George Bernard Shaw once said, ‘You use a mirror to see your face and you use art to see your soul’. It’s no surprise, then, that many people around the world use art as a means to deal with stress, trauma and unhappiness – or to just find greater peace and meaning in their lives. In exceptional times like now, art becomes even more crucial and essential. 

Now since work from home or WFH is becoming the new normal and getting out of our houses freely is still a little far, it can take a toll on the mind and cause stress and anxiety and for you to deal with that effectively. The Creative Art Therapy facilitators at Taal Inc. have put together a list of 15 art therapy activities for you to try at home to get in touch with the creative child within you by working with the Building Blocks of a joyful and contented life. 

  • Make a story: Write the first 20 words that come to your mind and weave a story with them.
  • Only use colors that calm you: Create a drawing or a painting using only colors that you find calming and curate your own Happy Hour. 
  • Draw or paint your emotions: In this exercise, you’ll focus entirely on painting what you’re feeling.
  • Make Intuitive Music: You don’t need to be a professional to make music that sounds good to you. Bring out that old instrument and make music that you like.
  • Play with mud:  Make sculptures of your feelings, focusing on only one feeling at a time. 
  • Put together a journal: Journals don’t have to just be based around words. You can make an art journal as well, that lets you visually express your emotions.
  • Paint to music: Letting your creativity flow in response to music is a great way to let out feelings and just relax.
  • Paint with five senses: Pay close attention to each sensation of the senses and draw focusing only on one sense at a time.
  • Draw your vision of a perfect day: Think about what constitutes a perfect day to you and draw or paint it. What about this drawing can you make happen today?
  • Draw something that scares you:Everyone is frightened of something and in this project, you’ll get a chance to bring that fear to light and hopefully work towards facing it. 
  • Draw yourself as a tree: Your roots will be loaded with descriptions of things that give you strength and your good qualities, while your leaves can be the things that you’re trying to change.
  • Make a gratitude journal: Write 5 new things you’re grateful for every night before going to bed and read it first thing after you wake up.
  • Design a postcard you will never send: Are you still angry or upset with someone in your life? Create a postcard that expresses this, though you don’t have to ever send it.
  • Burn the negativity: Write all the negative thoughts that you can and burn the paper, literally. Be safe and repeat when you feel like.
  • Write without lifting the pen: Grab your journal and pen and keep writing until you feel completely empty in your head and don’t lift the pen at all until you get there.

We hope these activities packed with tools of Expressive Arts Therapy and creative arts therapy will help you sail through your WFH routine smoothly. Do make sure you pen down your experiences and observations after doing these activities. Host these activities with your family or colleagues and yes, please share your experience with us, we’d love to know how it helped you. 

Until we meet again to make music and arts together.

-Aman Joshi

Taal Inc. Drum Circle Facilitator.