Art Heals

Yea! It’s officially Creative Arts Therapies Week!

To celebrate, I want to feature some of my new favorite Art Therpy resources.

1) Art Therapy Blog
A fellow blogger has some great, simple, therapeutic exercises for all ages.

2) National Coalition of Creative Arts Therapies Associations
This group covers: Art Therapy, Dance/Movement Therapy, Drama Therapy, Music Therapy, Poetry Therapy, and Psychodrama.

3) Quarterlife
Intrigued by video journaling/blogging (the basis of the show, Quarterlife), I’ve started to wonder: How can we continue to use technology in a creative way for new, therapeutic experiences?

4) Tumblr
How can artists can offer a balance in the technological industry?

What have you been into lately? Let us know…

What timing!

Listen to this great interview from one of my favorite shows, Fresh Air.

It features political scientist Jonathan Oberlander, who discusses problems with the current healthcare system and examines the remedies offered by each of the presidential candidates.

The insurance industry is catching on! They are realizing that our country is in crisis, that they must morph into something better if they want to stay in business. They have been criticized from all sides for getting us into this mess, and many Americans want to wipe them out in exchange for a universal, government-run health care system.

All of these factors contribute to insurance companies thinking differently about consumers, namely adults ages 19-29, dubbed “young invincibles” in these new campaigns.
Sound PPO News Article

Well Point, the parent company of Blue Cross Blue Shield and Unicare, has introduced plans designed specifically for the younger generation. The marketing appeals to this demographic - Internet savvy, hip language, easy navigation, striking design - and the plans provide coverage that meets their needs. Sound Health and Tonik keep the costs down by making the underwriting for these plans STRICT (i.e. you must be healthy to qualify).

Young adults now have more options! (check out another option I advocate)

Tonik
available in:
California, Colorado, Georgia, Nevada, Connecticut, New Hampshire

Sound Health
available in:
Illinois, Texas

*Special thanks to Jonathan Davis, who provided inforation for this article.

Be your own therapist. Take an hour one day this week to do an exercise in flow. Flow is the state of being in which a person is “fully immersed in what he or she is doing, characterized by a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and success in the process of the activity” (wikipedia).

Flow is a huge component of why art can be so effective as a therapeutic technique. The process of art creates in a person the state of flow. Athletes also find flow states while engaged in physical activity.

Whether you find flow through yoga or jogging, watercolors or flute playing, find it somewhere, and create a time and space to engage in it. It promises to make you feel alive.

TIPS:

1) Picking your medium
You can more easily observe the effect of your “active imagination” with activities that produce a tangible product: writing, painting, sculpting, music…

2) Environment
Try to address all distractions, and create a comfortable environment. Flow activities have unique benefits when done in solitude with complete focus, but they are also fun and useful when done with company or in the midst of daily activity. Try a few different environments.

3) Observe
Observe the symbols present in your work. Talk to your friends about what came up during your process. Keep a journal of patterns or cycles you see in your work.

“I have been like a boy playing on the sea shore, diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than usual, while the great ocean of truth lay before me, all undiscovered.”
-Issac Newton

While researching the link between quantum physics and energy medicine, I became intrigued by the idea that this relationship is where black and white meet, where science and religion become friends, where empirical encounters anecdotal.

Most energy workers I have spoken with approached the field with intentions based on philosophical and spiritual beliefs. Their practices are based on the experiences they’ve had. They see and feel what energy work can do, but many don’t realize that modern science is moving in the direction of explaining exactly why energy medicine works.

As medicine and science parallel, both fields are advancing towards new theories about reality and energy. I am interested in learning and sharing knowledge about the way empirical science and alternative medicine can support each other.

With the gaining popularity of the theories of quantum physics, demonstated by the success of movies like I Heart Huckabess and What the Bleep Do We Know!?, it seems we are growing more comfortable with the implications of modern physics. Perhaps revealing how the future of science relates directly to energy medicine will make us all more comfortable with what now seems esoteric about alternative health care.

If you’re interested in contemplating Quantum Physics check out these
Books:
Intoducing Quantum Theory
Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time

Communities:
Tribe

Websites:
What is Quantum Physics?
Visual Quantum Mechanics

and Movies:
What the Bleep!?
Nova:The Elegant Universe
I Heart Huckabees

Check out this great related blog. This artist is asking for artistic submissions specifically related to the migraines. A painful subject; a beautiful project.

Migraine Expressions

My article (an extended version of a recent post) on Health Savings Accounts was published on an awesome new webzine based in Chicago.

Check it out: Chicago 6 Corners: The Idea Intersection

They feature comics, photography, and political commentary as well as cool happenings in the great neighborhoods of Chicago.

A Reading List: Books that Heal and Inspire

Julie/Julia
by Julie Powell
A blogging success story

The Drama of the Gifted Child
by Alice Miller
Miller is a noted psychologist who began to heal herself when she started spontaneous painting. She says, “The spontaneous painting I began to do helped me not only to discover my personal story, but also to free myself from the intellectual constraints and concepts of my upbringing and my professional training . . . The more I learned to follow my impulses in a playful way with colors and forms, the weaker became my allegiance to conventnions of an aesthetic or any other nature.”

Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain
and Drawing on the Artist Within
by Betty Edwards.
These two books show you how to tap into the right/creative/intuitive side of the brain.

If You Want to Write: A Book about Art, Independence, and Spirit
by Brenda Ueland.
The first sentence is “This book should be a great help in the freeing of your thoughts and the genius that is in all of us.”

The Artist’s Way
by Julia Cameron
and Bird by Bird: Instructions on Writing and life
by Anne Lamott.
These two books urge people to write, write, write. Write often, write whatever comes to mind, write because it is healing, not
necessarily because you want to be published.

Dance of the Dissident Daughter
by Sue Monk Kidd.
This book is about tapping into the spiritual life.

How to Read a Poem and fall in Love with Poetry
by Edward Hirsch.
This book does exactly what the title says - it makes you fall in love with poetry. One of the reviews states, “The answer Hirsch gives to the question of How to Read a Poem is Ecstatically.”

Do you have books that have inspired you? Tell Us!

This one is tricky.
Eye Care is expensive and has recently entered a trendy phase. There’s a saturation of hip optometry boutiques where you can get fabulous frames and friendly doctors.

Eye Spy
D/Vision
Eye Want
Red Eye
Urban Eye Care

Perhaps you have insurance and can afford these places. If not, it gets tough.

Since I was young, I’ve had poor sight. I got my first pair of glasses in the second grade, first pair of contacts just before starting middle school, and LASIK at age 20. It is a necessity for me to find a good optometrist, and I have tried a few out in Chicago. I have found some good doctors, but I still have a wandering “eye” for affordable alternatives.

Have suggestions? Please comment…

As my mother says, “Art heals, but sometimes you need a doctor.” When it comes to health insurance, we as a nation have lost our way. Some people think the solution is universal health care paid for by the government. Me? I think government funded anything is scary. Just think if going to the doctor were like going to the DMV. SCARY. Instead, I support the combination of Health Savings Accounts with high-deductible Health Insurance Plans.

“Health Savings Accounts are a new option for health insurance and they have two parts. The first part is a health insurance policy that covers large hospital bills. The second part of the Health Savings Account is an investment account or retirement account from which you can withdraw money tax-free for medical care. Otherwise, the money accumulates with tax-free interest until retirement, when you can withdraw for any purpose and pay normal income taxes.” (http://www.hsainsider.com/hsabasics.aspx)

My mom articulates further:

Very few people know what this is or how it works, but I think it’s a great step in the right direction, something our government should have done a long time ago because people shouldn’t have to worry about losing their insurance if they want to change jobs or don’t have a job. I also think it makes the patient and the doctor more accountable. You can shop around (and should shop around as with anything else), but most people don’t if they just have a co-pay or whatever. Plus doctors will negotiate prices…”

For professional information:
HSA Insider
Assurant Health
eHealthInsurance

You can find HSA compatible high deductible health insurance plans through: Blue Cross Blue Shield, Unicare, United, Humana, Assurant, and other major insurance companies.

Continue reading ‘Preventive’