as an addedum, here is an article that I found well written about the equilibrium between formulaic and "freestyle" interaction with inner images: https://inthewilderless.substack.com/p/inner-wilds-alchemy-c...

This does not mean that therapists offering guidance or following a particular framework are chalatans, but it is an encouragement to avoid, as much as possible, to hammer definitions on phenomena too hard. Those frameworks exist, at least in part, because they have proven useful to some people, but none of them is "the answer".