Teaching relaxation and mindfulness skills can be extremely helpful for our clients. The ability to calm and focus our minds, even when we cannot change the situation around us, is an important part of distress tolerance, overcoming anxiety, and healing from trauma. Drawing the breath can be a wonderful exercise for practicing mindfulness through awareness and focus on the breath. This is an exercise that I actually first heard about from a client who had done it at a mediation retreat. I … [Read more...]
Building Creative Confidence in Art Therapy
“But I’m not an artist…I'm no good at art...” If you use art in therapy, you have probably heard this worry from your clients. They may be hesitant to try art, express that they are “not an artist,” say that they are “no good at art,” or get frustrated with the resulting art piece. Insecurity and lack of confidence around art-making are common concerns that creative therapists need to be prepared to respond to. Art therapists believe that the process is most important, not the quality of … [Read more...]
Midyear Check-in Art Journal Exercise
With the arrival of July we have hit the halfway point in the year – a great time to do a personal check-in and assess how the year is going. Are you moving toward the goals you have for the year? Are you living with the intentions that you set at the beginning of the year? Is it time to recommit to your intentions and goals? Or is it time to change your focus? Art journaling is a great way to explore a midyear check-in – for yourself or with your clients – especially if you did some kind of … [Read more...]
Expressing Emotions Through Creativity: A 6-Step Art Process
Using the art process to help clients express and explore their emotions is at the core of art therapy, but there are many different ways to do this. Sometimes the emotions are expressed unexpectedly or naturally arise from a directive that is not directly about feelings. For example, in “playing” with watercolors through a sensory-based activity, the client might discover that emotions are coming up in themselves or through the art. Or a prompt for a client to create a collage about family … [Read more...]
Should Therapists Make Art in Session? 10 Things You Must Consider
People often wonder whether art therapists make art alongside their clients in session. I think this is an important issue to explore further, so I’d like to share some of my thoughts about whether therapists should ever make art in session. If you are a play therapist, counselor, or other psychotherapist that uses art in therapy, it is important to understand why you typically should not make art along with the client…and when the exceptions to that might be. If you are a trained art … [Read more...]
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