Making Whole: Healing Through Art: Sticks and Stones

Select thin, narrow branches for this project

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal. 

The old adage: "Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones, but Names Will Never Hurt Me" was something your Mother may have told you when you were picked on by other children. Meant to teach you not to let the hurtful words of others effect you emotionally, both adults and teens can still reflect on this lesson and find meaning.

Adults may look back and find that although names Did indeed hurt, they also made us tougher, and taught us lessons about friendship. Teens or pre-teens who experience bullying present day may learn that the negativity that surrounds them can be wrestled into submission by controlling their own reaction to it. 

This dimensional art project uses natural elements of tree branches and stones, along with a glass vase to illustrate the adage and the beauty of self awareness.

Sticks and Stones:
 

 What you need: A straight round, tall, clear glass vase, 
Thin tree or bush branches, trimmed to the same height as the vase
Small and medium sized  pebbles and stones in whites, grays and blacks

Think about the old saying "Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones, but Names Will Never Hurt Me."  What does that saying mean to you. When did you hear it? What memories do you tie to the saying.  What does it mean to you now?

For Adults:
How did the negative and difficult experiences of your youth help shape you into the person you are today. What were the positive outcomes of those experiences?

For teens or pre-teens: 
How do we give power to the "names" and negative thoughts of others? How can we take that power away?

Think about the power you have to overcome negative influences. While doing so, choose branches and place in the vase in an appealing manner, fill the vase moderately full with branches.  You'll be able to view the branches through the glass vase and as you do it should resemble a wooded forest.  All branches should be trimmed so that they are straight across the top.

Add the pebbles and stones, allowing them to fall into and amongst the tree branches. You'll see them get caught, some will fall through. Much like how we dwell on some memories, and let others go completely.  Reflect on your memories while you work on this meditative art piece.

Once complete, you'll have a stylish reminder of how difficult things can turn into beautiful form ... how we can overcome darkness and make our past pain into present day strength.




Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

Making Whole: Healing Through Art: Stone Cairns

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal.

A stone cairn is basically an elegant stack of stones, not held together by any mortar or cement. Found in ancient civilizations all over the globe, they are currently found in desert communities, hiking trails and used not only as an art form, but as navigational and ceremonial markers.

From larger stones at the base, to smaller stones on the top, the rocks towers can be placed in a single placement, or in groups, and in any location. Depending on the stone colors and shapes and the way the stones are stacked, the cairns convey an emotion or feeling to the viewer. For some reason, most people feel a connection to the cairns... do you? 

Collect stones from local beaches, woods or anywhere you can find them. Pick out an indoor or outdoor area where you can safely construct your cairn. Feel free to use superglue or epoxy to hold your cairn together especially if you have pets or children around who may bump or topple your cairn.

Stack the stones into a cairn. Make one or a grouping of cairns.

Process:

The act of creating the cairns is a meditative process that connects us to the earth in a healing and peaceful way.  When done in a thoughtful way, the cairns can provide a moment of peace and calm both when created and when viewed later. They provide a visual cue to take a moment and rest, relax and discharge all of our stress.  We don't know why this seems to work... but it does. 


Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

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Making Whole: Healing Through Art: Who We Are at our Core

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal. 

Our Core

Determining who we are, at our deepest level, is often a difficult thing to do. Our definition of who we are and what our belief system is changes over time and with each life experience. Things we said we would never do in the past may change when confronted by difficult choices and decisions. As we go through life's journey, the very core of what makes us who we are develops, changes and is challenged. 
This art process takes that idea and asks artists to think about our "core being" and create and interpretation of what that might look at.  It gives an individual the opportunity to take a hard look at all the choices they have made in their lives and take ownership of all the mistakes, and successes, joys and regrets, and what effect that has had on their character and personality...their core being.

Things you need:  
Drawing paper
Markers, craypas, drawing pencils, crayons, chalks

Instructions:
Imagine yourself as an apple. You have a beautiful skin that you show to the world. Rosy and red, there may be some scars, there may be some bruises...
Under the rosy skin is the sweetness and foundation that makes up all that you are. All your memories, your actions, your life. 
At the center of it all is the core. This is what the rest of it is built around. Your core being. What are you at the very center? When everything else is taken away... what are the things that the rest of you is built around? Imagine your core... what would it look like? 

Draw what your core being would look like using the basic image of an apple core as a base.  Use color, line, images whatever, to define those things that you are at the very basic, center of your being, whatever that means to you....

Processing notes: 
When you look at your work, what do you see? Do you see positive images? Do you see negative and dark images or a mix of both.  Most people would present more positive than negative, but a mix, to show a realistic representation of an adults life journey. None of us go unscathed.  Someone who presents with all positive core being images may see themselves as idealized or want their life to be a fantasy.  Someone who presents their core as very dark and negative obviously would be a deeply sad and troubled person, still working through issues and not recognizing their inner good, in spite of having made mistakes through their lives.  

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Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

Making Whole: Healing Through Art: Found Hope (Love,Courage, Peace,...) Guerilla Art

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal. 

We have talked about Guerrilla art here before. Basically it is the concept of bringing art into the community in an unexpected way. Usually it involves big, bold artistic statements, but in this case, it is more about a generous sharing of handmade art and a simple message to a stranger that is a gift to the art maker and the surprised recipient. 

Making art is a deeply personal expression for most of us, and because of this, the act of giving it away, to a stranger...indeed, to leave it behind is both terrifying and liberating.  This art therapy process challenges the artist to consider a concept on a personal, emotional level, and then share it with a stranger.  By creating something meaningful, then lovingly gifting it away, the artist can work through issues of loss in other areas of their lives.

You'll need:  Small art canvases between the sizes of 4x6 to 8x10" on hard board, acrylic paints, brushes, water, Pens, high quality writing paper, dry glue sticks

Choose a word that reflects something that is important to you:  Hope, Courage, Love, Peace, Faith, Joy, Friendship, Mercy, Forgiveness etc.

On the small canvas, paint an abstract expression of that word using color, line and movement. Use the entire canvas area, covering it entirely.  Let it dry. 

Once dry, paint the word your chose boldly somewhere on the canvas, over the painting.  Allow to dry.

Pick up the paper and pen.  Cut the paper down to the size of the canvas.  Write the word "Found" followed by the word you chose to represent on the front of the canvas.  (so, you'd have "Found Love, or Found Forgiveness, Found Courage etc.)

Look at those words.  Imagine finding this, like a fortune, somewhere, like you were someone who needed it.  What would you say to that person?  Write it down on the paper.  For example, you might write:  "Found Love:  You found this today because someone thought you needed a hug, you needed to be recognized as worthwhile, and valuable, You are beautiful, wonderful, and worthy of big love. This artwork is a gift to you. "

Glue the message on the back of the canvas. 

Now, take your canvas out into the world. Leave it on a park bench, a seat on the bus, at a restaurant, in a mailbox, where ever someone who might need it, will find it.  Walk away from your wonderful gift knowing that you have shared strength and healing greater than yourself.


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Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

Making Whole: Healing Through Art: Wise Word Collage

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal.

Those of us who have been through any kind of pain in life, be it a romance ending, a death in the family, a loss of any kind, or even just the habit of internalizing our thoughts and feelings, know that writing out our feelings is often a useful way to release the inner angst and work through complex emotions.
Creative people have been doing it for centuries. Poets and great writers have used their own internal struggles to inspire some of the most powerful and timeless written words that still move and resonate within humanity today. A quick Google search under "famous quotes: heartbreak/ loss/love/ friendship or any other word that fits your own struggle or issues will turn up prose from names like Shakespeare, Poe, Whitman, Twain and others.

This collage process asks the artist to use found and printed quotes from the computer or book sources, or their own written words from journals or letters, along with abstract painting, to illustrate a feeling or emotion that they may struggle with or be working through.

You'll need:  11x17" watercolor paper on canvas or pre-stretched canvas, paints, Modge Podge decoupage medium, paint brushes, scissors, printed quotes of choice or copies letters, journal pages or written words to reflect your feelings or emotions

• Gather together all your written word material
•  
• Using paints and canvas, think about the emotion or issue you have been working on in your journal or internally, and using colors and form, express it on the paper.  Fill the whole of the paper with color and shape to give the viewer a sense of the emotion and feeling behind the issue for you.
•  
• Once done, allow to dry. While drying, look through your written word papers.  Tear the sheets of written words into irregular shapes to apply over your abstract painting in a collage manner.  You may use as many or as few as you think you'd like to, covering as much of your painting as you like.
• 
  
• Using the Modge Podge, apply the torn word pieces to the canvas and apply a coat of Modge Podge over the papers to seal to the canvas.  Once you are done apply the papers, apply a coat of Modge Podge to the entire surface to give it a consistent surface appearance.  Allow to dry before display.

Process Notes:  The purpose of this process is to express the issue the artist is thinking about in two ways, both through color and form and in word.  Through the process of making the art, the artist again releases some of the angst and power of the emotions associated with the original issue and puts that energy into the artwork itself.  While reading through the quotes and thoughts of others about similar circumstances or emotions, the artist sees that the feelings are not unique and that others have felt those same emotions and have expressed them... and moved on.  This takes some of the power and energy away from the original issue as well, making it just part of life, and not something life should revolve around.

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Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

Making Whole: Healing Through Art: Nature Mandala

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal. 

We have talked about Mandala's here before, and as an art therapy device, the Mandala is a versatile tool.  Carl Jung was obsessed with them and said, "I knew that in finding the mandala as an expression of the self I had attained what was for me the ultimate."

Especially significant as a tool for healing for women, the circle symbol, often associated with the womb, or Mother, can help artists work through issues and develop a sense of wholeness and integrity. 



Start this process with an 11x17 piece of watercolor paper and your favorite medium, water color paints, markers, drawing pencils, collage materials, ... whatever. 

Draw a large circle, a mandala on the paper to take up the majority of the page. 

Now, close your eyes.  Imagine a lush forest in springtime. Everything is mossy, wet, bursting forth with life. New growth. The sun filters through a canopy of bright green leaves, you hear water dropping onto the soft earth below your feet. Blooms on tiny plants begin to unfold around you. Vines begin to climb up the tree trunks, ferns shoot up and unroll into lacy feathers. Breathe it all in.

Now fill your mandala with the life that you absorbed. 

Process notes:  

The very act of filling the symbolic mandala with imagery of new life is a healing act. Subconsciously the artist feels renewed, and refreshed by the guided imagery and by the act of creation. As the mandala is of the artists creation, she acknowledges her own ability to be life-giving, in some way, and celebrates that through use of color and line. At the end of the process the artist should be relaxed and satisfied. 

If the artist is working through a loss due to abortion, miscarriage or other grief, creating life images in a mandala helps to re-establish the artist as a life-giver, a creator.  It gives the artist time to work through feelings of guilt, regret and sadness with each brushstroke or line. 

If the artist is so overcome by feelings of remorse, sadness or guilt that she cannot draw anything in the mandala, the group facilitator would need to encourage her to take the smallest step in creating one thing, one image of life in the mandala.  A small step on the way to healing, is still a step and opens up the door for verbal communication.

 
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Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

Making Whole: Healing Through Art: Rise from the Destruction

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal.

Many of us feel devastated by life. We feel wrought by our own decisions, regrets over past mistakes tear us apart because we refuse to forgive ourselves and move forward. Sometimes we torture ourselves over pain that we did not cause, but still endure...just to feel alive. Grief over lost loved ones, tragic events, whatever the cause of our inner sadness and self-flagellation, now is the time to end it. 
Spring...Easter, this is the time of renewal. A time to release ourselves of our grief, to forgive ourselves of our past and bloom again as all things do.

What you'll need:
8x11" water color paper
drawing pencils, paints or markers
Medium sized canvas board
Modge Podge decoupage glue
Small sponge brush

Take a 8x11" piece of drawing or watercolor paper and paint, use drawing pencils, or markers and use the entirety of the paper to create a symbolic representation of what it is that grieves you. Use color and line to put all your emotions of regret and sorrow, anger and pain into the image, releasing those feelings into the paper.  Move quickly and don't think too deeply about what you are creating. Use your emotions to move the colors and create the image.

Once done allow it to dry if necessary and get your medium canvas board out along with Modge Podge glue and a sponge brush.

Rip up your image of grief and pain. Tear it up into pieces and strips, destroying the memory of it and the power it has over you. Let it go with each tear.

Use the strips of paper now to create something beautiful on your canvas. Use the Modge Podge glue to glue the strips and pieces of colored paper down to form a beautiful flower, or image of your desire. Whatever it is, take your time to create something beautiful from the old, torn paper.

Once done, take a deep breath and release the last of that tension and know that your Spring has arrived.

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Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

Making Whole: Healing Through Art: Celtic Cross

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal. 

With St. Patrick's Day being this weekend, I cannot ignore the obvious holiday inspired art process. I will spare you the Shamrock drawing, but will instead take a cue from St. Patrick himself and set our minds on the Celtic Cross.

St. Patrick is said to have designed the Celtic Cross himself.  An artist of any faith cannot deny the intricate design pattern is a beautiful example of complexity and detail. The pattern in the Celtic Cross is a continuous, connected line. Creating a pattern like this yourself would be a difficult task to be sure.

Instead, I would like to invite you to use the  square Celtic cross pattern as your foundation and fill it in with a linear pattern, abstract and detailed, use the creation of the pattern as a means of meditation. 

On an 8x8" piece of drawing paper, draw a circle. Then, draw the basic "+" pattern in the center, giving you a interior cross surface to draw into. (as similar to in the image at the top of the post.) 

Take a fine point black sharpie marker, and begin to draw a design in the interior of the cross.

Lose yourself in the creation of it. Much like a doodle, let your mind wander as you fill in the cross pattern with angles, or the repeated swirls or waves you might create.  The joy of this project is in the creation of it, in the nearly hypnotic creation of pattern and line within the borders, not necessarily the completed project.  

While you work, let your mind clear of all worrisome thoughts. Think only of the security and comfort of the lines within the borders, of the flow of the ink on the paper.  Add as much detail as you want, use as much time as you desire.

Much like working within a Mandala, the process itself is the path to healing, it is giving the mind and body a chance to relax, to heal, to clear and de-stress, within certain parameters that give it permission to do so. 

Enjoy....  

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Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

Making Whole: Healing Through Art: The Art of Giving Away

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal.


Not long ago I read about an artist that would create small canvas paintings, beautiful creations really, and leave them around a city.  The artist would leave the artwork on bus station benches, park benches, at restaurant booths, in churches, store fronts, laundry mats, anywhere people might gather or stop.  On the artwork she'd leave a note saying something like," This is for you. This art was meant for you to find today. Take it and keep it. Enjoy it." Some call it Guerilla Art.

Giving away artwork is difficult for some people, just like letting go of our pain and guilt, or our egos and pride.  Anytime that we invest ourselves in something and then have to let it go... it is a painful process.

It can also be a rewarding process. The act of investment, and release, although painful, and although grief is part of it, can lighten our emotional load. It can relieve us of our internal baggage, our heavy -hearted burden that we drag with us through life. When we invest, and release, we can discover new skin...new life, new eyes to see the world. A renewed spirit. 

Definitely a journey worth taking. Although painful,...it is worth the journey, most would say.

So, with this in mind, this weeks Making Whole art process challenges you to take a small (4x6") pre-stretched art canvas and some acrylic paints and create something beautiful.  Whether an abstract swirl of color and line, a whimsical backdrop for a heartfelt poem, a fiery rose or scenic pasture with a lovers confession or mother's regret written across the bottom.  Whatever moves you... create it on the canvas.
Allow it to dry completely. Do not sign it.

On the back, attach a note. Say whatever you want to say, but make it clear that the finder of the art may keep it, may love it, may accept it in the sense that it was made and given to bring joy and happiness.

Take your art to a place where it will be found and leave it there. With it, leave any sense of ownership, pain, regret, grief... and walk away from it.  With each step you take, breathe deeply and feel lighter and lighter.....

Own the new you.


Read more about other Guerilla artists...
http://thisiscentralstation.com/featured/mysterious-paper-sculptures/

Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups


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Making Whole: Healing Through Art: Love Note to Yourself

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal. 

With Valentine's Day being this week, I thought about how we share our love with others, but often times give away our love, without loving ourselves first. Many of us judge ourselves most harshly, are overly critical of ourselves and say things to ourselves that we would never, ever say to a beloved friend or lover. 
Love Thyself is a great philosophy, one we are all familiar with, but it is difficult for some of us to do.  Sometimes we punish ourselves for past mistakes, or refuse to forgive ourselves for our human flaws. 

Whatever our issues, Valentine's Day can serve as a reminder to care for ourselves more tenderly and see the good in ourselves that our friends and family recognize.

In this art process you are asked to first pick up a pen and paper and write down all the lovable things about yourself. Make a list of why you love yourself, or why you SHOULD love yourself. 

Then, use the media of your choice, watercolors, pen and ink, colored pencils, collage materials, whatever you like, create a valentine as big as you like for yourself. Make it as colorful and creative as you can imagine. It will be a gift to yourself and a reminder of how lovable you are.

Once done, take a black sharpie and write along the border or within the heart all the reasons you are lovable. 

Hang on a wall or display somewhere as a reminder that you are a lovable person who is worthy of love and tenderness. 

Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

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Making Whole: Healing Through Art: Emotion Chair

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal. 

 Have you ever wandered through a furniture store trying to pick out that perfect chair? It is not as easy as one would think. The choices are endless, ranging from wood to wicker, upholstered and overstuffed to backbreaking stiff and ornate. Each chair as you look upon gives you a different feeling. One might make you want to hop in and take a nap, while another makes you feel regal or perhaps even tortuously put-in-your-place. 

We are all like chairs, when we present ourselves to other people. Sometimes we present ourselves as the comfy chair, sometimes as the throne; not to be approached.

Take up some colored pencils and paper or whatever your media of choice is, and create a chair that represents how you feel today. For fun, overemphasis the qualities your feel today in the look of your chair to make a fanciful chair that leaves no doubt about how you should be approached. 

Processing:  Look at the chair you created. What does the chair say to people that approach it.  Write out the words that it might say around the chair.  Are those the words you Really want to say to people? Are they protecting you or serving you in some other way? 
If you could help the chair to be more approachable (if it is not approachable)...what could you do? If you want to draw that solution, do so. 
If you want, draw the type of chair you'd like to look like.  How can you get from the chair you Are, to the chair you want to be? 

Options: Feeling Extra Motivated? Take a plain wood chair and turn it into your fantasy chair! By making your Emotion Chair dimensional, you acknowledge the power of that emotion, and in the case of negative emotions, once acknowledged, the emotion, and the effort of creating it in a 3 D model, helps to relieve the negative impact of it and reduces the power it has over you.

Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

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Making Whole: Healing Through Art: Prayer Flag

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal.

Prayer flags are a tradition that goes back thousands of years back to India. According to Prayerflags.com, "Bonpo priests used solid colored cloth flags, perhaps with their magical symbols, to balance the elements both internally and externally. The 5 colors of prayer flags represent the 5 basic elements: yellow-earth, green–water, red-fire, white-air, blue-space. Balancing these elements externally brings harmony to the environment. Balancing the elements internally brings health to the body and the mind.

Buddhists added their own texts to increase the power of the flags. There are ancient symbols, prayers and mantras for generating compassion, health, wish fulfillment, and for overcoming diseases, natural disasters and other obstacles."

Prayer Flag Project

You need:

Scrap fabric in both solid colors and patterns

Dimensional fabric paint

Cording or heavy string

Scissors

In this art process, You are asked to take a square of fabric of your own choosing. It can be a solid color, or a vibrantly patterned piece.  Choose a color or design that you resonate with... something that represents who you are on the inside... your personality...your soul.  The square of fabric can be cut with rough edges and should be at least 8x8"big. 

Next, take black "Slickers" or a black dimensional fabric paint, and paint on a word that represents a hope, a prayer, that you would like to send to the world.

Perhaps you don't want to use a word, and keep your hope or thought more private...use a shape or symbol instead.

Maybe you'd like to release something on the wind? Release regrets, sorrow, along with your hopes and prayers... make a separate flag for those thoughts.

Make as many flags as you like. 

Cut a small hole in the top left and right corners of the flags to pass cording through. String your flags along the cord and hang between two trees or posts so that the wind can blow across the flags to carry your prayers to the sky. 

NOTES:  In this process the act of releasing regrets on the wind can be a powerful thing, as is stating one's hopes and displaying them and releasing them to the "universe" in this way. It is like making a promise a concrete thing and giving it more power. It can help motivate and lift a person to a new level and is a visual reminder of goals for the future.

Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

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Making Whole: Healing Through Art: The Art of Rebirth

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal.  

Acknowledging our past traumas and the scars and ugliness left behind is a necessary process to go through before we can shed that burden and be reborn into the new day. In order to free ourselves from the guilt, sadness, pain and grief we may feel, we must face it and then consciously let it go.  This is very difficult for some of us, and unless it is physically enacted, this internal process may never take place. That is what this art process seeks to do.

Taking markers, paints, pencils or any art medium of choice, on paper and create an image of your past painful experience or trauma.  It can be an abstract expression of the lasting feeling you have, a realistic image that may haunt you of an experience, however you want to express it is fine. Take your time and express it fully on the paper in all its colorful or bleak ways it comes to you. Allow it to dry if you need to before moving on to the next part.

Once your initial image is dry (if painted) or completed. Look at the image and talk about what it represents (if in a group) or write out your feelings about the image. Write directly over the picture if you like.  Take a deep breathe and let go of those feelings.  Allow yourself the ability to move on from this dark place to a new place of lightness and forgiveness and bright new energy.

Now...Bring out a fresh piece of paper and a glue stick.  Tear apart the old image and use it to create a new image on the fresh paper. It may be hard for some people to destroy the old image, just as it is hard to let go of the old pain and trauma, but you must. You must rip it and tear it into pieces in order to make the material for a new image that will represent your moving forward.  Take the pieces of the old picture and create something of beauty with it.  Tear it apart and glue the pieces into a new shape, overlap them, add to them, whatever you'd like... but there should be nothing of the old painting or picture left whole. 

By tearing apart the old image of our trauma, we show that we have strength over it. By using it to create an image of something new and beautiful, we recognize that although we have conquered it, we can still acknowledge that it is part of us.. but it doesn't have to hurt us anymore. 

Can you use art to be reborn? Be brave enough to try.  

 Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

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Making Whole: Healing Through Art: The Mask of Grief

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal.  

This week's tragedy in Newton has left the nation coping with grief for the loss of innocent lives and may have re opened wounds for other parents of lost children. No matter who we have lost in our lives, children, or loved ones of any age, getting through the grieving process is difficult and we are often forced to maintain a mask of composure and hide our often overwhelming sorrow to deal with the tasks of daily life.

This process asks that you use an actual mask shape, make a dimensional mask or simply draw it out on paper.   Show, on the left side, the outer face you show to the world, and use the right side the inner emotions you feel regarding your loss or grief.  

By drawing out or expressing the duality of emotions, responsibilities and the conflict of doing what needs to be done and feeling, we give permission to our inner selves to release those emotions and recognize their truth and importance.  

When you show the mask to others, do they turn away or do they embrace you? 

They, most often than not, embrace and support you... you can always find true friends who will, and that means that you need to spend Less time with the mask on the left on... and more time wearing your true feelings on your face.  

The more time you spend sharing your grief, the more you can work through it and come back to the world stronger and with a sense of purpose renewed.  




Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

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Making Whole: Healing Through Art: Guided Imagery Tortoise Shell

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal. 


Guided imagery is a tool used by therapists and people in many professions. It is a system of visualization as a way to relax and move into a state of calm and sometimes a meditative state. Sometimes it is used as a tool to help people visualize things they fear, and to work through those fears in a guided imagery before facing the fear itself in reality.  The skill of the therapist or leader of the imaginary journey will determine how intensely the client in involved in their "fantasy."

As a tool for healing, it allows the artist to start in a restful, relaxed state of mind, without fear, and to approach an art process openly and honestly.  The following process is found in my book Art as Therapy: Inspiration, Innovation and Ideas.

In this case, I use the term "guided imagery" in a much looser fashion.  For you to complete this process on your own, I would want you to simply gather your art tools, crayons, markers, or paints and paper, and get yourself into a relaxed state of mind first before you read the following guided drawing assignment.

• So, take a deep breath, and relax.... close your eyes and find a quiet space before you begin the rest of this process. 

Think about a tortoise shell. A tortoise shell reflects all the beauty in nature, as well as an image of the life of the soul beneath it. If you had a shell, what would it look like?

Draw your shell.


Processing notes (read when you are done with the exercise.)

If your shell is flimsy and full of holes, you feel insecure, damaged, wounded. Why? What can you do to strengthen your shell? Make it harder? Over the next days, work on your shell and fortify it. Invite your friends, if you wish, to help you make it stronger.

If you shell is vibrant, extravagant and bold, you are an individual person with a creative spirit...good for you!
The act of drawing and working on the shell can be meditative... lose yourself in the process and see what the colors and shapes tell you about yourself.

Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

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