Nurturing art skills, building resilience
Resilience is the ability of people to thrive in adversity, to handle stress and crises, to continue operating after major shocks. Resilience allows people to adapt to change and respond to challenges.
Often, we think of resilience as a character trait that is innate, but experts say it can be developed. Author Lucy Hone is one of those experts, and in her brilliant TED talk she suggests three strategies to become more resilient.
First: Resilient people know that s**t happens, that suffering is part of life. Accepting this won’t make us feel discriminated (why me?). And that’s the first step.
Second: Resilient people are good at selecting where to focus their attention, choosing carefully to avoid fixating on negative thoughts and actions. Hone suggests to find 3 good things that happened to you every day (can be a cookie, can be a message from a loved one).
Third: Resilient people ask themselves if what they’re doing is harming or helping them. Focusing on actions, being able to decide which behaviour makes us happy and which makes us sad put us back in control of our like choices.
How can art be part of this process?
Creativity is the answer. Everyone is creative! Creativity is like a muscle that can be exercised and trained. And most importantly, you don’t need to be a Picasso to harvest the positive effects of art making. In fact, art-making develops creative problem solving, flexibility, and resourcefulness. And the more creative you are, the better you will be at finding innovative ways to face challenges and adapt to change. Through art you can become more resilient.
A pandemia classifies as hardship and a major shock to our system. These days, we are adapting to new rules of social distancing, living in fear of getting sick and losing our livelihood, feeling isolated from our loved ones.
With more time on our hands, we all could benefit from practicing our art skills. So here is a short list of FREE resources that you can access with a clic:
How to:
Video tutorial for Mandala drawing
Video tutorial in Collage art
A guide on Creating a comic with your kids
There’s plenty more video tutorials, blogs and ideas out there. Follow your interests and your instinct to find something that you really enjoy and gets your hands into it.
