Your Powerful Video Game Avatar

This practice uses guided imagery familiar to video game players to rejuvenate body, mind, and compassion. It is perfect for those interested in meditation and video game play. It aims to make compassion meditation and visualization accessible to people who play video games, as well as deepen the understanding of friends and loved ones of gamers.

Transcript

These are just a few that very few of our internationally attended speakers have found elf systems that are experiencing Iraqi Mind yourNext Love Close your eyes.

In your mind's eye,

I want you to begin to see a video game screen.

The screen is blurry,

But as you look closer,

You begin to see that it is a screen that shows a video game character or avatar.

Taking a deep breath in and out,

You will notice that the avatar begins to come more into focus.

Inhale again to sharpen the focus.

Now allow yourself to relax into your next exhale.

With each breath,

You begin to see your video game avatar more and more clearly.

Breathing in and breathing out.

Breathing in and breathing out.

Take a minute to look at your character's avatar.

What do you see about your body?

What clothing,

Uniform,

Or costume do you see?

Perhaps you are a warrior from an ancient time or a medieval knight.

Perhaps you see a samurai or a space explorer.

Perhaps your avatar is a funny cartoon character or a wild animal.

Perhaps you see your avatar from your favorite video game or perhaps you are making one up right now that is new and wholly original.

Take a moment to bring your avatar into clear focus in your mind.

This avatar is yours and yours alone.

It is special and powerful and valuable.

It is how you play this game,

Move through this world,

And connect with others.

This avatar is how you will complete quests,

Unlock achievements,

And accomplish things.

Looking up to the left-hand corner of your game screen,

You will see three bars.

The top bar,

Which is red,

Represents your avatar's body and health.

Take a look at how full the health bar is right now.

And now begin breathing in slowly and out slowly.

And with every breath,

You see the red bar begins to fill up a little bit.

Take another breath in and see how it fills in some more.

In three more inhales and exhales,

Your health bar will be full.

Breathe in more health and energy.

Breathe out any pain or discomfort.

Breathe in and feel your circulation tingling with new energy and power.

Breathe out any tension you are feeling.

That health bar is so close to being filled.

Breathe in and bring the bar up to full.

Now breathe out and see the health bar lock into place with a glowing outline around it.

The middle bar,

Which is blue,

Represents your mana.

By mana,

We mean your mind and higher will.

This energy is what will power your creativity and ability to bring your ideas into reality.

Take a look at how full the blue mana bar is right now.

And now,

Begin breathing in slowly and out slowly.

And with every breath in,

The blue bar begins to fill up a little bit.

Take another breath in and see how it fills in some more.

In three more inhales and exhales,

Your mana bar will be full.

Breathe in inspiration and mental energy.

Breathe out any thoughts that are fatiguing you or weighing you down.

Breathe in and feel your mind's eye tingling with new energy and clarity.

Breathe out any confusion or fuzzy distractions you have.

That mana bar is so close to being filled.

Breathe in some more creativity and bring that bar up to full.

Now breathe out and see the mana bar lock into place with a glowing outline around it.

Now look at the bottom bar.

The bottom bar,

Which is green,

Represents your stamina.

In this case,

Stamina means your resilience and your compassion for the suffering of others.

Your yearning for you and all beings to thrive in the face of adversity.

This green energy will allow you to persist in loving kindness towards yourself and others throughout the events of the game.

Take a look at how full the green stamina bar is right now.

And now begin breathing in slowly and out slowly.

And with every breath in,

The green bar begins to fill up a little bit.

Take another breath in.

See how it fills in some more.

In three more inhales and exhales,

Your stamina bar will be full.

Breathe in compassion for yourself.

Breathe out any criticism or harsh thoughts or feelings you may have for yourself.

Now breathe in and imagine widening that compassion to include your family and friends,

Their lives and struggles.

Breathe out any resentments you have against them.

Let those all go.

That stamina bar is nearly full.

With this breath,

Widen your compassion to expand to include the whole world.

Imagine the green glow of that compassionate stamina to wash over everyone and everything in the world and beyond.

And bring that bar up to full.

Now breathe out and see the mana bar lock into place with a glowing outline around it.

Return to looking at your avatar and allow yourself to feel grateful for all it accomplishes.

Your avatar can level up infinitely.

It can master so many achievements.

Your avatar can travel across boundless distances of time and space.

And now that it is powered up,

Your avatar is ready to help you achieve anything you want to achieve today.

In your mind's eye,

Imagine your avatar begin to pulse with energy in the colors of the three bars.

Pulsing with the red energy of health and vitality.

Pulsing with the blue energy of mana's mind and will.

Pulsing with the green energy of stamina compassion for you,

Others,

And everything.

As your avatar continues to pulse with this energy,

I want you to imagine it turn to face you.

Imagine your avatar leaving the game screen and floating through the air until it comes to settle deep,

Deep inside you.

Your pulsing avatar slowly fades into your deepest self and will stay with you for as long as you need it today.

Anytime you need to recharge it,

You have only to breathe deeply and replenish it.

When you are ready,

Begin to feel your feet on the ground.

Continuing to breathe comfortably and deeply,

Open your eyes and come back to awareness of your surroundings.

Take a moment to be grateful for this opportunity to level up your meditation practice and grateful for what your avatar will bring to you and to this day.

This has been a guided visualization meditation from Mike Langlois,

LICSW.

If you found it of benefit and want more information on my work,

Go to www.

Mikelanglois.

Com or www.

Gamertherapist.

Com.

You can also follow me on Twitter at mikelicsw.

Thank you.

Reviews

I love this so much! Thank you, Mike!

Such a cool concept, especially as a gamer.. some might not believe in mindful gaming but I do think it’s possible. So much love and light in your direction, brother. Thank you 🙏🏻

Wonderful I had so much fun doing this 🙏 thank you ❤️🙏🦋☘️

Loved the visual!! (And it made me smile, hearing your doggo🥰)
Thank you!

I’m an older person & this was so cool & fun! Empowering! Thank you so much! 🙏

This was fantastic! Really made me think and consider all parts of life and how I feel about them.

I can see this having great utility in many ways. Though never a die-hard MMORPG player, I did roll a number of rooms that, amongst them all, helped me to shape my avatar here most appropriately to my current needs.

My only note on this is that the selection of background music during the avatar creation phase and your explanation of what mana is was far too dark for the circumstances. It was music I would expect to find while doing a run in a shadow or dark region, or potentially when entering an instance for an epic boss fight. Generally one would be hearing more upbeat and "pep-talk" style music at the initiation of a new base level character - or even reconfiguring gear/specializations/stats on an existing one.

Granted, I don't have a wide range of MMORPG experience (mainly WoW - "For the Horde!" 😁) but I have seen enough others in action to feel fairly comfortable with my comments above. I thought the concept a great one when I first read about it a few years ago, particularly in the residential treatment centers for online gaming addiction in Japan and Korea. I am a mental health and disability services professional myself and my clients often present with these issues so I like to stay "in the loop" somewhat.

This practice is the first direct application of gamer-centric therapeutic and psychological technique I have had the opportunity to experience myself, and I can easily see how effective it can be for those already familiar with the format but perhaps less so with meditation as a mental concept. Different ways of expressing visualization in the end, but flexing the same mental muscles in many ways.

There's actually an audiobook on Audible right now titled "Sentenced to Troll" wherein an online troller is sentenced in court to run a troll avatar in order to experience the taunting and negative feedback personally that he had been using out to others. I haven't heard/read it yet, but it's on my wishlist, and the relatively new "Gamer Lit" genre seems to be taking off. I can see that working well with your meditative practices for sure.

Thank you for your innovative work and for sharing it with us here on Insight Timer. I will be looking forward to experiencing more of your practices in the future. I see the light in you. 🤲🏻❤️🤲🏻