially helpful for people experiencing the following:

If you would like to explore if this feels right for you, please feel free to get in touch and ask me any questions.

These will of course depend upon what you bring and most need from these sessions. The process deepens over time, and so after a minimum of six sessions, clients have typically reported the following: