'I pictured myself healing'

Visualisation expert Maya Raichoora used the powerful mental imagery technique to live the life she wanted after struggling with bowel disease

- EVA GIZOWSKA

Nine years ago, Maya Raichoora was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis, an inflammatory bowel disease. Within months shed gone from being super fit and passionate about sports to someone whose world revolved around pain and hospital appointments.

Yet today, Maya, 27, is a leading mental fitness and visualisation expert, coaching top footballers, tennis players and CEOs of global companies. She is also Nike's first mental fitness trainer.

But there was a time when her life was anything but smooth.

"Growing up I was what people might call a high achiever," says Maya. "I excelled at school, danced competitively and played professional badminton.

"I appeared confident, sociable and bubbly, but underneath, I was also sensitive and insecure.

"It wasn't until I got ill that I began to understand how important it is to look after your mental fitness."

When Maya was 15 she started to feel aches, cramps and pain after eating and was constipated, with blood in her stools. After having tests and a colonoscopy, she was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis, an incurable inflammatory bowel disease.

"I was told I would have 'flares' when I would be unwell, and other times when I'd be in remission," she says. "Unfortunately, as time wore on my symptoms got worse."