Teaching Mental Imagery
Channeling energy to improve physical and emotional wellness
By Susan Langlois
Mental imagery is a tool that is best known when athletes close their eyes to rehearse a complex movement, often just before they perform a high dive, a soccer penalty kick, or a foul shot. But mental imagery can also be used to help campers and staff members build resilience, manage their stress, and have much more fun at camp—especially when they master a challenging skill.
Photo: © Can Stock Photo / wellphoto
Even though stress-related illnesses for children are on the rise, the practice of mental imagery at camp can have a positive impact and actually improve health. Mental-imagery training can teach campers how to manage their psychic energy and improve their resilience: emotionally, mentally, and physically.
Mental imagery is a skill. By imagining a perfect performance, the brain strengthens motor patterns that send messages to muscles. On command, these motor patterns can then send signals to muscles to contract in specific ways.
One can improve these motor patterns by physically practicing a skill. An individual can also improve the motor pattern in the brain when seeing the activity performed perfectly in the mind’s eye (mental imagery). Eventually, with both physical and mental practice, a person programs the brain on how to throw a perfect spiral, move on-command to “come about” in a sailboat, or just expand the rib cage to take a deep breath. Visualizing a specific movement without moving a muscle can actually improve the motor pattern.
Using mental imagery to manage stress can easily be built into camp programming. This technique involves three steps that build on each other.
Step #1—Square breathing. It all begins with the breath. Bring campers’ awareness to their breathing and how it makes their bodies feel; just learning and practicing square breathing in itself can help campers find their center and feel more grounded.
This exercise has two important elements:
Natural breathing through the nose (which can divert each camper’s attention from the environment to what is in immediate control)
Counting to focus on breathing.
Natural Breathing. Ask campers to put their left hand on their belly. They can close their eyes if they want to. They can start breathing in through their nose and feel their belly get bigger. Also, ask them if they can feel their lungs fill with air. Then ask them to exhale as they normally do—and to feel their belly get flatter. Unless they are forcing a larger-than-normal inhale or exhale, they should breathe through the nose when they inhale and when they exhale.
On the next breath, ask them to notice what their shoulders do when they inhale and when they exhale. They can feel their shoulders rise when they breathe in and their shoulders fall as they breathe out. Repeat three more times. Now they are ready to try square breathing.
Breathe in slowly to a count of four (noticing how far the belly, lungs, and shoulders rise). Then exhale slowly to a count of four.
Breathe in slowly to a count of three (this time noticing how the shoulders rise). Then exhale slowly to a count of three.
Breathe in slowly to a count of two (this time noticing how much the lungs fill with air). Then exhale slowly to a count of two.
Breathe in slowly and think “one” (this time noticing how the belly gets bigger, and then think “one” and exhale slowly).
Repeat this square-breathing set once more. Stopping here on Day 1 might be best. Suggest campers try square breathing on their own one more time during the day.
Photo: © Can Stock Photo / serrnovik
Step 2 (on Day 2)—Mental imagery. This is most effective when it involves all five senses.
Ask campers to think of a day when something really good happened. Give some examples:
Having a favorite tuna sandwich for lunch
Helping a friend with a math problem, who then aced the test
Building a snow fort
Having a friend at home for a sleepover
Building a fire to roast marshmallows for s'mores.
If a camper (or two campers) wants to volunteer to share a good event, use that example to describe what happened, using all five senses:
What did the sandwich taste like?
Describe what the math problem looked like and how you helped your friend solve it.
When you walked in the snow to build a fort, did you hear the snow crunch or did you walk in fluffy snow without making a sound?
Did the doorknob feel cold when you opened the front door to let your friend in?
When your marshmallow started to turn golden-brown, could you smell the marshmallow or the smoke from the fire?
Now lead the campers through one square-breathing set. Repeat for a second set and at the end of the last, exhale, asking them to imagine the sound of the good thing that happened.
You can repeat with another set and let them choose which of the five senses they want to imagine at the end of the last exhale.
Step # 3—Anchoring. Attach an anchor to the feeling of the good thing that happened on the final exhale.
An anchor is a gesture or an action that can be attached to the imagery and the breathing that campers are practicing. A common anchor is to press the first two fingers to the thumb as campers exhale, and practice one of the five senses of the image.
At the end of each square-breathing set, perform the anchor with the image of one of the senses on the last exhale. So, eventually, this mental-imagery exercise will have five sets of square breathing (one for each of the five senses). Each time, the anchor is performed along with the image and the last exhale in the square-breathing set.
Eventually, the campers can try performing just the anchor with the exhale and the image to see if there is a relaxation effect. As they strengthen the connection, they can use it throughout the day to have a relaxation response with just the anchor, the breath, and the image.
This mental-imagery exercise takes only a few minutes a day, but the dividends of more resilience and enjoyment will be there for a lifetime.
Susan Langlois has more than 30 years of experience as a college professor, athletic administrator, camp director, and sport-facilities design consultant. She is a graduate of Springfield College and the University of New Hampshire. She is currently the Dean of Arts & Sciences at Rivier University in Nashua, N.H. Reach her at slanglois@rivier.edu.