Art for Healing

Welcome to my journey. I never dreamed I would paint with such zeal. You will hear me fondly utter.

For this left-brained, type A, overcompensating, “I want to do it all” woman, a brain injury was super inconvenient, halting my life as I knew it. My professional background was serving as a Psychotherapist for 25 years. Suddenly, I found myself reeling from challenges I could never have anticipated.

Someone or something wanted me to slow down from my million-mile-a-minute lifestyle, stop and, dare I say, “smell the roses.” I genuinely thought I was smelling them until the injury showed me that losing so much makes you see what really is important. It also awakens you to parts of yourself that are dormant or yet to be discovered.

I use humour to cope, often making myself the butt of a joke. I assure you this experience wasn’t funny; however, I had to find a way through. Somehow, laughing at how hard simple things were to accomplish was a release. I suppose I also hoped it would help others not to pity me.

Not knowing whether I would return to the work I was passionate about made me feel lost and incomplete. Time and again, I was reminded that healing takes time and that I needed to accept my circumstances. That was not easy.

My entire life, to that point, was dedicated to my children and one career focus. Now, my career was taken away; I suffered many other losses, and I felt subpar when it came to being the mother I knew myself to be.

I knew I needed a way to express myself. I needed to move everything within me to process the gravity of what was happening. I like to say painting found me, helped me connect deeply with myself again, and made me believe healing is possible.

I started to observe the world with an eye for wonder and felt enlivened by creativity.

Each painting is a play on colour and an expression of my innermost thoughts. This experience has humbled me.

Physical or mental pain takes away peace if we are absorbed in it. We become the pain. I was trying to transcend the pain I was experiencing.

My method of managing has been to turn to my mindfulness meditation practices and now add mindful art practices.

Painting has been like adding a mantra; it keeps me focused. This isn’t easy and doesn’t always work. Meditation and mindful practices are also much harder post-brain injury. That said, the practices have undoubtedly helped me to stay strong.

There is a dialectic to this artistic experience. On the one hand, there is this process of letting go and surrendering to the mediums, allowing inspiration to find its way through me, into my hands, and onto a canvas. On the other hand, there is a sense of taking control of a new learning opportunity and becoming a naive student once again. It is a journey, just like my recovery.

I share my art with you as a message of hope. Life goes on.

Life rarely goes as planned; it isn’t supposed to. The pivotal moments in our lives make us stop and reevaluate everything. My brain injury had me enter a brain fog, literally and figuratively. As the mist has started to lift over the last six years, I’ve begun observing everything in new ways.