Re: Finishing "Well"

Thank you, thank you one and all (that was two for Grace) - I really valued getting your comments about my poster and was interested to see the difference in your responses. Today was the day the assignment had to be completed, and the scary day we had to present it to the class. The whole thing has been quite a stressful ordeal for me, although there have also been aspects that I've enjoyed too. So, basically, we had to think up a question to do with art therapy (client group, setting, etc.) then answer the question by doing lots of research, then turn your findings into an A1 poster. (A1 is a paper size for you foreigners - fairly big too). Because I'm interested in possibly working in palliative care (people with terminal illness), I wanted to do some research in that area and after quite a bit of reading and thinking, my question turned out to be 'Can time-limited art psychotherapy offer ways of healing spiritual pain in the face of incurable illness' - i'm sure you've all been wondering the same. I actually have really quite enjoyed some of the reading, although it did seem to wander off topic quite regularly. I ended up reading quite a bit about the issues people have who are faced with their own death and while i know it sounds a bit depressing, it really helped me to see art therapy as a ministry and something that is quite appealing (while being terrifying at the same time). I've got several pages of quotes if anyone's interested in reading them, but basically, I divided my question up into separate sections, which were, what are the issues of incurable illness, what is spiritual pain, what is healing and what can art psychotherapy offer. Anyway, its a long story but basically, my poster is more of a response to the research than an explanation of it. Its about the fact that we all have to die and despite that, being faced with our own mortality is very stressful and scary, but can be eased by a number of things (including art therapy) and can actually end "well" (a little play on words there). I chose the butterfly because apparently in greek the same word is used for both spirit and butterfly and like it as a bit of a symbol for life after death or transformation etc.

I think what i found most difficult about the whole thing was the fact that it wasn't clear what the expectations were and the instructions were baffling and intimidating so not much help. Also it was given to us over a 2 week study break which meant there was no one to talk to for advice etc so we were left floundering a bit. I think my compulsion to get things right or be perfect made me feel like I had to guess what I was sposed to do and this was quite tricky and big source of pressure. The same with the presentation. I felt like because my poster was fairly general, I needed some way of 'proving' that I'd done the research and I was getting all agitated trying to condense it all and organise it in a way to tell everyone. (I woke up at 5.30am this morning and started writing it all out again, before giving up and deciding to wing it - which turned out to be the best option. So, another learning experience.

I realise this is the first time I've posted about the course and so have just dumped you all into my world for a few mins. There's a lot to say and yet quite hard to describe too. Anyway, intending to explain a bit more now that I have a day or two to relax before the next assignment.