Why #flow (2) ? : "STUCKNESS"
Here’s another reason why flow is such a powerful guide for our creative FLOW workshop series. What happens when you are given a blank sheet of paper and told to create? If you’re like me, you suffer from a massive “stuckness” in these moments. I think the “stuckness” originates from the internal pressure of having to produce ART. This may seem like an impossible and ridiculous task to most.
However in the last two years of studying Expressive Arts Therapy when this moment has been encountered almost daily, the “stuckness” has faded away. Why? I think this is one reason: it doesn’t matter WHAT you create just THAT you create. I needed a whole lot of practice to get over my self criticism here but I did get over it. Cathy Malchiodi, who is a leading international expert, writer, and educator in the fields of art therapy, expressive arts therapy, trauma and arts in healthcare, says it well here:
““Expressive Arts Therapy is not about being an artist, it’s about using art to create a better life.””
Getting over our judgment of what we create is more the task- at least it was for me. I didn’t want to ruin the paper with my scribbles that couldn’t be undone. With this in mind, most -or even all- of the initial Expressive Arts Therapy explorations are low skill- extremely low skill. We will choose activities that could happily entertain a toddler.
I do hope you’ll join us at CreativeFLOW.