Weaving Your Creativity into Therapy: Integrating Expressive Arts in Mental Health

By Chelsea Angeles

Expressive Arts Therapy is a form of psychotherapy that integrates creative arts to enhance and deepen the therapeutic process. Implementing expressive arts is effective when feelings need to be expressed beyond words. It is a pathway to the wisdom of the body and emphasizes somatic (body-based) practices to facilitate personal growth and healing. Weaving your creativity into therapy sessions allows your inner world to be expressed and understood. It is an approach grounded in holistic practices of the interconnected nature of mind, body, and spirit. 

What is Expressive Arts Therapy?

Expressive Arts Therapy engages the creative process through imagination and play. The modalities used are visual arts, creative writing, movement and dance, sound and voice. Expressive Arts Therapy goes beyond words and feels into the wisdom of the body to facilitate emotional processing and healing. Mindfulness and grounding approaches are also integrated alongside talk-based counselling. At the heart of Expressive Arts Therapy is the intermodal flow, which is the way art modalities are woven together to facilitate a deep and meaningful process. 

What happens in an Expressive Arts Therapy based session?

In a session, you can expect a check-in where together we find a starting place or a seed to begin the art-making process. The modality we start with is dependent on your safety and comfort. Visual arts may be the starting place (painting or drawing). Then, to deepen the process, writing can be introduced as a way to respond to your art. If movement feels safe, small gestures or breathing would be a way to feel into the body. In that exploration, voice or any sounds may accompany the movement. Then, the session would close with a check-in again and crystallizing any insights that emerged. 

As you are guided through the artistic process, what unfolds is a surprise and discovery for both the client and the therapist. This third component, the art, is what facilitates a deeper understanding of your inner world. 

Who can benefit from Expressive Arts Therapy?

Every session and its shape is client led and will be guided gently and intentionally. Expressive Arts Therapy is accessible to all humans, any age, and any level of artistic experience. The beauty of the arts is its accessibility for all humans and their complexities. Art is a universal language that can be accessed when given the time and space. For folks that may think they are not an artist or are not creative, Expressive Arts Therapy may be a safe place to begin to explore those beliefs in a non-judgemental space where the process is more important than the product. There are also people out there who are curious to reconnect with their creative side or may feel stuck or are unsure how to begin the process of reclaiming your artistic side. 

No matter where you are in your relationship with creativity and art, working with an Expressive Arts Therapist is a way to gently (re)introduce the artistic process in your life. If you are looking for a way to understand your inner world, process emotions, and cultivate transformational growth, Expressive Arts Therapy is a safe place to land. 

Expressive Arts Beyond a Therapy Session

The work that emerges in a session has lasting benefits after a session ends. In an expressive arts based session we are doing more than art. At the heart of a session, we are building the capacity to play, fostering imagination, and connecting to the felt sense of expanding your inner world. 

A pillar of expressive arts is that it asks us to connect with our imagination and sense of play which opens our world to possibilities beyond our current circumstances. We find a different way to approach conflict or that feeling of being stuck in a loop of the same story. This also fosters a space of curiosity where we can expand our openness to try something different or new. 

How to Get Started with Expressive Arts Therapy 

Here at Empowered Living Holistic Counselling at The Den Wellness Collective, we offer expressive arts based sessions with a professional Expressive Arts Therapist. It is important that we meet you where you are at, so we can gradually introduce a creative practice while also working together to integrate therapeutic modalities that you feel connected to. This is an ever-changing process, where we can check-in and see what is working and what we can shift together. 

If you are curious about integrating Expressive Arts Therapy in your sessions, we can begin with a free discovery call to talk more about your needs and how we can explore the artistic process together.