Phase Transition*

Yesterday I had the strange honor of sitting beside a beautiful young woman who was literally pulling her hair out. I didn't understand what was happening at first. I was getting to know her and she was getting to know me, as well as what I do in the hospital. We spoke of her illness, of the fact that her hair was falling out (she didn't want it shaved), of the cartoons playing on the television. The entire time we talked, she pulled at strands of her hair, twirling small bits,  and calmly yanked them out, putting them carefully on the coverlet.

By the time I left the room, she had tucked a considerable amount of what had once covered her head into a plastic sandwich bag for safekeeping.

It was one of those scenes that goes in so deep, I wanted to run away and cry. I had an art group to facilitate, so instead, I went back to my office and stared at the wall of orderly art supplies, the bottles and tubes of color lining the shelves bringing me comfort.

I've been thinking a lot about repair; how to reconstitute myself after being torn in so many different directions all day long. Inspired by comments on this blog, from my family and local friends, I've been thinking about my art work, it's purpose and relation to the art therapy.

I'm always trying to find a "balance"--somehow comprehend the relationship of making art to practicing art therapy, but both are subtle practices and too mysterious to hold onto all at once. Instead, I've begun to think of the two as intertwined, a kind of ongoing tapestry, in which each activity informs the texture and direction of the other.

Since trying this approach, I've felt more relaxed and present (that ever present word : "present"!)

I've found myself describing my art work as a way to restore a sense of calm amidst the overwhelming flux surrounding me. I've often thought of art making and art therapy as forms of Tikkun O'lam, a Jewish phrase that means "repair of the world." What I've most recently come to appreciate again, is that while practicing both arts, I am repairing myself too! (Well, heck, I knew that, but I guess it's just on a deeper level this time!)

I've continued to adapt patchwork quilting to paper and instead of putting diverse fabrics together to form a beautiful pattern, I take sections and bits of paintings along with pieces of collected paper and put them together into patterns--with the patterns signifying more than the surface beauty. They attempt to fuse the variety of experience together into a whole. The process of the work is soothing and at the same time frustrating. I paint, cut out a square, cover a small area and then immediately tear off other areas of the work, then repeat the whole process again.

It's stretching me, this work, not letting me become complacent. Each new section has its own internal direction but is also patient, waiting quietly for me to discover what it is and turn to it--again and again.

* A "phase transition" is the process by which matter transforms via a thermodynamic system from one phase or state of matter to another.

Take 2: Palliative Care and Paper Swaps (The Whole Story)

Our pediatric department is beginning a pediatric palliative care team and as we lay the groundwork, we're introducing the idea of integrative therapies to our pediatricians.

It's not a new idea. My colleague Kathy Lorenzato, a music therapist, has been teaching and practicing Reiki, a hands-on healing technique, for over 10 years, and I have joined her for the last 4 years. As far as integrative therapies go inside the hospital, at the moment, we're it.

With this in mind, the two of us were invited to speak to our pediatric physicians on staff about art therapy, music therapy and Reiki. I made a PowerPoint to explain the use of art in palliative care and put together a resource list on other integrative therapies.

It sounds simple on the surface, but as my husband noted, trying to explain the value of therapies whose effects cannot be quantified, to a group of science oriented folks, made me more than a bit nervous.

That's where my own art therapy came into play. Over the last couple of weeks, I participated in a Paper Swap organized by Gretchen Miller of 6 Degrees 2. I mailed my offering to an artist living in Missouri and looked forward to receiving an envelope of my own in return.

Days passed while I worked on the PowerPoint and my anxiety rose accordingly. Raised in a family with a healthy number of doctors, I've had some run ins with scientific minds and I've always felt myself lacking. Although art therapy requires a certain amount of intellectual engagement, I depend more heavily on my intuition, letting passion do the heavy lifting.

One day last week at the peak of my fear, a large padded envelope arrived, postmarked Australia. I opened it carefully and sifted through the contents; feathery tissue, textured rice papers, leaves of patterned scrapbooking pages and a packet of gaily colored buttons.

I considered the colors and shapes sitting on my lap and something shifted internally. As I touched the papers, taking in the colors, patterns and textures,  my fear eased. I realized that "right here, right now" on my couch I was experiencing the tangible results of art therapy.

I went into the presentation 2 days later with an insight. Rather than seeing the doctors as a group of individuals whose opinions I wanted to change, I saw an opportunity to heal the split between my own thinking and feeling, between the intellectual and the artistic.

I stood on the podium, praying the memory stick and my own memory would work. As I looked at the slide of a patient's artwork projected behind me, I remembered the joy I felt working with him--but I also remembered the research, the effort that others had gone to, in order to document the effectiveness of art therapy. Research that is necessary for art therapy to be accepted into the treatment team's fold.

The presentation went well. The physicians were attentive, and even better, I felt the old split inside me being carefully drawn back together. When our talk ended, we gave a Reiki demonstration. Up there on the dais, Kathy, one of the pediatric residents, our Child Psychiatrist and I offered Reiki treatments to four doctors who came forward. I felt the tide beginning to turn.

A Light Touch

I've been practicing watercolor for 7 months now, with my teacher, Stacey Vetter. As is my wont, I thought that I'd be seeing certain kinds of results earlier. It doesn't really matter what I'm doing, exercising, studying, making art--I always want things to happen overnight. In this case, I wanted to see how the watercolor painting would transfer over to my collage work.

Luckily, I did notice results with the watercolor, at least enough to keep me going and, just when I'd forgotten about what it was I wanted to happen, it began to do so. I am just beginning to understand how crucial a light touch is.

Previously in my art, I've worked hard to create a series of layers whether it is in fabric, collage, paint or even pencil. I want to show the history of marks, to leave tracks that hint at the evolution of the piece.

Now, as I begin to believe in the power of the light touch, I find myself applying the same process with collage. This morning after adding a layer of gel to a panel, I stood back, gazed at it and stripped away layers that had been softened by the gel. There was a moment that I caught a reflection of the piece's bones and I liked them.

It makes me think of Reiki, that hands on healing technique that we use in the hospital to help with pain and anxiety.

As I hold my hands in different positions on a person's body, I find myself thinking "What I am doing? Is this crazy?" And invariably after I say that to myself, I see the child relaxing, going to sleep, the room quiets and even the parents in the room settle down. One of the patients I worked on described the effects as "smoothing out the wrinkles of pain."--As if while the pain subsides, ripples of relaxation take over.

I can't help but notice the correlation between Reiki and watercolor.  Watercolor too is a smoothing and rippling-the sound and feel of the paint going onto the paper, the shush shush as the brush slides over the soft, stippled paper, brushing on color. And there's something else about the relationship between Reiki and art; both require a light touch. The less you work at it, the better it is.

6 Degrees of Progress

For the past several days, I've been working on a plan for my upcoming workshop: Still Point in a Changing World. My original idea for the workshop was to offer participants an opportunity to spend time in their studios, (whatever their definition of studio might be) on a daily basis for the period of 21 days.

A common notion states that a habit requires 21 days to set. (In actuality, some habits can take longer, but I thought that this time period would be  workable range in people's lives.)

I wanted the studio practice to be akin to a meditation practice; something that they could return to day after day from whatever flurry they found themselves in and locate a point of stillness.

It was inspired too, by my own practice of  watercolor, which I'd conceived in a time of hospital fatigue.

I'd wanted to do something simple, daily and beautiful, with which I could find refreshment, nourishment and tranquility. I found it in the watercolors..

However, I realized that I couldn't just say to workshop participants : "Ok, get yourself a box of watercolors, find something to paint and just keep it up for the next 21 days." Instead, I decided to read about mindfulness and creativity and found myself covered in reference books.

At the same time, the Jewish practice of the Counting the Omer began. (This ancient practice takes place between the holiday of Passover and the later harvest festival of Shavuot).

An artist friend of mine, Laura Hegfield, introduced me to a Facebook page entitled, "A Way In," where Counting the Omer has been re-imagined as an invitation to mindfulness practice: paying attention not only to each day as it passes but also to the individual spiritual qualities which were assigned to it by the 16^th century Jewish mystics.

I became fascinated with the simple words and phrases which were offered up each day like a carefully crafted ceramic bowl.

I decided to weave some of the meditations (along with others from a variety of sources) together with prompts for each of the 21 days. Each day of the 21 day workshop will offer a meditation and studio practice for artists to explore.

I couldn't wait, so I decided to start experimenting myself.  I'm working on Day 10 and you can see the results above. If you're intrigued, you can register here for my workshop and discover what the rest of the days, and the other five workshops, have to offer.

Going Through, Not Passing Over

I've been thinking a lot about holidays this year, particularly the Jewish holiday of Passover.

Passover is a time of spiritual renewal, of looking back in order to see ahead. A broad theme of Passover is freedom, something so vast, that I've scarcely tried to contemplate it; being someone who prefers to find the macro in the close-by mundane.

I'm also someone who seeks to understand what spiritual traditions have in common rather than how they differ.

The Friday before the holiday weekend, I met a child in the hospital where I work whose artwork contained just these confluences of large and small, distant and nearby, to which I would add, past and present. This young six year old girl had lost her father to incarceration and her mother to death by addiction.

When I first heard about her, I wasn't sure what to expect. Certainly not the vibrant being who walked into the playroom eager to engage in the activity I had chosen: creating a paper Easter basket.

I like this activity because by creating a series of folds and cuts in a square piece of paper and manipulating them, you can create a real container.

Flora sat down and pulled one of the folded pieces over to her place and began to copy the words, "Happy Easter," onto one of the squares. With great detail and many felt tip markers, she painstakingly created designs and drawings on each surface of what would become the inside and the outside of the basket.

I find it intriguing that at this stage, while the child is painting or drawing, the inside and outside are not yet determined. Enclosure can go either way, depending what she chooses to do. A metaphorical exercise about the public and private selves.

At any rate, after Flora had filled both sides of the paper, I stapled her basket together-but she wasn't done quite yet. she took squares of soft, pastel patterned fleece and glued one to each surface of what had turned into the inside of the box.

She proudly showed me her basket, asking, "but where are the eggs?" I went on my own egg hunt and found several colored plastic eggs. I handed them to her and she tucked them into the bottom of her basket.

It seemed to me that this small child exquisitely exemplifies the theme of Passover. She lost her original home and was forced to leave for a new one (she is lovingly cared for by a relative); she had created her own safe transitional home in the basket.