90 day collage for self discovery - notes on the process and additional images

August 26, 2016

90 day collage for self discovery - notes on the process and additional images

"The un-examined life is not worth living" - Plato

"We cannot live the afternoon of life according to the program of life’s morning, for what was great in the morning will be little at evening and what in the morning was true, at evening will have become a lie.” - Carl Jung

What does this mean and why should it matter? Wayne Dyer explained it best:

"Carl Jung writes that the afternoon of our lives represents the time when we begin to shift away from the ego being the dominant force in our life. We begin moving towards a life journey that has meaning. The morning of our lives is really occupied by ambition—getting as much as you can, collecting as much stuff as you can get, impressing as many people as you can, preparing yourself for a job, saving your money, setting goals, pleasing everybody, and doing the right thing. That’s basically the essence of the ego. In the afternoon of your life, you don’t do life. You do what resonates with the callings of your soul."

How do you find out "the callings of your soul"? For each person, the process of finding out is different. From a personal perspective, art and craft have long been among my favorite "go to" places for sustenance. Though I have been working intermittently on visual journals for a long time, developing a context and structure to interpret the resulting art work has been a challenge. Even though it appeared that art therapy theory and practices might fill the gap, something was missing. It is against this backdrop that I started on Shelley Klammer's Collage for self discovery - 90 day challenge. (For an idea of what this is all about, see Self Acceptance with Collage Art Therapy). Though I exceeded the time-frame by by several weeks, the discipline of creating a daily collage and writing a paragraph or page on each, has established a ritual which has had several positive spin-offs.

The process of creating an intuitive collage is simple: Step 1 is to gather together a journal, scissors, magazines, flyers, stickers, embellishments, whatever art materials you possess and adhesives. Next, ensure that you have about 15 to 20 minutes of uninterrupted time - I generally managed this when the family were asleep. It helps to have a specific place to work at. Then, you center yourself by breathing deeply and regularly until your feel ready. Now, you select whichever images and materials appeal to you at that point in time, paste them onto a page, without too much thought or rearrangement, working on the basis of "what feels right". When the page was ready, set it aside and grab a cup of tea or something that nourishes - the idea is to move out of the 'intuitive' state. Then, return and do a "free association" interpretation of the collage (more about how to do that later). Finally, give it a one to four word caption.

How does it work? The thinking behind intuitive collage is based on Jungian concepts. According to Jung, our waking behavior, thoughts and actions are largely powered by our unconscious minds. Though it is impossible to fully apprehend the unconscious mind, developing some understanding of it and a capacity to dialog with it gives us a greater understanding of ourselves and ability to be effective and enjoy life. In order to do this, we need to be aware of the differences between the conscious and unconscious minds.

The conscious mind is logical, rational and thinks in sequence, focuses on one thing at a time and understands words, concepts and measurements. The unconscious mind, is intuitive, emotional, operates through feeling, hunches, sensory perceptions and is non-verbal. It doesn't miss a thing and stores every experience and event occurring around us as a memory. It makes associations that defy logic, but have a wisdom of their own. Besides our own experiences, the unconscious mind also has access to what Jung termed the "collective unconscious" which is ancestral and species memories common to all human beings. The collective unconscious contains universal patterns known as 'archetypes', that have been personified in myths, legends and religion.

The conscious and unconscious minds communicate differently. The conscious mind communicates in words, numbers and with a step-by-step rationale that leads to clear-cut conclusions. The unconscious mind, by contrast, communicates through sensory perceptions (images, sounds, smells, touch, taste) and feelings. The process of intuitive collage helps bridge the gap. It engages the unconscious, selections are made without judgement on the quality of the work (ie whether it is 'artistic' or not), but merely by allowing 'feel' and intuition to guide the process. The next stage - journaling using free association - involves just writing down, without censorship, any thoughts that the finished collage provokes. Once this is done, one can analyse the writing for further insights - specifically, looking for 'transference' (ie unknowingly transferring feelings about one person to another), 'projection' (ascribing feelings and motives one has difficulty admitting to, onto another person or thing) and 'resistance' (maintaining a mental block against remembering or accepting some events or ideas). Over time, one could see patterns emerge in either the images or their interpretation or could become aware of behaviors and thoughts that one would otherwise be unaware off. The insights possible are invaluable.

Though I have completed the 90-day challenge, I suspect that I will be using the technique indefinitely. I am sharing the collages I posted in the hope that they will encourage other people to explore the benefits too.