I am grateful to be an Expressive Arts Therapist because to be a therapist is to be an artist.
As an artist working within relationships of growth and healing I know I am on the right path when I share remarkable moments with children, teenagers, and families. There are endless ways these moments coalesce to form deep connection, joy, understanding, and determination; in essence all the vital stuff of humanity.
The therapeutic theories and techniques that guide me have come through the careful observations and research of my colleagues and those who have come before me. Carrying out these understandings of human development, relationships, and healing through intentional creative processes is nothing less than the unfolding of meaningful experience.
Sometimes I think it is hard for parents to understand the far reaching effects of play therapy and the expressive arts. This confusion can lead to questions such as:
- Is this really going to keep Johnny from hitting his sister?
- Is Becky really going to get better grades by doing this?
- I play with my child too, how is this going to help?
I welcome such inquiries because they come from parents who care, who want the best for their children. My response is a resounding YES, this will help.
As I engage children, adolescents and families we all have goals in mind, target behaviors to change, grades to raise, but we humans are not simple mathematical equations to solve. If we do A plus B then C will happen. Hey I admit, sometimes C does happen (thankfully) but usually not consistently over time. This is why creative collaboration and individual differences are so essential to therapy. Through creative therapies something deeper is happening. Long lasting fundamental moments of transformation are occurring. Over varying degrees of time these core changes begin to affect those most disruptive behaviors that have called out to us saying, “I need something more.” Johnny does stop hitting and Becky gets an A.
Many parents I see are already engaging with their children in creative ways each day. So I say, come in and let’s have the whole family play together. Let’s get more intentional about
play time and also weave creative methods that help into your every day routine. For developmental disorders, attachment issues, mood issues, and learning disorders the bottom line is the same, finding one’s unique path to human connection. There is no script for authentic human connection, although some explicit teaching is very helpful, when it comes down to cultivating fullness of life collaborating creatively is what leads to quality living.
I am so thankful for all the moments I have shared with my Clients. One mother heard me and her son through the wall in the waiting room and said later, “I have not heard him laugh like that for so long!”
I recently asked a seven year old girl. “What can we work on together to make the things that are hard for you easier?” She replied wistfully, “Oh, there are so many things.” I am now the keeper of a folded up drawing she titled my problem. We will pull this problem out of my drawer next session and play it out, play beyond it, play from the deeper perceptions from which this problem emerged. Expressive arts therapy calls forth the expression of these deeper perceptions because they are the stuff of art. Expressive Arts Therapy is an immensely human process and a beautiful one at that.
beautifully explained.