How Does Art Contribute To Healing?
What Can Art Do To Help Us?
Research on the subject has been accumulating for some years. A 2019 World Health Organization report, based on evidence from over 3000 studies, “identified a major role for the arts” prevention of illnesses. And in 2018, doctors in Montreal, Canada, made headlines when they started prescribing patients who suffer from certain diseases with museum visits to visit the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.
How Does Art Contribute To Healing?
A few years ago I started back painting and once I picked up the brush and started the process I couldn't put it down. Art gave me a unique gift a central idea of empowered vulnerability that totally resonated in my soul as I painted intuitively how I felt in the moment. Using art as a tool of pure freedom to feel empowered vulnerability acknowledges my deep caring for the world and the people in my life as well as those who cross my path for help and my sensitivity to their influence. Art allowed me to provide meaningful ways to care for myself and to share that experience with others as well as to continue my work in the world.
For example, here's a piece I created while trying to make sense of escaping with food after being mom-shamed and called fat during the holidays by inconsiderate elders not knowing any better. I. didn't feel blue. I felt disgusted.
What Are The Benefits Of Art?
I believe art is healing because it forces you to forge a connection between your mind and your body. Here is what I mean:
-experience/express a deeper level of self-awareness -uncover and work through obstacles on your personal and/or spiritual path -reconnect with your creativity and passion for life -heal body and mind, heart and soul -enhance your connection with both the Light Within and Source Energy/God -build a stronger sense of self and connection to emotional wounds
Here's an example of a piece I captured while sitting outside on my front porch reading my bible and talking to God, Angels, Ancestors, and my Divine Team this is what the sky looked like so I grabbed my camera to capture the beauty of God's Creation.
Another piece I created while trying to process the loss of a miscarriage I felt as if I was lost in foggy woods all alone and drowning in pain.
These are simple ways to express yourself through art. Even if you feel like you’re not artistic or creative, art therapy is still a powerful healing tool. The key is breaking through the glass boxes we create for ourselves. The bottom line is art heals. Let it help you recover. To see more of my work visit here.
What can do to help us?
Dr. Nikki LeToya White
Help Developing A Plan For Self-Care
Do you want help developing a self-care plan that works for your own busy schedule? Do you want accountability in implementing a self-care plan? If you or someone you love is struggling to maintain optimal mental and emotional health, consider reaching out to Spiced Life Conversation Art Wellness Studio and Botanica. We are a Metro Atlanta, Conyers Georgia area. We are a coaching and counseling practice with empathetic, skilled counselors and recovery coaches who can help you set goals, develop a self-care routine, and move forward to build a more fulfilling life. Our team would be happy to work with you either just for a couple of sessions to develop and implement a Self-care plan or longer term to work toward overall better mental health within our membership site or other programs.
About The Author:
Dr. Nikki LeToya White MSEd-TL, Ph.D. RHN is the founder, director, and full-time board-certified trauma-informed nutritionist, folk herbalist, and wellness consultant at Spiced Life Conversation Art Wellness Studio and Botanica. She created Spiced Life Conversation, LLC
Art Wellness Studio and Botanica provide the Metro Atlanta area with counseling and coaching services where clients are carefully matched with the right program for healing abandonment and childhood emotional neglect trauma that cause codependency, emotional eating, financial stress, and imposter syndrome as it relates to the fear of success and being abandon. We help you begin your emotional healing journey with ease. Recently, we have expanded to include an online membership site so we now provide support to people living all over the world. All of our recovery coaches provide at least one evidence-based treatment to assist in your recovery. Dr. White is a big proponent of self-care and helping people live a fulfilling life! She has been in full remission with both codependency and emotional binge eating disorder since 2016. In living a life in recovery from sugar addiction. Loving her low-sugar balance lifestyle.
Dr. Nikki LeToya White