uk Therapy

AUTOGENIC TRAINING/THERAPY

Autogenic training contributes to good health. It is probably the most effective simple technique for dealing with stress ever developed in the West. It is a thorough, comprehensive and highly successful deep relaxation technique developed in 1932 by the German psychiatrist Johannes H. Schultz.

A.T. consists of a series of simple mental exercises designed to turn off the 'fight or flight' mechanism in the body and turn on the restorative rhythm associated with profound psychophysical relaxation. It is a method which when practised daily brings results comparable to those achieved by Eastern meditators. It is particularly appealing to the Western mind because, unlike many forms of meditation and yoga, it has no cultural, religious or cosmological overtones and requires no special clothing or unusual postures or practices. Perhaps most appealing, as the name implies, is that it is generated from within . The person practising A.T, has no external values or philosophies imposed upon him or her.

Schultz noticed that patients experienced remarkable relief from tension and fatigue and also tended to lose whatever psychosomatic disorders they had been suffering from. Individuals are able to induce this deep mental and psychological relaxation at will.

Schultz thought that if he taught people to make suggestions to themselves that deep relaxation was happening to their bodies, he could rapidly and simply introduce them to the state of passive concentration which characterises the autohypnotic state and can be used to exercise great influence over the autonomic nervous system to restore imbalances which prolonged stress has brought about.

Patients not only found themselves able to deal with current stress levels easily, in a way that was difficult to describe, they also appeared to eliminate 'old' stress which had accumulated in the body. With this came improved mental and bodily functioning plus the, apparently automatic, elimination of maladaptive behaviour as well as whatever neurotic or psychosomatic symptoms accompanied it.

The early researchers had uncovered the fact that in this state of 'passive concentration' all the activities governed by the autonomic nervous system could indeed be influenced by the person themselves, not by exercising any conscious act of will, but rather by learning to abandon themselves to an ongoing process. This strange paradox of self-induced passivity is central to the workings of A.T.

After a few weeks of practising three times a day, a state of profound psycho-physical relaxation can be induced at will. Once the exercises have been mastered they can be practised anywhere, even sitting on a bus!

In other words A.T. brings about a state of passive concentration, which lets the mind and body work towards more harmonious functioning. It appears also to enable you to achieve a higher level of psychosomatic well-being.

If you choose to use this remarkable technique, over a seven week period Josette Morgan can guide you through the Autogenic Training/Therapy exercises and enable you to 'switch off' and achieve deep and refreshing relaxation at will.

Josette Morgan

www.empathyandempowerment.com