Reframing Vodou's Vèvès through Guided Imagery Therapy and Neurotheology as Diasporic Expressions among Haitians in Miami-Dade County, Florida

The Haitian culture is paved with colorful images, intricate symbols, and art archetypes that appear to encounter with the cultural, spiritual, and psychological qualities of the Haitian ethos. Formidable pictorial narratives such as images, music, songs and dance, and arts articulating tools for guided imagery, unknown and not conveyed, exist and bond Haitians in Miami-Dade County, Florida. The constituents of imagery vividness are culturally cogitated to discover whether guided imagery can be salutary. The purpose of this article is to explore how guided imagery as a therapeutic modality of mind-body medicine with its tentacles in neurotheology’s deep continuum of spiritual and religious experiences through the discovery of consciousness can help reduce stress, emotional distress, immigration challenges, and socio-economic issues for Haitians. It also highlights the signs of the Haitian diaspora as graphic systems, cultural and religious experiences, and presents vèvès as therapeutic conduits. The theoretical framework is Paivio and Ernest’s (1971) work on imagery ability and visual perception, meaning imagery in terms of visual ability, implies a relationship only between imagery ability and recognition of nonverbal stimuli. This theoretical framework deeply fits in the Haitian culture for therapeutic experiences and forms of religiosity. This article proposes an active transformational imagination exercise of guided imagery for three archetypal images as conscious experiences within the culture: 1) The mother, 2) music, songs and dance, and 3) an imagery known as vèvè (pronounced as vehveh). The tools considered: Gestalt Art, and Dialogue with Art Therapies for music, songs and dance, and vèvès, foreshadowed by an inner advisor exercise about the mother are expressed to heighten the imagery experiences.