My resiliency is being challenged but holding firm. Well, mostly. I’m doing some art-making which helps. I am far (far) from a successful visual artist, but I do dabble and have had my successes here and there. But as an Art Therapist, I know just doing anything art-ish is really good therapy. This week I participated (and you can too, it’s still open) with a group project via Maryhill Museum in Washington State. (go to www.maryhillmuseum.org and the link for Discovery)  The project is called Exquisite Connection. Based on the surrealists art sharing during the Spanish Flu Pandemic (isn’t that interesting?) they would add bits of their art to a collective piece developing what they would call an “Exquisite Corpse”  (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exquisite_corpse)    You can see my addition below.

Like art therapy, no skill or training is needed. Kids and adults, artist and non-artist alike can add their bits to it as an expression of what is going on in the world today. I encourage you to art-make in some way this week. Do it for yourself. As one of my mentors taught me lately…there is art that is PERFORMATIVE and then there is art that is TRANSFORMATIVE. Do it to feel better.   With Aloha, Dr. Vali