We learn about the importance of respecting others and our environment from an early age, such as, listening when someone else is talking, being kind to others, turning the lights and tap off to promote sustainability. What about the importance of respecting yourself - listening in, being kind to yourself, thinking about sustaining your own energy? Therapy can be a way to connect to your authentic Self. Art can also offer a way to connect to your authentic Self outside the therapy space!

Importance of Authentic Self

Therapy offers ways to listen and connect to your authentic Self. Many approaches emphasize the importance of one’s authentic Self for healing and wellness:

• The Internal Family System modality views connecting to the Self as an inherently healing process that can support internal transformation and improved relationships (Hodgdon et. al., 2022). 

• The Jungian approach sees therapy as a path to self-individuation meaning understanding inner potentials and self-knowledge (Stein, 2019). 

• Roger’s person-centered approach emphasizes self-actualization which is a process to understand and act fully aligned to one’s thoughts, feelings, and beliefs (Martin, 2014). 

• Existential therapy views each person’s inner world as a “unique culture with its own history, language, values, practices and symbolic systems.” (Lester, 2023, para. 30).

All these approaches emphasize the importance of getting to know your authentic Self in a deeper way and the healing qualities that come from that process. Getting to know yourself can offer many benefits including understanding your needs, wants, desires such as relationships that feel supportive, life goals that speak to you, and activities that replenish and nourish you. In order to be in touch with those things, we need a way to listen in.

Art as a Way

As an Expressive Arts Therapist, I have witnessed that art not only promotes self-care but also a deeper understanding of your authentic Self. It can offer a way to listen in, be compassionate, show respect, and honour your self-worth. 

Art can also offer an alternative way of being mindful. While mindfulness has received a lot of attention, not everyone finds mindfulness accessible. Some people find art more accessible as it invites action and doing while listening, instead of stillness and focusing on the body, which can be difficult to do.

Art can also be a practice that invites play and fun. Current cultures often encourage logic and a narrow sense of productivity. Art can be a place to break rules, play with nonsense and feel a sense of freedom. 

Art can also support grounding, calming the nervous system, expression (especially for things that may feel difficult to express verbally or in relationships), accessing the unconscious, working with metaphor, finding new meaning and allowing what wants to happen but doesn’t get to happen (such as play, making a mess, going slow or not holding back). 

Another cool thing about art is you can do it on your own!

Creating a Practice for Your Self

Choose a space and materials that feel nourishing to you:

• You may start by noticing a space in your home that feels nourishing and private so you don’t have to worry about filtering or holding back.

• You may choose what you want to bring into that space. Do you want to change the lighting? Have a cozy blanket? Play soothing music?

• Is it the outdoors that nourishes you? Go outside and discover things that you find beautiful, interesting and intriguing. Arrange them into a temporary sculpture that can be left in nature for someone else to find.

Let your Self know this time is just for you:

• We can get stuck into trying to do things well and for others. While these intentions are important for our own goals and relationships, it can also put us into a rhythm of only doing something for external outcomes. What about setting time where you can fully listen to your Self – listen to what feels nourishing, soothing, and joyful. 

• You may start by saying to yourself, “This is just for me” 

• You may want to create with your eyes closed, using your non-dominant hand, or purposefully making your art messy or ugly.

• You can always choose to get rid of the final product. You can rip it up and create something new with it another time. Or you can just let it exist exactly how it is, even if it isn’t “good”. There’s a lot of messages you can send to yourself through that process of letting your art “be” instead of asking it to be something different. 

Listen to your preferences, curiosities and desires:

• Try doing things in different ways just to discover your preference. Try colouring very fast and then very slow to see what pace feels right for you. 

• Try different ways of creating such as:

• Scribble as fast as you can and see if you can find a familiar object in your scribble (just like looking for objects in the clouds), and then emphasizing that image you see in your scribble through colouring or outlining.

• Layer or sew fabrics with buttons, beads, threads together. You may want to choose items that feel nice to touch or look at. 

• Dance on the page with a pastel or crayon with your eyes closed. 

• See what creature you can invent if you combine two different animals and then ask it what it wants to be called. 

Play:

• Play, just play! Kids do it! Animals do it! See if you can lean into your creature-esque state so you can do it too! You can try seeing how many objects you can use to build a structure or create a fort for yourself or your pet. You might be surprised by what’s possible from spontaneity and play. It’s most likely something you could have never planned for… 

Don’t hold back:

• Sometimes we hold our Self back, afraid we’re doing too much, afraid of making a mistake. Let yourself go! Try new things. See what happens. If you want to rip up your art and make it into something new, go for it. Yes, you may have liked the previous version better but that’s ok. You can always rediscover what led you there and try it again. 

• Allowing yourself to make mistakes and try new things can be liberating and lead to new discoveries. It can help you break out of thinking in “good and bad” and help you practice from a place of curiousity and openness.  

Time to reflect:

• After taking some time to create, you may ask yourself:

• What is present within me? 

• What was it like to take time to create?

• What was challenging? What supported me?

• What do I want to continue to make space for?

• You may discover new things about yourself and what you need through creating. You may find new ways of transforming and shifting emotions, thoughts, physical symptoms and body sensations. By creating, you may drop into a sense of home within and sense of acceptance. 

• You may get a deeper understanding of your nature and authentic Self. 

At times, art can also feel challenging.

Art can put us in touch with parts that need attention and haven’t been heard. If that happens, here are some options:

• Take some time to openly write in a journal as a way to listen to what needs your attention. 

• Find a nourishing place to put your art or practice. Where does it want to go as you pause? Can you wrap it in something or place it in a safe space as you move away from it. Perhaps another day you’ll be ready to revisit it.

• See if there’s someone you can talk to about what you’re feeling. 

• Look for someone else’s art, perhaps online, that offers insight or comfort to you: a poem, a song, a movie, graffiti. One of the amazing things about art is it can foster connection and understanding oneself and others. It is a personal expression but I imagine it also represents a collective experience. 

If you or someone you know is interested in exploring expressive arts therapy or wants to learn a bit more about how art therapy can support you, I invite you to reach out to us to schedule a free consultation.

References

Hodgdon, H. B., Anderson, F.G., Southwell, E., Hrubec, W. & Schwartz, R. (2022). Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) among survivors of multiple childhood trauma: A pilot effectiveness study, Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment & Trauma, 31(1), 22-43, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/10926771.2021.2013375

Lester, R. J. (2023, June 1). A new therapy for multiple personality disorder helps a woman with 12 selves. American Scientific. Retrieved May 29, 2023, from

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/a-traumatized-woman-with-multiple-personalities-gets-better-as-her-parts-work-as-a-team

Malchiodi, C. A. (2020). Trauma and expressive arts therapy: Brain, body & imagination in the healing process. Guilford Press.

Martin, N. P., (2014). Aspects of the self and psychological outcomes (Publication No. 1163) [Doctoral Dissertation, Georgia Southern University]. Digital Commons at Georgia Southern. https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/etd/1163

Stein, M. (2019). Psychological individuation and spiritual enlightenment: Some comparisons and points of contact. Journal of Analytical Psychology, 64(1), 6–22. https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-5922.12462