Will Day:
Creative Arts Therapist. Practitioner of various creative arts. Camaldolese
Oblate.
Introduction
At this year’s
Carmelite Symposium ‘Ways of Seeing’, I was invited to present a session for
those wishing to explore their creativity and its relationship to their
spiritual life. I thought it might be worthwhile to offer some of that material
here on the blog.
We are all
creative beings.
Whether we are
arranging things on our desks, putting together a meal, negotiating a difficult
conversation or spontaneously breaking into a little, gleeful dance routine,
our creativity is at play. It lives in us from our very beginnings, propelling
us forward into the ever-new.
Artists and
inventors show us the wonderful, mysterious dimensions of this human capacity.
But we don't have to identify as artists to enter their life-giving game. By
making a conscious choice to foster and explore our creativity, any of us may
open a door to great pleasure, nourishment, challenge and revelation.
Here are some
simple and practical suggestions for those wishing to open to and explore their
own creativity. Whether you are a beginner, someone who has well and truly
begun, or someone wary of the whole endeavour I hope you may find here some
useful techniques and inspirations.
Implicit
throughout all that follows is the understanding that creative activities may
potentially become contemplative and prayerful. Of course one might experience
creative activities without them being in any way overtly contemplative, and
one might also, on occasion, find oneself spontaneously falling into a
contemplative zone whilst drawing, playing music or such. However if you decide
to sit down to draw, stand up to dance, or begin arranging some collage
materials with the intention of being open to inspiration, communion and
transformation then you are choosing to engage in a contemplative practice.
Intention is very powerful here.
I Can't Draw!
Many of us feel inhibited
when it comes to the creative arts. It is very, very common for people to say
'I can't draw', 'I can't paint', 'I can't dance', 'I haven't a creative bone in
my body' etc. These notions obviously spring from experience but in many cases
they seem to me to be eminently adjustable. As ideas, such thoughts are very
powerful, and powerfully limiting. Yet in a curious way they may actually
be the tiniest of impediments because they are simply ideas, even
if based on prior experience.
Might it be possible
to make the decision to start afresh, and see what happens THIS TIME? Might it
be possible to brush the old ideas to the side, like feathers, just for now,
and having done so, make the discovery that your creativity is right there,
waiting, ready to go? Notice I say 'your creativity', not your capacity to
imitate Michelangelo.
The trick might be
to begin in a spirit of curiosity and play, rather than with the expectation
that you must make ART, draw a perfect horse, or dance a 'perfect' line . For
me, aesthetic splendour or beauty has more to do with authenticity of
expression than anything else. My attitude to art galleries and the reverencing
of 'art' in those places changed radically when I turned to art therapy and
began working in nursing homes, psycho-social rehab contexts, and with many
other groups of people who were motivated to explore, to play, to find out, to
follow their curiosity... I was constantly stunned by the power, beauty, wonder
and fascination of what people made with their own curious hands in their own
humble ways. Constantly I found myself looking at 'art' much richer and more
fascinating to me than much of what I see in galleries. It was the enthralling
attraction of human difference and particularity, managing, often struggling,
to express itself creatively.
I too began as a
person who 'can't draw', who was intimidated by paints, pastels and clay (I
still am a bit intimidated by clay), and simply because I was encouraged,
decided to have a go, was given some art materials and the freedom to be messy,
awkward, insecure and curious, I became PLAYFUL, and once that door is open
Lila (the cosmic spirit of Divine Play) puts her hands on the reins with you
and off you go....and so, over time I discovered new arts-based activities and a
sensibility around them which has enriched my life immeasurably, and which has
become a well of healing power and spiritual nourishment.
Reflective
Drawing.
Find a nice
crayon, perhaps a soft powdery crayon. Find an appealing piece of paper or
card; go to an art supplies shop and spend some time looking at and feeling the
varieties of crayons, of papers and card, this in itself can be stimulating and
can stir and excite your creativity. Years ago Ayurvedic practitioner Dr Lorna
Scurfield told me that in the Ayurvedic tradition it was understood that
digestion begins in the fingers. In a culture where food has traditionally been
eaten with the hands, rather than with metal utensils, the fingers are the
first to feel the various textures and shapes of the food. This sensory
experience enters the body and stimulates, enters the digestive system and
turns on the digestive juices. Similarly, looking at, feeling and gathering art
materials with pleasure and expectation sparks the creative process and begins to
turn the wheels of imagination and creation, long before you sit at the table
to formally 'begin'.
If you haven't the
money to spend at an art supplies shop, op shops can be treasure troves for art
materials, as are $2 shops.
So, find a crayon,
find some paper, then find a quiet, comfortable spot.
Perhaps you might
light a candle.
Begin to draw; you
are simply exploring; what can this crayon do? Perhaps you might draw a line of
colour, or a circle of colour, a shape of some kind. Go over it a few times with
your crayon, methodically, meditatively, settling into the activity, grounding,
forming a basis. Begin to colour the circle in. This can be so satisfying (I
particularly enjoy doing this with coloured pencils) quietly filling the inside
of the circle with this new, interesting field of colour. It doesn't have to
have an overt meaning; simply the movement, the reflective concentration, the
repetitive physical activity, entrains the human organism in a particular
way...
James Taylor sang;
'deep greens and blues are the colours I choose, won't you let me go down in my
dreams'. Simple shapes and colours have deep connections and meanings within
us, as do simple movements, like the circle dances of so many cultures on this
planet. The repeated steps, circlings and rhythmic gestures of the dance
somehow stimulate, recalibrate and realign, just as the simple rhythmic
strokes, patterns and colourings in of our drawings tend to settle, smooth,
integrate and enliven.
I recall attending
classes with Somatic Psychotherapist and Buddhist Julie Henderson years ago in
which she told us that branches of contemporary physics were coming around to
the Buddhist understanding that at the most fundamental level, matter, or the
underlying energies constituting matter, tend to form in circles spirals and
waves, so all those ancient tribal circle dances where we classically move in
circles, spirals and waves, and which can produce such a profound sense of
ease, of well being and harmony both within the individual and communally, may
simply be realigning us, macro with micro. I suspect this may have a visual
correlate as well.
It seems to me I
got a clue to this some years ago: Lying on my back amongst the old eucalypts
on the bank of the Yarra River I gazed directly upward into the fractal
crazy-paving of the tree canopy high above; beautiful random patternings of
leaves, branches, sky, shadow and light forming an aesthetically glorious
sky-field. Somehow gazing up into this was deeply settling and orientating. Is
it that the natural fractal forms and patterns, were somehow mirroring forms
and patterns deep within my physiology, bringing me deeply into myself? I
wonder.
So the simple
experimentation with drawing, with shapes and colour can open a door into a
nourishing, inspiring and mysterious dimension. I'm not talking about bells and
whistles; you might enthusiastically draw a marvellous castle and miss it all
if you hadn't quieted and settled, but if you manage to quiet and settle a
little, letting the drawing process lead you as much as you lead it, then the
subtler pleasures and gifts may reveal themselves.
