Healing Journey
The images on this page are of artwork I created, starting in 2006. Most were created when I was a protegee in a mentorship program sponsored by the Women’s Art Resources of Minnesota (WARM). I intuitively entered that program in 2008 after experiencing profound healing while creating my Talking Suitcase at a grief workshop following my mother’s death. During the two years of the mentorship program, I was concurrently enrolled in an experientially-based holistic health coaching program at the Center for Spirituality & Healing at the University of Minnesota.
—Talking Suitcase
My story
As a psychiatric nurse I was no stranger to talk therapy, but the healing power of imagery was new to me. I was at a point in my life where I was ready to dig more deeply into healing from early childhood trauma and I sensed that the art experience would augment the personal transformative work required in the coaching program. That is exactly what happened, but to a degree that exceeded my wildest imagination and changed my life.
Although I have no formal art education, I am a lifelong knitting addict and lover of all things fiber. As I started the mentorship program, I was obsessed with wet-felting and its rich metaphors related to healing. I created Going Deeper, a seven-foot rug, only realizing after the fact that I was grounding myself through the work. It took two days and a team of ten friends to actually get the rug felted — a valuable lesson in the importance of seeking help and building community.
—Going Deeper
The art experience
At that time, I was regularly listening to guided imagery as part of my deep healing work. In the images shown below, Riding the Waves emerged out of that guided imagery, as did The Bandaged Place - a six-foot mobile of fiber-covered chicken wire hearts. Garden Within followed — an abstract representation of the safe place I imagined while listening to my guided imagery scripts.
I began Breaking Open to Joy — a piece that took over two years to complete — immediately after returning from a week-long Knitting and Meditation Retreat. After intuitively tearing in half the felted piece I had created as the foundation, I re-joined the pieces by knitting them back together. Much as had been the case with Going Deeper, I only saw after the fact how the work reflected the major life transitions I had moved through during that period, as I stitched the pieces of my life back together after divorce.
—Breaking Open To Joy
My current work-in-progress lacks a name; sometimes I’m inspired with a name before I start, other times it presents itself midway or upon completion. I am tearing up the pages of 45+ years of my journals, collaging them onto eight inch cardboard letters, then layering brightly colored netting and glitter over the paper. The letters spell out the five key words contained in the Serenity Prayer (serenity, accept, change, courage, wisdom), as well as the word LOVE. The Serenity Prayer became foundational to my healing toolbox back in 2012 when I began participating in Alanon, a decision that changed my life.
“At the deepest level, the creative process and the healing process arise from a single source. When you are an artist, you are a healer…”
—Rachel Naomi Remen
Through this work, I Iearned much about my own creative process. In response to an image that spontaneously comes to me — sometimes while meditating, I intuitively create something tangible, process its meaning through writing, and experience the healing by sharing it with others, both verbally and visually. I also learned that creativity and expressive arts open doors to healing that I might never pass through if I seek therapies that only engage my left-brain.
During this period, I also explored many other healing modalities, including bodywork and energy work. The experiences confirmed my belief that health and well-being are about resiliency, balance and the integration of mind, body, and spirit. The combination of the arts with the integrative therapies was a profoundly powerful healing experience for me — one that changed the way I serve others through my work in the world. I bring my heart and mind to the art of my practice. I partner with clients to help them identify and realize their goals, and to see themselves as whole and empowered. And I am dedicated to promoting wellness and resiliency, believe passionately in the power of art to heal, and weave those values throughout all that I do.