Creativity for Emotional Release

The other night, I was feeling that dull anti-climactic boredom of having completed a huge project, in this case my new website. In the past, boredom, along with avoidance, were my biggest catalysts to eating when I wasn’t hungry. But with years of practice of recognizing what is going on, I sat still long enough to figure out that I needed to get this feeling out, and I thought about what would be the best way to do that.

I pulled out a flipchart size pad of paper, my markers, a magazine that I saved for collaging purposes and a glue stick. I sat on the living room floor, armed my non-dominant hand with a marker and let it rip. This was not about artistry. It was about expression. For the next 15 minutes, I made whatever frenetic markings I felt like. I used varied markers, ripped three colourful magazine pages up into little pieces, glued, scribbled and then wrote the words that came to me in big letters BOREDOM TRANSFORMS TO CALM FRENETIC EXPRESSION. When I was finished that picture, I did another, this time with lighter colours, eventually etching out the words as they popped into my mind JOY EXPRESS, ONWARD HO, PARIS IN SPRINGTIME, I LOVE YOU TZABIA. Logical no, informative of my feelings, yes.
I felt satisfied and free of the heavy feelings I had 30 minutes earlier. I cleaned up and went to bed.

i wanted to share this with you as an example of how honouring our feelings with creative expression can inform you of what is really going on, and then leave you transformed.

CREATIVE EXPRESSION = INFORM + TRANSFORM