Healing with Art - My story

This post is part of an "art trail" organised by Shimmer Sistarts to celebrate Inspire your Heart with Art Day which falls on January 31 every year. It is a day on which people are encouraged to look at the benefits of art on our hearts and to appreciate art in all its forms. The next post on this trail is by Danielle (Danie) May of Blue Lotus Art Space - check it out by clicking on the business name, which is a link. Also, the name of each business mentioned in this post is a link to the relevant business website or blog post. They are well worth checking out.

Regarding my own experiences, I felt that the best way for me to celebrate how art works in my life is to share the story on how art helped me navigate challenges in my recent past. The art works below are results of various courses I have taken.

          

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Art is my friend. It has been my "go to" place for many years and currently is for me, a vehicle for navigating change.

Six years ago, a series of unanticipated events caused an identity which I had carefully crafted over several years, to come crashing down. I was adrift and knew that I had to make big changes. It was at this stage that a number of synergistic  influences touched my life.

The first was an opportunity to do a series of Expressive Art Online Workshops run by Shelley Klammer;  while simultaneously also doing a series of personal-growth related short courses with Barbara Grace. 

The second was an exposure to the concept of  Intentional Creativity as envisioned by Shiloh Sophia McCloud and the chance to connect with a sisterhood of creative, supportive women whose courses I have taken at various times. Among these are Tania Magennis of Seer of the Heart, Gisela of Artuition with Gisela, Jenafer Joy of Inspired Inquiries, Amber Bonnici of The Radiant Mama. There are several more, including Lou Reed (more about her later). All these ladies offer free courses, which I dive into quite frequently and definitely recommend.

The third was the opening to study Icon writing. All the while, I was looking for a way to marry these in with my on-going interests in life coaching, energy medicine and Jungian studies.

Through the work I did on Shelley's courses I realised that art need not be pretty to be healing and that process and practice were more important than product.

Contemplative practices like Icon writing and Thanka painting, demonstrate how art can be a conduit for connecting with the Divine. They allow one to connect with the archetypal world in ways that cannot be described or analysed, but only experienced. Such practices prepare the mind and energy field for new, transformative ways of being.  

I was still looking for a holistic contemporary approach to art therapy, when I chanced on Shiloh Sophia's courses. These were an eye opener as they made it clear that art-making can be a powerful way to connect with the subconscious mind. The subconscious mind speaks to us through image, symbol and colour. Shiloh's work empowers people to explore their potential through creativity using a 13-step process.

The knitting together of all these approaches came through the work of  Louis Reed, founder of the Energy Medicine Institute who runs a year-long program called Quest, which teaches through theory, community engagement, writing/journaling, art-making and energy practices. Each step in the teaching process builds on the previous one.

Most recently, I have signed up for Life Book 2019, run by Tamara Laporte. It is a year-long art course incorporating healing and well being processes too.

What does this all mean in real terms?

I was at a point in my life when I needed to transition out of an identity which  was no longer relevant and develop a new paradigm for moving forward. I had neither the conceptual framework, skill sets or tools to facilitate a change. I lost the capacity to do daily yoga, a practice which had sustained me for several decades. The mental and psychological supports I had relied on were no longer meaningful.

I turned to art-and-craft making, but at the time felt that my practise was an indulgence. It actually was a means to empowering, sustainable change, but I didn't realise it then.

All of us face instances in our lives, when changes are irreversible and out of our control. Nothing can prepare us for the magnitude and enormity of grief when one becomes aware of that. We can choose to ignore this or pretend that it isn't happening, but doing that makes us smaller people, simply because of the energy expended in maintaining that charade. In the end the only viable way to deal with change is to engage with it and come to terms with the fact that one cannot set the timetable or agenda for healing. Transition happens as and when it happens and one has to make one's peace with this fact. Intentional art-and-craft making activities provide powerful ways with which to interrogate our feelings and to safely guide the process of transformation towards empowering outcomes.

For some of us prayer and meditation facilitate change. For others "talk therapy" works, whether with a professional counselor or supportive friends. For me art-and-craft making provided a means to understand my journey and begin to appreciate that each and every one of us has a "medicine" and "gift" to bring to the world. They are easy, joyful ways to move through change, because they allow us to bring in help from the wise, resilient being within and from support structures which we might otherwise never consciously understand or engage with.

For more artwork generated by these processes, please visit my Instagram profile at: Gillian Castellino Instagram