When my son was two, he saw our dog get hit, run over, and killed by a large delivery truck.
He was about ten feet away. He witnessed a horrible thing, but he had no way of expressing it at only two years old. I asked my daughter’s pre-school teacher for advice.
She told me to buy some watercolors and a pack of paper and let him paint his feelings out.
So that’s what I did.
He went through almost one thousand sheets of paper and two boxes of watercolors. He would sit down at the table and paint furiously for hours, but gradually, it slowed down.
We could see him healing before our eyes.
The pictures started out mainly black and red. (Our dog was black.)
Then you could see things changing.
He wasn’t painting at such a furious pace, and the other colors in the paintbox began to show up on paper. Eventually, he laid the brush down, and he was done.
Hopefully, you don’t have anything so dramatic to heal, but if you do, making art can be an excellent way to let your feelings out.
Sometimes we have trouble naming what we’re feeling, or we hesitate to write it down because it’s private.
Art can help you heal what’s hurting you.
You don’t need talent. All you need are a few supplies and a willingness to try.
You can paint, color, or maybe try collage. Get some anger out while you rip up some paper to add to your collage.
When you feel better, throw it away.
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