CREATIVE ARTS FOR HEALING!

I feel the freedom to express myself, I can move my body, trust within myself and in the group, I feel supported and helped” Participant.

For me yoga has always been about healing – mind, body or soul, usually all three – and about creativity. Yoga opens up our creative potential and helps us discover the artist that we each have within us. Regular students often express experiencing a boost of creative energy and confidence and respond to this in all sorts of ways – with the visual arts, writing, cookery, gardening, music, facilitating a team meeting at work, painting the house, or re-organising their sock drawer… and lots more! Yoga also frees us to enjoy the creative process while letting go of our attachment to the end result.

As a writer and lover of all creative pursuits, inspired by a year of studying a foundation course in the healing arts with Ragamuffin, it has been a natural progression for me to incorporate very healing creative therapeutic art into my teaching. In regular classes this may simply be in the form of the music I choose or of guided visualisations and meditations. In private yoga therapy classes we may use journals, simple images and words as a means of reflection after experiencing yoga and meditation. With children and adolescents I also use journals and we have lots of fun with yoga games and all sorts of art forms – role play, clay, play doh, musical instruments. Often the creative process is led by the students or clients themselves.

The arm swings were so releasing, so relaxing, freeing. I was letting go. In the meditation I found it so hard to peel off the layers, but when I did I saw myself, my pure soul, who I am.” Particpant

I have found that this approach also works beautifully in groups. Recent experience of working with groups of counsellors and social workers in Cambodia who support victims of trafficking, abuse and other traumatic experiences, has shown me how effective yoga combined with healing arts can be for group work. It can improve communication, encourage team-building and bonding, increase trust and empathy within a team, release stress and trauma and generally aid individual and group processing and healing. This work can be done with many different kinds of groups, according to their needs.

If you are interested in experiencing any of the above either as an individual or a group please get in touch.