In September 2016, a local Wellington newspaper published an article about the work WellArT art therapist Pat Hay was doing with residents at a local rest home.
On 6th May Irena Stenner and Mary Brownlow were invited to present a workshop at NZ Association of Christian Counsellors Annual Conference using Interactive Drawing Therapy. The presentation was about "How to work with anger using IDT". We enjoyed the 2.5 day conference held at Wellington Amora Hotel with two key note speakers Pieter Roussow and Ruth McConnell speaking on neuroscience, trauma and healing the brain.
We were happy to see that our workshop was a good fit with the predominant theme of the weekend. There was a lot of interest in our topic, with more than 55 participants choosing to do our workshop. IDT works so well, because different parts of the brain are being activated in quick succession. The theme of anger was also very interesting in the context of the conference, because anger is such a raw emotion, which at times impedes clear thinking, or - in the language of the neuroscientist - the involvement of the prefrontal cortex. Doing anger work with IDT offers the opportunity to name the feeling, reflect on it, and release it in a safe way through expressing it on the page. This involves different parts of the brain. Our presentation included a brief introduction to IDT, some examples of clients' work, a demo, to show how working with anger could look in a counselling session. Mary did a brilliant impersonation of an angry client. After that we led the whole group through a guided drawing process on anger. We wanted people to have the experience of putting something on the page, using strong energetic movements with the crayon, such as scribbling and banging the crayon onto the board, to experience the release of energy that happens, and the brain chemistry that changes as a result. At the end we invited them to make a choice of what they wanted to do with the page, rip it to pieces, scrunch it up, or even to stomp on it. There was a lot of ripping and some throwing. All of this activity made for a lively workshop. It was a great experience to present a workshop like this in the context of neuroscience. IDT and art therapy have a lot to offer, this was acknowledged a couple of times by the keynote speaker who called art therapy a "primitive" therapy. He explained that by primitive he means that art therapy has the ability to access the primitive parts of the brain (unlike the more cognitive therapies), the amygdala and the limbic system and through doing this then provides an opportunity to activate the prefrontal cortex, which is the place that enables self-awareness, insight and choice. In short, it helps our clients to express and resolve powerful feelings while feeling safe to do so and to establish new neural pathways so critical to wellbeing. We met at Mary's new studio space in Melrose. Mary led a workshop using a shared group sand tray with miniature objects and art materials to talk about and make imagery about “a personal and professional identity” . This generated many cross references in our collective experience, inspiring us to share more intuitively about that which supports us in our work and when ‘the personal’supports a‘professional’ Self. Beautiful imagery!!
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April 2020
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