Making Medicine from Poison with Expressive Art Therapy

If your compassion does not include yourself, it is incomplete.                                                            ~Buddha

This is the first week of the pen and ink challenge for #Inktober. I decided to make medicine from poison with Person-Centered expressive art therapy. It was an emotional challenge to make medicine from poison in watching the Supreme Court hearings. I found myself feeling peeled open to the core, and felt unprotected in the overwhelm of the abuse, pain, power, and non-coherence. I was spiraling down. I needed to take a break from the chaos and found solace in these drawings. For this reason, after looking at the word prompts for the first week, I decided to make medicine from poison through Person-Centered expressive art therapy.

My drawings started on Day 2 with the word, #Tranquil as Day 1 was #Poisonous, and needed to create medicine from the start. To add stillness in the midst of all of this material that derailed my energy, my breath, and my sense of well-being was the healing template for gathering all the words together to create wholeness. The Chinese characters in the upper left-hand corner with the protection mudra mean, “Peace and Safety.” The protection mudra has within it a beam of light with a flame and heart. Protection and a sense of peace create a calm heart and are home to the hearth of safety and trust.

I decided to make medicine through the week from the image of #tranquil to transform the #poison. This pen and ink, in its current iteration, is the result of navigating these waters.

The other drawing cues were #Roasted, #Chicken, #Drooling, #Spell. #Venom and #Exhausted. The symbols are all interpreted from the beginning with Buddha in tranquility offering the protection mudra. Safety is a harbor in the midst of poisonous material whose venom can affect us at our core if we allow it. The rooster in Buddhism is a reference to “desire.” Whether it is a desire for a particular personal outcome, or the desire on the big screen of our world, staying in touch with your breath to support your well-being is key to sustain your health and energy reserves. Self-care allows you to pace yourself over time.

The moon is a reference to emotion, and a reference to the spell emotions can cast when attached to an outcome or overwrought with emotions. Mindfulness through meditation, coming into a still place, and accessing the bigger picture creates the opportunity to regulate our emotions. The venom and “drooling” related to force without heart or compassion create imbalance. This imbalance immobilizes and restricts your ability to feel centered, connected to love,

However, tuning into the messages from inside your breath and your heart, makes it easier to relax, feel calmer, hear the messages, receive the guidance and the balance that is needed to respond to feelings in the present, take action, or ask for help in the process.  For more information on how to use breath patterns to create calm in your body-mind system and create natural endorphin-stress responses, read more here: http://www.windowstotheheart.net/remembering-to-breathe-on-the-emotional-roller-coaster/

It is a process, and the road seems long, even if it is opening in ways we do not yet know or understand. But, I do know that as I look at this Medicine Buddha, there are options, and through breathing and pacing ourselves we can all deepen and expand our heart connections to create positive change even if it is one step at a time.

I now have this Medicine Buddha on a music stand in my living room to take in all of the images. Please use this Medicine Buddha, if you feel called, as a reminder that you, too, are protected. You, too, are safe. You, too, are loved.

Much love,

Kimberly

Personal Note: This ink drawing is made with a technique called Pointillism with stippling. I am still wanting to add more detail with color or brush. I love multi-media so I could not resist adding the glass shapes over the images that were drawn underneath. Next week I am looking forward to creating a new possibility with ink and brush.

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