My Favourite Soothing Images and Memories....

When my mood prevents me from engaging with the world outside, it takes me a supreme effort to even venture beyond the door. I have had periods of low mood, panic attacks and just plain emotional exhaustion when I have not had contact with the world outside for up to a month. At those times when fear of contact with people prevents me from doing what I know would be helpful ie getting out and about, enjoying fresh air etc, I need to focus my mind in a way that allows me to be fed with 'good things'.

It helps for me to reawaken my senses by listening, by eating regularly, by looking and noticing familiar images. These images are positive for a number of reasons. Because some of them remind me of positive moments such as holidays and family, they allow me to reconnect with positive emotions and connect them with the world outside my own head. I use the photos as a way to engage my sense of smell, sound, taste as I imagine myself back in those moments. For the pictures of nature I again imagine that my senses are engaged with the world outside and imagine myself enjoying the feel of sun on my skin, the sense of wind tousling my hair, anything that reminds me I am not imprisoned inside, nor have I been all my life and to believe that I could enjoy such moments again.

My senses are a gift that I forget when I am struggling with emotional pain and distress, but by using these pictures I am able to remind myself that I once engaged with the world around me and I will be feeling well enough to do so again.