Art therapy usually deals with negative emotions. Fear, resentment, shame, guilt, anger are unpleasant experiences that require living and accepting. But positive experiences also need to be realized and appropriated. Art therapy can help you anchor positive experiences to be a resource and support in your life.
Any positive experience is a valuable resource. When we are sad or anxious, we can remember those moments when we were happy, when we felt tenderness or delight, gratitude or calmness. Art therapy helps to preserve these experiences in visible and tangible objects - the products of our creativity - so that access to our treasury of positivity is easier.
In neuro-linguistic programming, this technique is called "anchoring".
It is best to create such "anchors" when you are in a favorable but calm state.
Proceed according to the following algorithm.
- Set aside time and space for your work.
- Prepare art materials in advance (paints, brushes, paper, pencils, plasticine, clay, or others that you like best).
- Remember the events when you experienced a vivid positive experience that can support you in difficult times, plunge into it so that you can experience it here and now. Give yourself a few minutes to do this.
- After you fully experience the positive emotions, embody them in your art product. The quality of this product is completely irrelevant. The main thing is that it emotionally reflects what you are feeling.
- Place the product in a prominent place so that it catches your eye and keeps you warm for moments of happiness and peace when you need it.
Create yourself several of these positive anchors and place them in different places in your home. Let them serve as a kind of amulets against excessive negative states. Expand your collection and connect your family and friends to it. By creating shared positive anchors with loved ones, you will not only gain a valuable resource, but also strengthen your relationship.
