Join Dr. Misty and Michell at NeuroSparkly as they welcome fellow therapist Alli Fisher for an insightful chat about the magic of art and creativity in therapy. As two neurodivergent, queer, licensed therapists, Dr. Misty and Michell dive deep into how art intersects with healing, discussing various techniques and personal experiences. From somatic drawing exercises and childhood art traumas to the soothing power of colors and sensory experiences, there's something for everyone. Alli shares her journey into art therapy, the importance of embracing 'ugly art,' and how to create a therapeutic space. Plus, they tease their upcoming newsletter about grounding and coping skills through art. Remember to keep it sparkly!

Join us as we dive deep and embrace our inner sparkle. We're so excited to have you here. I want to thank all of our listeners for supporting us on this journey as we figure out what the heck we're doing. We love to talk about this stuff, so we're just glad that you're here listening this week. We are really excited. This is one of my favorite topics, which is art and creativity and all things like that. And I know it's one of your favorite things, too, Misty.

Allie Fisher is with us this week. She's a therapist with us at Flow art, and she is a provisional art therapist as well as an LMHC. She was also one of my students at Antioch, and I saw her through her internship, and now I get to supervise her. So that's very exciting. So go ahead and say hi, Allie.

But that's the thing that's magical about art therapy, is it doesn't need to look amazing. I tell my clients all the time, if you draw a circle and put a dot in it, and you tell me it's a giraffe, then it's a giraffe, and it's the best giraffe.

But there's also a lot of ways to be able to work around our inner critic, too, and just focus on the self expression, too. So being able to use, like, collage or purely work in just, like, color. So there's a lot of ways to work around that so everyone can have access to it, even if it's something that they're feeling nervous about and how they'll perceive themselves through it, too.

Yeah, it's interesting because art can really be so many things. And I always think about Andy Warhol with this kind of stuff, and he always said that art is anything you can get away with. What are some common art techniques or art therapy techniques that you use, Ollie, when you're starting out with somebody?

That's all I can, like, how I can describe it. It's like a matte red. It's not glossy. It's not shiny. There's not any texture to it, but it's, like, oppressive red. And when I first started doing the ketamine treatments, it flipped me out. Like, it made me feel really suffocated and really claustrophobic. And then at one point, like, six treatments in or something, I finally was just like, I don't want to be afraid of this anymore. I'm just not leaning into the experience of it. And it was like I became the material. It was a really weird sensation, but it happens that way every single time I have the ketamine treatment. It's never nothing, like, present. That red texture. Really interesting. That's how I would experience that. If I went through that hopscotch, probably in the red room, it would feel like that to me. Probably, like, oppressive.

Soothing? Or is it going to bring this feeling or that kind of thing which I'm thinking about, but I feel like that really, again, I feel like it depends on a lot of experience too.

Right.

Is.

I don't really get it, but anyway, so for our samsari scribble drawing, so you just take a piece of paper and lay it on a flat surface. I'm going to lift up so that way you all can see, but then you'll take your marker. I prefer a marker to you other because I think that the sound that the marker makes gliding off of paper is really soothing compared to you can't really hear it as much if it's a pen or a pencil. So I'm just adding a bonus soothing sound while I do it. So we're going to be focusing in this. Since I have my scented marker, I'll be pulling on my smell, my sense of smell and sound and hearing it. But then we're also really going to focus on touch. So when you put your drawing utensil on the paper, I want you to put your like, the side of your palm leaning up against the paper too. So if you're using a utensil, basically your palm might get a little dirty with just like marker residue coming up. But I if that's washable, that's the preferred. So you can really feel it. And so you'll just put it on the side and then. So press the marker down and just slowly move your marker around.

And you'll notice generally when I do that, a lot of people will notice a different sensation in their heart and chest and that movement. And so then just continuing back down and just continue to focus on the smooth feeling of the paper gliding against your hand, and then that sound of the marker as it makes those kind of languid movements and your arm as it moves too. And then that sound of the tool kind of rubbing against the paper.

And just as a moment focusing in on those different senses and movement to calm your body and your nervous system down. And you could do that as long as you want or until you feel calm and, yeah, then once you feel like you've gotten to a point where you feel like you're done, you can just end. It doesn't need to have a final image.

I have a range of clients who, some who will never participate in themselves physically making the art to clients that make art in every single session. But I always talk about, I will make art because that's my tool for communication. You're not yelling at it, but only.

My gosh, what's going on?

But, yeah, I think painting is really the one for me that I notice, because I think that really involves a lot of. A lot more of my body, too, of those kind of bigger movements, which I think really helps, versus the smaller thing. But I know 100%. I know some people who like the smaller, more controlled things really helps them too.

You can check out our newsletter that'll be out next week. It's going to be all about using art and creativity for grounding and coding coping skills. I have a meditation in there that's all about imagining your creative space. Like we just talked about, using all the different senses. I'm so excited that we got to all hang out today. And thank you so much, Allie, for joining us. If you want to learn more about Ally, we're going to have the flow art therapy link down in the link below.

Bye.