Introduction, Objectives, and Course Resources

Introduction:

Our four months together will be rich with conversation, creating, and inner work. Each module will include readings, videos, and prompts to engage at your own pace over the two weeks between sessions. Since the course depends largely on time for personal reflection and creating, I encourage you to be mindful about how you are tending your time and your emotional well-being. A common practice in the grief care world is dosing, which simply means creating boundaries around our experience and intentionally setting aside time for grieving, then stepping out of it when we need some space. It is a gentle and compassionate way to care for ourselves in the midst of what is heavy and sometimes overwhelming.

*Before our first session together, please read the Introduction, and Chapter 1 in Art is a Way of Knowing by Pat Allen, and begin a reflection journal to collect your thoughts and experiences.

Objectives:

    • Progressive attunement and openness to one’s own grief and integrative process

    • Increased familiarity and fluency with creative practices (visual art, digital photography/videography, movement, music/sound, poetry, etc) through personal reflection

    • Deepened intuitive sense of the connection of grief and loss with creative practice

    • Increased competency and comfort in communicating and inviting clients into creative means of expression

    • Deep connection to fellow cohort members for shared support

Required Texts:

Optional Texts:

    • Memoir of your choice–

      • Throughout the four-month course, each participant might choose to read a memoir that expresses a journey through grief and loss. We can then use portions of the book chosen as case studies for our vocational exploration, if desired.

    • It All Belongs (Roy and Judy Smoot)

      • A truly beautiful and raw journey of a wife diagnosed with terminal cancer and her husband through their personal journals and creative practices.

Other helpful (optional) resources:

Essential Art Therapy Exercises and/or Guided Art Therapy Card Deck (Leah Guzman)

  • The Art of Soul (Regina Coupar)

    • This book has concrete guidance around specific artistic materials/techniques, as well as the author’s personal faith reflections around art-making. We may reference a couple of chapters in this but reserving it at the library might be a better option for many of you, especially if you already have a personal art practice.

  • Each module will have a list of creative materials, at differing levels of cost, appropriate for the prompts included. You are welcome to “upgrade” as you feel led.

    • examples of materials–

      • drawing supplies

      • collage fodder/varied papers

      • various substrates (paper, cardboard, scrap wood, altered book, etc)

      • digital resources (smart phone or pad, photo or video editing software/apps)

      • sculpting supplies (clay, model magic, play doh, found objects, etc.)

      • natural, recyclable, and found materials (ie: sticks, shells, seeds, and feathers, junk mail, etc.)

      • instruments (drum, recorder, chimes, sticks, etc)

Christine Hiester