Last month I introduced two types of therapy that we can turn to when faced with challenges or difficult life events – social work and psychotherapy.
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Today I’m just introducing psychology and art therapy.
Psychologists work with the person’s mental health, working out what the mental health issue, behaviour diagnosis or developmental disorder is.
But more than that, a psychologist also uses strategies to help improve the person’s life, such as cognitive behavioural therapy and others.
A psychologist can also help you to develop strategies to deal with phobias, anxiety and social situations.
Psychology tends to focus on the individual but can include couples or family in a therapy session.
Art therapy is the focus of my work, it involves the use of art materials to communicate between the person and the therapist.
As with all therapies discussed, art therapy is person centred, but it also can include the unconscious world of the client, and sometimes the spiritual.
Art therapy isn’t about the therapist analysing the person’s artwork and coming to conclusions, nor is it an art lesson, and it doesn’t require any artistic talent – sometimes you’ll just do scribbles, blobs of paint, or mash clay.
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The art therapist will ask you about your artwork, what it means, what stands out for you, any emotions that come up, and how you can apply what you’ve learned in your life.
Some art therapy sessions include meditation to help you to get right into what is going on for you.
As I said last week, you should always be in control of how your counselling or therapy session progresses, that’s what makes our work client-centred.
Ganga Ashworth and Lindy Dowe (psychotherapists) both kindly contributed to this column.
Ganga can be contacted for appointments at ganga@singingtheself.com, and Lindy on 0417 267 145.
Linda is an art therapist and social worker in private practice in the Southern Highlands, NSW and may be contacted at linda@highlandsholistic.com.au or 0438 400 446
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