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First acquaintance, painting became attached.

I have been in contact with and studied psychology for six or seven years, and have taken some psychology courses. I have always been interested in the course of body wisdom. I believe that the real change comes from the participation of the body, not just the cognition of the mind.

So, I came into contact with some courses about body and mind one after another and learned the five-rhythm Zen dance of internationally renowned master Jo. Hardy Joe Hattie, Feidenkwas and Isalan massage courses of internationally renowned master BenJ Langdon, and sound therapy courses of master Sarah Varvik. ......

The master's course taught me to pay attention to my body and breathing. When I put down my brain, my inner state of true peace will appear, and my body will feel soft and relaxed, which has benefited me a lot.

By chance, I learned that Peking University and the US-China Institute of International Psychology (CIP) jointly offered a systematic course "Painting Therapy Psychology". With curiosity and expectation for art therapy, I am happy to go.

What is painting therapy?

Painting therapy is to treat diseases through self-expression, which began to develop in the1920s. As for the origin of painting therapy, it can even be traced back to prehistoric cave painting.

In the field of psychological counseling, painting therapy is the representative school of art therapy.

Painting therapy refers to the therapist's understanding of visitors' inner consciousness through painting activities and helping visitors express their inner feelings, such as letting visitors project their own thoughts, inner contradictions, interpersonal relationships and anxiety caused by diseases through painting.

Painting therapy can be expressed by painting, collage, sculpture and other artistic activities with pigments, crayons, colored pens, carbon pens, clay or other painting materials according to the needs of visitors, so as to achieve the purpose of treatment.

Painting therapy has nothing to do with painting skills, nor does it need painting foundation, but only needs professional painting therapists to accompany it.

So, what is the function of painting art therapy? How to play these functions?

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Painting therapy-opening the window of body consciousness

In China, we don't have much nonverbal education. We pay more attention to the thinking of the brain, but ignore the development of the body. It cannot be ignored that people's physical diseases often come from emotional depression, guilt and loss of contact with the soul.

In the process of life growth, it is inevitable to face troubles and setbacks. When people don't want to experience traumatic experiences again, the subconscious will automatically establish a defense mechanism to protect us and hide them deeply. Originally, we just wanted to forget some painful events. I didn't expect that when we closed this, we closed the whole channel and closed the connection with ourselves, others and everything.

Painting therapy bypasses the self-censorship and defense mechanism of our consciousness, crosses the limitation of language and reaches the deep subconscious. Let a person examine himself more truly, and find his memories and emotions that have been suppressed, restrained, avoided and forgotten.

When you open the window of body perception, when you understand your real thoughts and feelings, those subconscious things jump into consciousness and self begins to achieve harmony and unity.

At this moment, the healing began.

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Painting therapy-self-discovery and self-reconciliation

Who are you? Do you know yourself? Do you like yourself? Do you accept yourself?

We are often busy dealing with these anxieties and pains and avoiding these emotions, but we never forget to ask ourselves what kind of me I want, what kind of me I hope to be in the future and what kind of environment I am in.

Connecting yourself with the past is a very important job in psychotherapy.

All relationships between people are actually relationships with themselves. When you can truly reconcile with yourself, when your goals become clearer, when you get closer to yourself and find yourself, you can truly return to inner peace and harmony. Only when you really find yourself can you have infinite strength to move forward bravely.

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Painting therapy-the ability to guide you to connect happiness

It is not easy to find happiness in yourself, and it is impossible to find happiness elsewhere.

-Agnes ripley's "Treasure Box"

Life is a journey of self-exploration. Only by constantly exploring and improving yourself and opening the boundaries of life through continuous growth can you see yourself differently in the next second of your life, feel a richer life and live out the richness and freedom of life.

There is no limit to life, and the future of every day is worth looking forward to.

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Review and summary of the first-level course of painting therapy

The five-day study of the first-order course of painting art therapy, from strangeness to kindness, from being unable to write to being unable to stop at all, from being single to being more and more three-dimensional, has to marvel at the magical charm of art.

Listen carefully to Dr. Valval Hewitt, a teacher from England, share her artistic creation, and write down in her notes that the principle of painting art therapy should be visitor-centered.

Yes, a good painting therapist, even a psychotherapist, is not a skill, but a sincerity, a sincere concern for visitors.

In the process of painting therapy, more consideration should be given.

How can I understand you, my visitor?

How do you understand yourself, my visitor?

What do I need to learn? How do I need to adjust?

We should be flexible enough to adjust the plan.

Tell the visitor that your current state is not your fault, and you have a frank desire to understand the attitude of the visitor.

As a window to open body consciousness, painting therapy has several advantages over language:

It can display a variety of information at the same time, without the limitation of language logic to present the complex relationship between elements (even chaotic and illogical relationship), which is more free, rich and three-dimensional, so it is more realistic;

Bypass the defense mechanism of language and show real feelings and experiences;

Use more specific and intuitive colors, shapes, textures, etc. It directly and strongly touches people's senses and makes you feel the same, regardless of abstract cognition and indirect experience.

At the same time, we should understand that not everyone is waiting for you to interpret and evaluate. Your interpretation or evaluation may be a wrong judgment or a wrong way, and more importantly, respect your visitors.

So, please don't underestimate others' feelings about normal care. All counseling, treatment and skills should be based on real concern for visitors, and they need awe, love and compassion, as well as wise methods to face visitors.

In the past five days, in this safe field, following the guidance of teachers and through painting activities, we have explored our real needs and inner voices together, released our unresolved inner needs, expressed ourselves more freely and completely, and connected others and ourselves more deeply and truly.

It is lucky to find your true self, but only when you have the courage to be yourself will you find yourself so beautiful.

Ok, now let's get a pen and start doodling! Draw whatever comes to mind, whether it is concrete or abstract, even points or lines, and you will embark on a wonderful journey of painting awareness.

It's never too late to open your body consciousness with painting.

You too.