While environmental scientists across the world were working hard to finalize the assessment of the 2019 UN Report on the State of the Environment, I was eagerly descending the steps to my basement art therapy office on Main Street, Ann Arbor so I could put the finishing touches on my latest painting. I’ve felt this space to be particularly compatible with psychological work that requires a quieting of the mind chatter in order to be able to access inner wisdom.
Posts tagged #Art Therapy
Mother Nature
I have been paying close attention to our backyard for many years now, and know which tree will be the first to turn green (the little willow by the pond), which wildflowers will bloom first, how much progress the moss has made in its fight for territory over the grass. Because I am unable to convince others let alone my husband that our attachment to lawns is not the best idea, we have plenty of it in our backyard, but due to our lack of chemical warfare against Mama Nature’s preferences, moss and some clover types are beginning to make their claim
Thinking Outside the Box
I was pretty convinced that my wild woman would be of the earth, probably covered with some dirt, have long un-styled hair, and maybe, bit of a crazed gaze that warned the beholder that she is not to be messed with. That she is to be feared even. Western society has burned even the tamest of wild women (wise women and healers) for centuries to make sure there is no question that our psyches equate wild with dangerous. In fact I am bewildered more than anything that this archetype has survived and is coming through in our imagery at all given how long and hard mankind worked to eradicate it.
In the Heart of a Dragon
This is the third time a dragon has showed up in one of my paintings and it continues to make me uncomfortable. The best way I can explain the discomfort is that the value of rational, scientific thinking as the only valid type of information gathering was such a central part of my upbringing that the consideration of the mythic is often accompanied by shame.
Persephone’s Daughter
As is often the case, when I first finished this painting, I had little knowledge of the insights it held in store for me. The first revelation came when my husband commented that the fish to the left was not in a natural position, that it wasn’t moving. Often the very section of a painting that doesn’t make sense holds great jewels to unearth about what lies in the deeper layers of the psyche.
How I Came to Be an Art Therapist
Shortly after I graduated with a masters degree in clinical psychology, we had a major earthquake in Adapazari, Turkey, a town close enough to my home-city of Istanbul that resulted in a death toll of 35,000, and many more that were wounded and/or traumatized. I was part of a group of private practitioners, and overnight our office space expanded to include hospitals and tent cities.
Big Magic Indeed
Some magic is small, like how the laugh of a baby can melt your heart regardless of your state of mind. Some magic is big, like when you run into an old friend in a city of 15 million people you are only visiting for a week. When the likelihood of something happening is way smaller then it not happening, it is called synchronicity.
Goddesses –Who are they, really?
I’ve been taking online art classes offered by the Art of Allowing Academy for over a year, learning to paint the female face through connecting to the Divine Feminine. Connecting to the intangible happens through the allowing process, letting of the feminine form appear on the canvas and following it with your hands. In other words, going with the flow as opposed to a planned execution. And making an appearance She has been!
Mindfulness
A psychotherapist’s “bag of tricks”/toolbox/medicine bag consists of various modalities and techniques that we’ve learned over the years. After years of formal training and countless workshops, one tool/way/concept has infiltrated everything I do as a therapist, and shapes and informs how I work and live — mindfulness.
Process Painting and Mindfulness
Instead of sitting, we paint; instead of coming back to the breath, we come back to what our hands want to do from moment to moment. The nature of the mind doesn't change with the activity itself; we still get hijacked by thoughts of the past or future, or are influenced by critical inner voices, such as, It’s supposed to look like something by now, or What everyone else is doing is so much cooler, or I can’t really change it in the last week …
Art, Health, and Wellness
It’s time to wake up to the realization that artistic creativity promotes health and well-being at any age. As a lifelong learner and nascent artist, I've experienced some of the health benefits of artistic creativity since retiring from a 30-year career in university administration.
Art Therapy and the Emergence of Angels
I had ended my last blog with the question: What are your hands going towards these days? So, I will start there today myself. I have been continuing to create little mosaic pieces on my son’s broken Taekwondo boards. What stands out to me this time around, rather than the materials, are the forms that have been emerging . . .
The Mosaic of Our Lives
In the art therapy stories I've shared thus far, I have explored various themes of change. The need/want for it, on the one hand, and the mechanism/process toward it, on the other
Art Therapy Stories Continued
By Sibel Ozer
The arctic cold has taken a toll on many of us. The psyche desires to retreat with a cup of hot chocolate in one hand and a book in the other, preferably in front of a fireplace, all the while reality demands that we continue attending to our responsibilities and enter the cold over and over.
The World of Images, Symbols, and the Unconscious: A Source of Healing
We are definitely a product/progress/accomplishment oriented society and most of our psyches are deeply craving the opposite as a result. The permission to enter and stay in the non-doing is often a gigantic challenge for most of us, let alone someone who has spent a lifetime doing what is expected of her, since it meant survival.
