In session three, “Restoring Stillness” we focus on times of stress and feelings of burnout. Mindfulness and nonjudgmental process-based artmaking are not meant to cure you of stress, but can be helpful tools in managing your stress.
Patricia Kinser & Jill Ware
Patricia Kinser is a nurse practitioner and Assistant Professor in the VCU School of Nursing, who does research on mindful interventions for various populations. In this video, she frames our thinking on how we should approach our own stress and shares potential coping mechanisms. She encourages us to try a variety of approaches but always with self-compassion. And Jill Ware, from the VCUarts Depot, shares her personal story of how a new art practice, from dance to drawing, gave her a mindfulness practice free of judgment and how it affected her positively during an extremely stressful time in her life.
Mary Shelden
In this very soothing and calming breathing exercise, we take a moment to notice our bodies’ natural rhythms and let go of any anxieties we are feeling at that moment.
Mary Shelden
In this guided meditation, Mary uses her relaxing voice to lead us in an exercise for our imaginations. We conjure up a safe and comforting place and feel it, sense it, and know that we can always return back to it.
Choose one art activity.
Jill Ware shares two activity options: “Color Experiments” is an abstract painting style, but fear not for those that don’t have paints, the other is a line drawing style from her”125 Images” project.
Ideokinesis is Judith Steele’s dance activity that helps you notice how you can direct your focus and mind’s eye to find balance and ease with the use of imagery and movement.
Frames of Mind[fulness] is Laura Chessin’s photography activity that can be done with found objects and a mobile device.
This guided meditative writing activity by Stephanie Miller-Rizzi encourages taking time to re-center, focus on the now, and connect to that which is most important…in love.
Coming soon.