ART THERAPY REFLECTIONS: December 2009

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Snow Lovers

Monday, December 7, 2009

Remembering to be Mindful at this Busy Time of Year

Here is a list of some resources:
Wherever You Go, There you Are: Mindfulness in Everyday Life (Kabat-Zinn, J.)
A Path with Heart: A Guide Through the Perils and Promises of Spiritual Life (Kornfield, J)
Full Catastrophe Living: Using the Wisdom of Your Body and Mind to Face Stress, Pain, and Illness (Kabat-Zinn, J.)
Radical Acceptance: Embracing Your Life with the Heart of the Buddha (Brach, T.)
The Miracle of Mindfulness: An Introduction to the Practice of Meditation (Hanh, T.N.)

The Wise Heart: A Guide to the Universal Teaching of Buddhist Psychology (Kornfield, J.)
Emotional Alchemy: How the Mind can Heal the Heart (Bennett-Goleman, T.)
When Things Fall Apart:Heart Advice for Difficult Times (Chodron, P).
Turning the Mind into an Ally (Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche)
Mindflness-Based Cognitive Therapy for Depression (Segal et al.)
Lovingkindness: The Revolutionary Art of Happiness (Salzberg, S.)
Dancing With Life: Buddhist Insights for Finding Meaning and Joy in the Face of Suffering (Moffitt, P.)
Thoughts Without a Thinker (Epstein, M.)
Insight Meditation (Goldstein)
Mindfulness, Bliss, and Beyond (Brahm, A.)
Calming Your Anxious Mind (Brantley, J.)
Start Where You Are (Chodron, P.)
Going to Pieces Without Falling Apart (Epstein, M.)
Losing a Parent (Kennedy, A.)
Peace is Every Step (Thich Nhat Hanh)
Starbright–Meditations for Children (Garth, M.)
Curious? Discover the Missing Ingredient to a Fulfilling Life (Kashdan, T.)
The Relaxation Response (Benson, H.)
Everyday Zen and Nothing Special (Beck, J.)
Saying Yes to Life (Bayda, E.)
The Stress Reduction Workbook for Teens: Mindfulness Skills to Help You Deal With Stress (Biegel, G.)
Undoing Perpetual Stress: The Missing Connection Between Depression, Anxiety and 21st Century Illness (O’Connor, R.)
The Mindful Brain: Reflection and Attunement in the Cultivation of Well-Being (Siegel,D.)
Mindful Motherhood: Practical Tools for Staying Sane During Pregnancy and You’r Childs First Year (Vieten, C.)
Mindfulness Yoga: The Awakened Union of Breath, Body and Mind (Boccio, F.)
Beginning Mindfulness: Learning the Way of Awareness (Weiss, A.)
Breathe! You Are Alive: Sutra on the Full Awareness of Breathing (Hanh, T.N.)
The Art of Forgiveness, Lovingkindness, and Peace (Kornfield, J).
Still Here, Embracing Aging, Changing, and Dying (Dass, R.)
Nonviolent Communication (Rosenberg, M.)
Mindful Exercise (Jones, C.)
New and Selected Poems (Oliver, M.)
The Essential Rumi (Barks, C.)
Coming to Our Senses (Kabat-Zinn, J.)
Soul Without Shame (Brown)
The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying (Rinpoche, S.)
Heal Thyself (Santorelli, S.)
The Spontaneous Fulfillment of Desire (Chopra, D.)
Overcoming Addictions (Chopra, D.)
Awakening of the Heart (Welwood, J.)
Zen Heart: Simple Advice for Living with Mindfulness and Compassion (Bayda, E.)
The Mindful Path to Self-Compassion (Germer, C.)
Teachings on Love (Hanh, T.N.)
Get Out of Your Mind and Into Your Life: The New Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (Hayes, S. & Smith, S.)

Friday, December 4, 2009

The Christmas Tangle

I've learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way he/she handles these three things: a rainy day, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree lights. (Maya Angelou)

Thursday, December 3, 2009

My Therapy Dog

Cyrus, my Therapy Dog, checking out the supplies after a busy workshop.

Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)

Karen Wallace M.E.d. BCATR is an Art Therapist, artist, Focusing Trainer, and art instructor living and working in Regina SK. Canada. She has a private practice with adults and children and specializes in depression, trauma and life transition. She facilitates art therapy, creativity and art groups. She teaches internationally. She shows her mixed media art in galleries in Regina, Victoria B.C. and the Gulf Islands. Karen is known for her enthusiastic and dynamic teaching style. Her workshops are rich, playful and creative. Karen’s art work is a reflection of her art therapy work. She expresses her love of nature, her practice of Buddhism and her family in her art. Web site: www.islandnet.com/~kwallace

What is Art Therapy?

Art therapy is typically referred for situations in which words are difficult (ex: grief and loss), if there is a mind-body relationship to the nature of a person's trauma (ex: sexual abuse, PTSD), or for clients who are inept with words (ex: children, persons with a communication disability). Art therapy is also often sought out by clients who seek a more tangibly productive therapy (literally “rolling up your sleeves”), enjoy expressing themselves visually (artists, architects, crafters, etc.), or for whom talk therapy has not achieved the desired outcome and want to try something new. Art therapy is generally described as a highly illuminating, enjoyable, and unique experience.

In my work I see individual clients who are exploring issues such as depression, anxiety, stress, life transitions, abuse and trauma. I use psycho-education, cognitive behavior techniques, solution-oriented and expressive therapies.

I draw on a wide variety of theories to create an integrative approach. I am client centered and use techniques and theories which 'fit' the client. I am a practicing artist and combine theories in a very creative way in my practice to facilitate clients' journeys through change.

Some of the tools I use in my work are sand tray, all forms of art making, life mapping, goal setting, relaxation techniques, guided visualizations, journal and creative writing, movement, somatic experiencing techniques, stress reduction techniques, reframing, EMDR, Focusing, mindfulness meditation techniques and play therapy.

Focusing Oriented Expressive Therapy

Focusing Oriented Expressive Therapy
Do you want to learn how to:
· Be a better listener to yourself?
· Make clear choices?

· Be calm and compassionate to yourself?
· Support yourself through change?
· Feel relaxed and stress free?

Focusing helps you learn how to be Present and listen to yourself so that you can move ahead in your life in an empowered and safe way. Focusing brings you closer to wholeness and allows you to access your inner wisdom. This helps you move in the direction of your potential. It can help you move beyond blocks and get in touch with your goals. Focusing is a gentle and powerful way to develop a deep interpersonal healing relationship with yourself. Awareness of sensations in the body can be blocked through habits of dissociation and repression. This is because the sensation maybe uncomfortable or painful, and we are not trained to focus on this inner knowing and awareness of the body.

Learning Focusing to Help Free the Artist in You

Do you want to learn how to:
· Be a better listener to yourself?
· Make clear choices?

· Be calm and compassionate to yourself?
· Support yourself through change?
· Feel relaxed and less stressful?

Focusing helps you learn how to be Present and listen to yourself so that you can move ahead in your life in an empowered and safe way. Focusing brings you closer to wholeness and allows you to access your inner wisdom. This helps you move in the direction of your potential. It can help you move beyond blocks and get in touch with your goals. Focusing is a gentle and powerful way to develop a deep interpersonal healing relationship with yourself.
In this workshop we will work with:
· artist's blocks
· money issues that we may have around our art
· time issues that we may have for our art making
· why we can’t get into the studio

What is Focusing?
Focusing is "direct access to bodily knowing." It is a practice that takes a person towards a state of conscious perception that goes far beyond knowing something on a mere conceptual level.

As with Somatic Experiencing, Focusing refers to this bodily knowing as a felt sense. As the Focusing Institute's website explains, "You can sense your living body directly under your thoughts and memories and under your familiar feelings." Focusing happens at a deeper level than your feelings. Under them you can discover a physically sensed murky zone which is concretely there. This is a source from which new steps emerge. This murky zone "opens" as you learn to stay with it longer. Being with it increases the ability to sense feelings behind words or images, even when those are not yet formed. Eventually, you can learn how to let a deeper bodily felt sense come in relation to any problem or situation. It is a subtle process, hard to define in words. Focusing was developed by the philosopher Eugene Gendlin in the late 1960s and early 70s, while he was working with the famed psychologist Carl Rogers.

ART THERAPY REFLECTIONS

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Snow Lovers

Monday, December 7, 2009

Remembering to be Mindful at this Busy Time of Year

Friday, December 4, 2009

The Christmas Tangle

Thursday, December 3, 2009

My Therapy Dog

LinkWithin

Art Therapy, Somatic Therapy Websites

Blog Archive

About Me

Translate

Please cite me if you repost my material.

Facebook Badge

CanadianPlanet