What Others Say
About the Academy, IGIsm Certification Training, and the imagination...

"The Academy for Guided Imagery has created and finely honed an exquisite training program. Years of development and feedback has resulted in a creative program with great integrity and clinical relevance."
-Jeanne Achterberg, PhD
Senior Editor, Alternative Therapies in Medicine

"I find Interactive Guided Imagerysm so useful that I plan to require training in it for fellows in the Integrative Medicine Program I am creating at the University of Arizona Medical Center."
-Andrew Weil, MD
Author, Spontaneous Healing

"The Academy provides an exceptionally thorough, professional and well thought out training for practicing clinicians. My own Certification Training was extremely valuable to me and I prefer to use AGI graduates whenever possible in our hospital programs."
-Leslie Davenport, MS, MFCC
Executive Coordinator
Humanities Program
Marin General Hospital

"Guided Imagery and visualization can enhance the effectiveness of other treatments, including allopathic drugs and surgery. Try them for any illness and all autoimmune disorders."
-Andrew Weil, MD
Shape, January 1996

"The guided imagery training that I received from the Academy was by far the most exciting and useful training that I have received since finishing my PhD. I still get referrals regularly from the Academy's listing of graduates. I enthusiastically support any professional considering adding Interactive Guided Imagerysm to their armamentarium."
-James M. Holcomb, PhD
Clinical Psychologist

"Though I have been in practice since 1973, I have seldom seen the depth of understanding, clarity of direction, and motivation toward change through other modalities. Clearly Interactive Guided Imagerysm is an approach to therapy which is making a major contribution."
-Richard D. Berrett, PhD
Professor of Child and Family Science
California State University, Fresno

"My clients now leave my office more relaxed, grounded, empowered . . . Certification Training is a transforming experience."
-Ron Rehrer, MFCC
Pastoral Counselor

"The training itself connected me with my own 'inner healer,' a gift that keeps giving as I do Interactive Guided Imagerysm. I have found it to be very helpful in working with hospice and chemically dependent clients."
-Marsha Aliamus, RN
Registered Nurse

" . . . a truly invaluable experience that opened a gate for me to a deepened understanding of innate healing power. I sincerely believe that any physician who practices Integrative Medicine should be well-practiced in the applications of Interactive Guided Imagerysm... Its use in pain and symptom management, as well as insight and resource cultivation, has made the path of healing powerful and meaningful . . . What a joy!"
-Carl Hendel, MD
Integrative Medicine

"For me the most important part of my Interactive Guided Imagerysm training was to really develop my skills as a listener. The AGI training program also helped me to be less judgmental and interpretive with regard to what I hear, whether in an imagery session or in other patient communications. Finally, my work with imagery has restored my enjoyment of the practice of medicine because it takes me and my patients into unknown, magical places of healing and awareness."
-Matthew Zwerling, MD
Orthopedic Surgeon


ACADEMY GRADUATES ANSWER QUESTIONS ABOUT INTERACTIVE GUIDED IMAGERYsm

How do you use IGIsm in your practice?

Richard Berrett, PhD:
"I use IGIsm as one of the significant modalities in treating stress, depression, PTSD, marital, family, and child issues."

Sara Doudna, MA, MFT:
"I use IGIsm in my psychotherapy practice. It is a basic tool which I have developed and continue to develop to treat a variety of issues. I find it to be especially powerful when used in combination with EMDR."

Jann Fredrickson, MSW:
"I use IGIsm all of the time. It is wonderful in that it naturally lends itself to brief therapy which the insurance companies love. I do not set out to do "brief therapy" but patients tend to get resolution to things quickly. I use it for cancer patients, for addictions, for men who batter, for any kind of violent behavior, and for folks who cannot choose between one thing or another."

Carl Hendel, MD:
"I use imagery to facilitate and manage symptoms of pain, to gain insights of mind/body messages, and to help patients develop internal resources to move through the adversity of illness."

Henry Milan, D.Min:
"I use IGIsm in a variety of ways. With sexually abused persons to help them get in touch with their goodness, as well as their gifts. With dying patients, I have helped them imagine their dying and what their after-life might be. With cancer clients, at times I have had them imagine chemotherapy helping them. More importantly, with some I have assisted them to speak to their cancer cells, asking its name, why it has come, and what does it want. I have used IGIsm in marital counseling not only to imagine the kind of person each is, but how a good marriage or divorce is imagined. The instances for using IGIsm are numberless."

Diane Saunders Sternbach, CHT
"I use IGIsm almost exclusively, with hypnosis at an absolute minimum."

Barbara Wieland-Mark, PhD, CHT:
"I use IGIsm with both emotional and physical client needs and I find it useful with virtually all my clients."


Please describe the value of IGIsm in your practice:

Berrett:
"It is difficult to use implicit boundaries of language to describe the value of IGIsm. It is the most powerful and useful modality I use in my practice."

Doudna:
"I frequently work with people who are involved in 12 step recovery. I find this work to be extremely effective in all aspects of the recovery process. In addition, I use it in working with somatic problems, anxiety, depression, performance enhancement, and other behavior changes, to name just a few. In extreme cases, I have often used these techniques in working with PTSD and dissociative disorders."

Fredrickson:
"The value of IGIsm cannot be measured. It is a Godsend for me and for anyone that I introduce it to."

Hendel:
"Invaluable, a centerpiece of mind/body medicine."

Lonning:
"For me personally it has great value in terms of my own process. It is also very helpful to my patients both individually and in classes as they learn to be still and trust their inner process. As you can imagine, people with cancer have high anxiety and often make major life changes in response to the diagnosis. IGIsm helps them get in touch with their authentic selves and to trust their process of change."

Milan:
"IGIsm is invaluable in my practice. It is like using poetry and frontal lobe thinking. It is a major factor in helping clients make use of their own inner resources and beauty. It has become an integral part of all of my work."

Saunders Sternbach:
"IGIsm is invaluable."

Wieland-Mark:
"Because everyone's imagination is unique, IGIsm gives a wonderful window into the client's experience. The elegance of the process is that the client explores and appreciates their own inner resources and it provides them with a lasting tool for self-exploration and healing."


Please describe your experience of the training you received from the Academy:

Berrett:
"Professional, deep, complete, stimulating, an outstanding experiential learning."

Doudna:
"I completed the certification program in 1992. It was not only the most professionally beneficial training I had ever experienced, it was also the most personally enlightening and satisfying. I had used other forms of imagery work for many years and had been certified as a hypnotherapist only two years prior. I felt that the process with the Academy far exceeded my former trainings in its thoroughness, its professionalism, the quality of the training materials used and the individual attention I received throughout the certification process.

I was also impressed with the variety of healing modalities represented by the faculty and the highly sophisticated level of accomplishment attained in their individual professional and personal lives. The small group environment in the Preceptorships allowed intimate contact with the mentors which promoted an intense and personal learning experience."

Fredrickson:
"The training that I received is the best I've gotten anywhere, period. Nothing else has even come close to the level of professionalism and the respect the Academy's training afforded me."

Hendel:
"The process of certification combined with the warmth, support, and skill of the Academy's faculty was among the most positive professional experiences I have ever had."

Lonning:
"I was very pleased with the level of training, the presenters were professional and skilled. David and Marty were great and the intensive weekends were the best supervision I have ever received."

Milan:
"The training was one of the most positive and useful experiences I have ever had. It has been very easy to recommend the training."

Saunders Sternbach:
"I was delighted with the training. The 'reverse oreo' makes learning and striving so stress-free."

Wieland-Mark:
"The training with the Academy was a top notch experience. The material was very clear and accessible and the concepts were well supported by example and literature. There were two long trainings called Preceptorships which were well defined and organized. They fostered the clear understanding of the process of IGIsm. The style of the Preceptorships allowed a repeated experience of the process on both sides of the relationship - as a guide and as a client. This helped to build a confidence and clarity of the use of the process in a variety of clinical situations."


Please share a story on how IGIsm worked for one of your patients/clients:

Milan:
"There are so many stories but a recent one is illustrative. A young adult woman had a fractured tibia which was causing a great deal of pain. In imagery she spoke to it with great anger asking why it was so hurtful. As she continued, gently I asked that she speak to it asking what it needed from her. In an instant it said that it needed to be loved. There was visible shock on her face, then suddenly she realized she had been cursing a part of her body and now understood why it was not healing. This was a major turning point in her life."
*All the names were changed to protect confidentiality.

Hendel:
"I cannot claim to have a cure for any illness, especially Multiple Sclerosis. However, utilizing imagery as part of the integrative medicine process, I have had two patients, who, having a definitive diagnosis of MS prior to the work, now have different diagnoses. Both have been labeled as misdiagnosed originally (what a common story for two people who heal against the odds). Also, several patients with Fibromyalgia have learned how to manage their lives and improve the quality of living, with much credit to the IGIsm process."

Saunders Sternbach:
"In the creative area, my special story is about an actress client who had used IGIsm with me for audition stage fright. When she landed a role on a PBS special, I suggested that she might like to try IGIsm for exploring her character. She said that she and the director had fully explored it already, and that she didn't think she would learn anything more, but she would give it a try. She was in her own words 'blown away' by the insights she had. Her work with IGIsm led directly to her finding a depth to the character no one else associated with the production had seen, and led her to give a performance that was filled with nuance and depth she would have otherwise missed."

Wieland-Mark:
"I worked with a client who presented with severe stress that was being experienced as both as anxiety and onset insomnia. In our work on the insomnia, it presented itself as an image of an invader/intruder into her apartment which she described as being otherwise safe. Conversations with the image revealed him as a friend who had died a violent death. She was able to explore her grief surrounding the death of her friend as well as fear of her own. As she got to know the image she was able to reach closure with the friend. Additionally, with the help of her Inner Advisor, she was able to construct a globe of protection around herself to sleep in and got the agreement from her Inner Advisor to stand guard over her while she slept. Her insomnia has ceased. She is very enthused about IGIsm and we are continuing to use it to deal with her anxiety."


Quotes On the Imagination...

"Imagination is more important than knowledge."
-Albert Einstein

"Imagination is the eye of the soul."
-Joseph Joubers

"The spirit is the master; imagination the tool, and the body the
plastic material ...The power of the imagination is a great factor in
medicine. It may produce diseases in man and in animals, and it may cure them ..Ills of the body may be cured by physical remedies or by the power of the spirit acting through the soul."
-Paracelsus, Father of Modern Medicine

"A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral."
-Antoine de Saint-Exupery