Imaginal Practice opens doors to new ways of being and relating that can radically shift how you relate to yourself, experience, other people and the world. It can fundamentally change how you work, play, relate, understand and feel; creating richness, flow, aliveness, honesty and depth.
It’s quite a mysterious practice. If you are just starting out, you may be looking for the thing that will help it ‘click’ into place, for the imaginal realm to open up to you.
Importantly, the imaginal isn’t something that you add to experience, it’s revealing the underlying creative expression that is innate and already present. The imaginal realm has a psychedelic quality to it and practicing with it can open up new senses in your experience.
The content here is designed to nudge you towards getting directly, or more deeply, in touch with the imaginal realm in your experience as well as to understand what the imaginal realm is and how it works.
Other meditation practices, such as jhana meditation, heart practices and mindfulness practices can make it easier to access meaningful imaginal practices, but they aren’t a pre-requisite. The imaginal realm is accessible to all and it can also work the other way – imaginal practice will help you deepen into other contemplative and spiritual practices.
Some of the key imaginal practices and cultures that I am building upon include Jung’s Active Imagination, Rob Burbea’s Soulmaking Dharma, Tantric Buddhism, Shamanic Journeying, Cliff Barry’s Shadow Work Therapy and George Lakoff’s Metaphors We Live By.
Writing
Some key information to orient you and some suggested practices to try.
Videos & Guided Meditations
1. Non-Dual Body, Heart, Mind and Soul Video Talks and Guidance
Foundation non-dual practices that can help with accessing the imaginal realm.
2. Becoming an Imaginal Practitioner Retreat, taught at Dharmagarage
A retreat designed to give people all the skills, knowledge and experience they need to become imaginal practitioners.
3. Playlist of videos about Imaginal practice
Videos about Imaginal Practice, from introductory talks to recorded practice guidance.
4. Awakening to the Imaginal Realm, taught at Berkeley Alembic
Experience is much more innately psychedelic and creative in nature than you might imagine from the habitual routines of your usual day-to-day perspective. By connecting to the imaginal realm in both body and soul, you can discover this innate psychedelic quality, allowing experience to flow more fluidly through you as your life and practice becomes a more natural expression of Buddha-nature.
In this four-part series, which combines talks, guided meditations, and self reflection, we will connect with the four aspects of experience that are the foundations of imaginal practice: Somatic-Imaginal; Eros; Myth and Metaphor; and Mysticism.
There will be a two-fold dimension to our work, a balance between developing the technical skills required to unlock these parts of experience, and the more receptive work of surrendering to the already present imaginal undercurrent within experience.
To take most advantage of this series, it will be helpful if you are comfortable connecting to your subtle or energy body, have done some work with a transformative healing modality, and have had some experience of open awareness.
Podcasts
Nouveau Shamanic Cinema Podcast, with Joost Vervoort
An entire podcast series where we watch films as if they are dreams or imaginal practice and use this to discuss dharma and the nature of reality
Interview on Deconstructing Yourself
I talk about imaginal practice, incorporating the darkness and more.
Meditation, Meaning, Myth and Magic, with Daniel M. Ingram – Part VI
We discuss creativity, journeying, imagination, and the richness of practice
Video Interview Series with Imaginal Practitioners
I chat with some practitioners about how they work with the imaginal