Mindfulness and art - mindful drawing (BLICK-02-EN)

Mindfulness and art - mindful drawing

single work and group work

• A box with various objects
• Pencils
• Sheets of paper

If the exercise takes place indoors, there must be enough space for each participant to draw.

If the exercise takes place in nature, care must be taken that the participants have a suitable surface on which to draw.

15 minutes

This exercise is not an art exercise! So it is not about drawing a particularly great or beautiful piece of art. Many people are trained to think that something good must come out of holding a pencil in their hand. But that is not the purpose of this exercise. This exercise is about mindfulness and how mindfulness can bring us (back) into contact with our inner world of experience.

Artistic methods and mindfulness go together very well:

When I draw an object, that is art. But I also give mindfulness to an idea or a figure or an object. Mindfulness is like an (imaginary) magic wand: whatever I point this wand at comes to life.

In drawing, I point this magic wand at something, at an object, a person or a landscape. That has a lot to do with mindfulness.

So in this exercise, drawing is not about drawing a beautiful picture, but about giving mindfulness to something that is.

What is drawn has something to do with the momentary situation the person drawing is in. In the last part of this exercise, this fact is taken into account in a feedback round.

Theoretical and practical background, introduction, …

Briant Rokyta works as an art therapist at a rehabilitation clinic for people with burnout. He believes that mindfulness is essential for survival on psychosomatic wards.

He often hears from his patients: I am mindful anyway! But how does that help me in life?

I understand all that about mindfulness, but I don't know how my situation is going to get better!

In such cases, Briant usually explains the metaphor of the magic wand to his patients: "Mindfulness is like a magic wand! Whatever I point the magic wand at comes to life.

Most people have thoughts going through their heads all the time. This is completely automatic and very, very often it is the same thoughts over and over again that have stubbornly taken hold and do not allow us to calm down. Briant calls these autimatic thoughts thought chatter. And thought chatter absorbs mindfulness.

"Now, if I direct mindfulness where, I draw mindfulness away from the thought-cinema. If I don't direct it, if I don't give direction to my mindfulness, it is absorbed by the thought-cinema.

And one more thing is important to remember: Mindfulness is a lifelong practice."

And then Briant tells his patients about a magic trick:

"When you find the liking in mindfulness, you have won, because then the heart is with you. Because when I find the liking, then I want to keep practising."

So mindfulness cannot be a task ordered by a therapist.

Last but not least, he tells them about a Harvard University study that looked at the question: What makes people happy?

In a telephone survey, the test persons were asked: What are you doing right now, and how present are you?

The result of this study was that for those people who said they were happy on the phone, it was not what they were doing, but how present they were.

To be happy, you have to move from an unconscious. automatic life to a more conscious life.

Through this method/action, these benefits are achieved:

• In this exercise, the participants practice consciously directing their mindfulness outwards.
• In this exercise, participants practice consciously directing their mindfulness inwards.
• This exercise illustrates that everything we pay attention to comes alive for us.

Step 1

The participants are given a box with different elements and objects from which each participant can choose an object.

Alternatively, the exercise can also be done in nature. Then each participant is given the task of finding an object in nature that appeals to him or her.

Step 2

Now there is 10 minutes time to give the object mindfulness by drawing it.

So the participants have the task of using a pencil to give the object a structure on a piece of paper.

Step 3

Now the participants are given the task of turning their attention inwards: "How am I feeling right now? For example, if I am angry at the moment, I will try to draw this feeling. This feeling is added to my picture.

For example, I first drew a coffee mug. Now I realise that I'm grumpy and I draw thorns on top of the half."

Step 4

At the end of the exercise there is a feedback session: The participants show each other the pictures and answer the following questions:

• Why did I choose this object?
• What does this object have to do with my current feeling?
• Or what did this object trigger in me?

Briant Rokyta

http://www.briantrokyta.com/

https://www.singulart.com/de/k%C3%BCnstler/briant-rokyta-5165

Briant Rokyta is an experienced painter, draughtsman and sculptor from Austria with an international outlook. Rokyta uses various media for his designs, including oil and acrylic paints as well as ink. His paintings, which range between abstract and figurative, are impressive works of art that skilfully mix colour and light.

Visual Arts

English, German