“Never mind if you can talk posh or not, you will be heard and seen. You can produce something of your own regardless of your background, education, and personal history .You can use weird and unsocial emotions as a force to create not destroy!”
Roy, inmate at a prison studio
HOW DOES THERAPY WORK?
There are two key elements which form the basis of effective creative education;
The non-verbal interaction with the arts-medium:
We can explore past experiences such as fear, anger, worthlessness and desire as well as unnamed/ unconscious emotions through a medium without being exposed to the original pain and anxiety again. We can imagine different scenarios and practise them before daring to use them in “the real world”. In this way the medium works as “safety net” and spring board for the future.
The therapeutic cathartic effect:
This is projection of the client’s aspects onto someone or/and something else, damaging relationships can be relived with the therapist, allowing the participants to reflect on attitudes and behaviour from a safe position. We can reveal the roots of problems and behaviour by understanding personal art- work and interaction with the therapist.
Clients are supported to “work through” stressful issues, to adjust them and learn the tools to lead a more integrated life.
We believe that creative therapeutic interaction can change people’s behaviour positively because understanding and self-adjustment take place.
What else can creative Psychotherapy offer?
Clients can be socially compromised, mentally challenged, traumatised or otherwise unable to cope with the demands of social interaction in everyday life. Combined with the possible intensity of emotions triggered by the material in e.g. art settings, behaviour can become unmanageable, both for the person experiencing it and others around them.
Therapeutically untrained providers may not have the experience, let alone legal status and qualification to cope with such behaviour.
Creative work without qualified psycho-therapists can therefore not fully address traumas and psychotic behaviour/emotions. It concentrates on present and future behaviour with little regard for past trauma.
Psychotherapy allows us to take all aspects of a client’s life into consideration and has with that a deeper reaching holistic quality.
Creative Psychotherapists are required to undergo postgraduate training in psychotherapy and counselling.
This gives them the ability to work with clients beyond the traditional artwork and into a field of healing and treatment. Psychotherapy sessions take up personal conflicts to a deeper level and deal with them consciously. By using the arts materials to identify and express traumatising, personality-threatening experiences, symptoms and unwanted behaviour are positively manipulated and possibly resolved in order to achieve a more balanced and socially capable person.
Therapy is successful when the client gains a realistic sense of acceptance and control over his or her disrupting emotions and behaviour and an enjoyable and effective way to communicate.
Creative Psychotherapy is a postgraduate qualification registered with the Health Profession Council in the UK