Today on the podcast, registered psychotherapist, art therapist and author Amelia Knott is helping us discover the art of thriving online and sharing ways to reconnect with yourself, your thoughts and your sense of wellbeing.

You’ll Learn: 

• Common challenges that result from the online space and being constantly connected
• How to reconcile the good and bad of the internet and social media
• What art therapy is and how it helps us connect with ourselves and our needs
• Ideas for starting your own creative practice

Even (or especially) if you don’t think of yourself as an artist, stick around. This is not like your middle school art class! 

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Amelia Knott is a Registered Psychotherapist + Art Therapist. She's also an artist, content creator and author. Her book The Art Of Thriving Online was recently published. Her mission is to support people in their mental health by combining psychotherapy, counseling and art making.

Art as Therapy

Amelia’s passion for this work came from profound experiences as a young person who was given the opportunity to use her creativity to work through significant grief and trauma. 

She explains that, for many of us, language can feel quite limiting. It can be difficult to put our feelings into words. But art, whether it be writing, collaging, painting, drawing or any other creative medium, allows us to tap into our intuition and deeper parts of ourselves. 

Art creates another access point to emotional regulation, communication, self soothing and self awareness. It has the capacity to surprise us when we look at something from another vantage point and helps us grapple with two things being true at the same time. 

Art gives us agency in what type of art we create, what materials we use and what we choose to do with them. It allows us to practice being imperfect without consequences. 

Whereas a drawing or painting class is focused on teaching a technical skill (and may end up making you feel like you aren’t a creative person at all), art therapy is much more about how the process feels. The final product isn’t so important. It’s about finding meaning in creating it. 

Challenges in the Online World

In her new book, The Art of Thriving Online, Amelia helps us bring awareness to how our online existence might be impacting us. 

While we both agree that there is a lot of value to the online space, it also comes with a lot of challenges. In many cases, it messes with our attention, sets an unrealistic standard and gives the sense that the world is more divided, scary and dangerous than it actually is. 

Pretty much all online platforms, from social media to ecommerce and news websites, are designed to keep us engaged for as long as possible. They’re also designed to make it hard to stop. There’s no limit to what you could discover or feel inspired by, which means there’s also no limit to the things you could miss out on. You could scroll forever, but it often pulls us away from what we truly want and need. 

Because of this pull and easy access to a screen that is distracting us in 10 different ways at once, our attention is fractured. It becomes hard for us to focus and actually get stuff done, which leads to overwhelm. We’re no longer accustomed to spending time getting a task or set of tasks done all at once. 

Our nervous systems get activated by the type of information we’re fed online. In an effort to hold our attention, more “captivating” content (i.e. content that is inflammatory, divisive, negative or scary) is usually pushed out more readily than positive and hopeful posts and articles.

Comparison is also a huge challenge in the online space, particularly on social media. We’re not just comparing ourselves to people we see in real life (which can be unhealthy already). We’re comparing ourselves to curated, filtered feeds. The pressure we feel to do things differently or better can be devastating. This is a big one in motherhood, especially if moms are isolated. 

Defining Wellness

Wellness means something different for each of us. Amelia talks about helping people become the author of their own definition of wellness. She doesn’t believe in a one-size-fits-all solution. Rather, it’s something we all have to figure out for ourselves. 

A lot of what we see about wellness online are things that can be sold, performed or shown. But what about creating metrics like how many books you read with your kids this week or how many times you got out into nature?

What does it mean for you to be well? How will you know if you’re well? She says, “if we don’t author those definitions for ourselves, then the default is gonna be whatever performs well in an algorithm.” 

It’s also important to be flexible, give ourselves grace and know that our definition will evolve and change. It’s not a failure if you can’t keep up with a new habit. It might just be a sign that you’re paying attention to what is and isn’t useful for you. 

The Art of Thriving Online

Amelia likes to start conversations about the internet by validating that your time online is harmful AND it’s also deeply meaningful. Our lives are so entangled in these tools that our goal should really be to collaborate with them. The challenge is in how we hold the messiness - the fact that it’s not all good or all bad. It’s both. 

The challenges are real, but there is also potential for so much discovery, inspiration and connection. There are great conversations happening around mental health and the challenges of parenthood, helping to reduce stigma and calling out some of the toxic parts of our culture. 

But when we pick up the phone at every possible moment to avoid ourselves or boredom, we miss out on the chance to let insights and meaning come at a natural pace. 

When people dedicate time to an art experience, it gives their minds a chance to wander and daydream. Amelia says that in that space, ideas and reflections really start to get integrated into the brain. For example, after a therapy session, rather than jotting down some notes and moving on to the next thing, Amelia likes to block off 20 minutes or so to create something with no plan. It gives the brain a chance to make sense of what just happened. 

You don’t have to make a giant abstract painting or detailed drawing to experience the benefits of art. There are so many ways to create moments of delight in your daily life. Explore with art, nature, journaling, music, cooking, homemaking or anything else that interests you. It can be as simple as picking a flower from the yard and putting it in a cup where you’ll see it throughout the day.

One of Amelia’s favorite ways is to do a creative practice where the decisions are already made, like paint-by-number, a coloring book or crochet. These activities are tactile, rhythmic and repetitive, so you’re not having to analyze or problem solve. 

The Art of Thriving Online is more than just a book you read. In this interactive guide, Amelia has combined research, personal stories and lots of art and writing prompts to help you learn about yourself and reconcile your relationship with the time you spend online. 

You’ll look at how it impacts your attention, how you feel about productivity and privacy, comparison, fear, anger and disinformation. You’ll end up with a better sense of what feels true and needed for you, which you’ll describe in a final statement Amelia calls the “gentle manifesto”. 

As moms, we get so focused on taking care of our kids that it’s easy to lose sight of ourselves as individuals. Tapping into your creativity is a wonderful self care practice to understand who you are and what you like. 

Connect with Amelia Knott:

• Learn more about Amelia and her work on her website at: https://www.arttherapyinreallife.com/
• Follow her on Instagram and Tiktok @art_therapy_irl
• Buy Amelia’s book: The Art of Thriving Online: A Workbook: Creative Exercises to Help You Stay Grounded and Feel Joy in the World of Social Media

Resources:

• Episode 144: Get Your Brain to Do More and Rest Better

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✨ A simple tool to stop yelling once you’ve started (This one thing will get you calm.)

✨ 40 things to do instead of yelling. (You only need to pick one!)

✨ Exactly why you yell. (And how to stop yourself from starting.)

✨A script to say to your kids when you yell. (So they don't follow you around!)

Download the Stop Yelling Cheat Sheet here

Connect With Darlynn: 

• Book a complimentary session with Darlynn
• Learn about the different parenting programs at www.calmmamacoaching.com
• Follow me on Instagram @darlynnchildress for daily tips 
• Rate and review the podcast on Itunes

Alright. Well, welcome, Amelia Knott, to the podcast. I'm

so excited to have you here. So thanks for being here. Oh, I'm

delighted to be here. I'm excited about our conversation. Yeah. So why don't you introduce

yourself? I've introduced you already in, you know, in the intro. But

just yeah. Tell us a little about yourself, your work, and kinda what brought you

to this, like, intersection that you work within.

Yeah. Absolutely. So I'm an art psychotherapist,

and essentially that means I use the modality

of art making, you know, whether that's writing, collaging,

painting, drawing, whatever whatever creative medium,

as a therapist. So that gets to be what is really the

catalyst for change and insight with the clients I work with.

And I came to this work really because I had

some profound experiences as a young person where

after some pretty significant grief and trauma, I had

these opportunities to to express myself creatively.

And I found and I think this is true for so many people that a

lot of our experiences are really hard to put

into words. Right? Whether that is

grief or trauma, whether it's even positive things. Language can feel quite

limiting. And I think where art becomes really

useful in terms of a healing journey is it can allow us to

bypass the analytical and cognitive part of our brains, and

we get to express something or explore something in a way that might

be intuitive or unconscious or just regulating.

Right? Sometimes it feels really good just to scribble or

do something with our hands. So I think it's a long

way of saying I really came to this work because in my own life,

art has given me safe passage through challenging

experiences and really helped me to know myself deeply.

And getting to do that in my work, I think, is such an incredible

privilege. But when it comes to this intersection of

Well, actually, I'm gonna pass you there because I wanna talk about it for a

second. We'll do the intersection in a second. Because I was just thinking about, like,

the talk conversation around words and, like, I actually find it very easy

to use words and language to communicate and,

just always been a writer and journalist, you know, journaler and all that. And I

think partly why my work is really valuable is because I

can put into words what people find really complicated to like,

it's all messy inside, and then they're not sure how to articulate it.

And I'm interested in this conversation because I

don't I over not over. I don't wanna judge it. I just I use words

a lot. I'm good at it. And it's easy for me to express myself that

way. And not everyone has that access. And

you're creating another access point to emotional

regulation, communication, self soothing, self

awareness. So I love it. And it's really not something

that I have done really in my life. Like, if

someone invites me to, like, an art thing, I just

do it, and then I get a star and I leave.

It does it's not that meaningful to me. So I'm looking forward to

this conversation and seeing, you know, how I can maybe bring this into my own

life and, what it would offer. So, yeah, I just thought

I'd poke that in there. Like, how yeah. We all need to

figure out ways to process our emotion and

communicate and, soothe. And there are many different

I mean, I use nature actually a lot more than in writing. I

find nature is my creative expression in many ways. And,

so, yeah, I don't know. Nature, art, words, journaling, talking,

there's just different modalities. So I love it.

Well, I love that you use the word access point. Right? Because I

mean and maybe even for someone who loves words.

I know lots of people, and I actually I work with a lot of clients,

especially women who use words and express with

words all the time. Sometimes it's helpful to try, like, another vantage

point to get to know something. Like, maybe there's an issue or

a situation in our lives that we've kind of explored with

words a lot and are still looking for a

different way of seeing it, I think that's when art can be really useful because

I think art has the capacity to surprise us. Right? You might be working on

something and then step back. And, oh my gosh,

actually, I didn't see the way those colors interacted or

it kind of looks like a face or some kind of symbol in in that

corner over there. So I think it's a lovely

compliment. Right? And that's what happens in our therapy too. It's not

just the making. It's the talking, the kind of setting up, getting to

know each other. There's some kind of creative prompts, and

then how we talk about it and make meaning from what we're seeing in front

of us. So it's it's a bit of a dance between language conversation

and and the visual. But I think I think about it

as an extra tool in in a tool belt for how we might know ourselves

and be well. Yeah. It's so beautiful. I was thinking

about, like, the different prompts that I've had, like, art prompts that have actually

impacted me. I remember one time it was like, why did I don't know. I

just saw this heart, and it was, like, represent some

part of the heart. And I I noticed, like, mine was, like, really, really tiny,

this, like, part, in my heart that we drew. And

then I, like, looked around, and I was like, woah. Everybody did it way different.

Like, this little kernel thing, I wouldn't even give it voice or

space in this drawing. And then that

kind of was like, wow. So in my non

analytical space, I evaluated this part of my

life as very small and minuscule and dark and quiet and, like,

what if I brought that to more light and colored it differently? Yeah. So there's

gonna be some really cool pieces that you can bring with good

prompts and then a reflection from that.

Yeah. It's not just scribble. Mhmm. Yeah. I mean, it's such a powerful process you're

describing, and I think the barrier many people,

feel to engaging in something creative or trying to

use art as a therapeutic tool is this belief that, oh, I'm not

necessarily trained or skilled. Not an artist. Yeah. I'm not

an artist. Creative. I don't know how to draw. Yeah. I mean, I have all

those people feel that baggage for myself. Yeah. I think I'm not good at it

at all. Almost comical, the degree that I cannot

draw. But that's not

an obstacle or barrier to accessing this modality.

So that's good for everyone to know, like, who's listening because they're like, oh, I'm

not an art. They, like, stop listening. It's like, no. No. No.

Stay. Hang out. So we got some good things to talk about. Mhmm. Well

and that's, I think, one of the most important things too is what's

different between, say, maybe, like, the art class in middle school that made you feel

like you weren't a creative person. Right? Or a class

where a certain skill was being taught versus art therapy

is we're looking so much more at how the process feels

and what we're seeing in the art afterwards. The skill, not

as important. The final product, not as important. And and

like what you just described in that profound process, noticing, oh,

without thinking about it too much, I I drew this heart as being small and

chose these colors. What could that say about me? What meaning or metaphor

am I finding in that? That doesn't take incredible rendering

skills. Like, it always amazes me how much can come through in

a crumpled piece of paper or a quick scribble. Right? Mhmm.

You don't need a a fine art degree to do that. Mhmm. Yeah. So

that's great. So we've already established what we've already got overcome one obstacle for

everybody. So Good. Good for us. So

now your work is interesting to me because I think art therapy has a lot

has a space for sure. We're talking about that. But you have this

kind of take on it, like the art of thriving online. That's the name of

your workbook, and you really are evaluating or or

become bring awareness to how

what our online world and our online existence,

how it may be impacting us. And so I wondered if you could talk about,

you know, that what you see in terms that

we talked, like, could be social media, it could just be your phone distraction, it

could be your email, it could be check I mean, I have moms. What they're

one of their stressors is not overusing Instagram or

overusing, you know, some sort of social media.

It's a mom's messages, the text group

chains. And Oh, that's awesome. Can

we just agree on that? Useful and a wonderful place to gather. But, yeah,

that's there's so much that's happening in a group The classroom

WhatsApp conversation or if you

get into leadership in a school and all of a sudden you're in,

like, the PFA or PTA or whatever the mom's, you know,

volunteer organization. And then there's a lot of discussion

about, like, what kind of pumpkin muffins you should bring to the

thing, and if they should be store bought or not, and,

like, if they should be organic and it is a whole world

unto itself, just that WhatsApp text. And it can be

this happens to the young girls. I'm going ahead of you. But I noticed that

with, like, coaching parents of teenagers that the when the parent

takes the phone away, which is great,

big fan of screen time limits, but it creates a lot

of anxiety that you are not in a

conversation that is happening. Uh-huh. It's like

being in the school yard and seeing a group of 20

girls having a conversation in the corner, and you're picking

up trash from detention, and you don't know what they're doing. And

you're terrified they're talking about you, or they're making plans for the weekend that you're

not gonna be invited in, or they're talking about a boy or a girl or

whatever. And that that's what happens when you're young. And then when you're in the

mom world, dear god, you can't let your kid get out of

the thing or, like, you're really worried about something and you wanna make sure it's

like hypervigilance and are it's so much

of a distraction. I wondered if you could talk a little bit about what you're

seeing in the online space and how you what you do with your

art and your therapy and what you help people with. Well, I think what you're

naming, right, this paradox that we're all experiencing, whether

we're teenagers just learning to use as a social tool, whether we're parents

who have, like, 40 messages in the group chat.

It's hard to put our time online, whether that's social media,

whether that's the text or or whatever it is we're doing on a screen.

It's really hard to put that just into one box. Yeah. You can't just

be like screen time. It's bad or good. It's it's both. And I

think something that's really helpful is to to

recognize that. Right? There's parts of it that can feel really challenging,

really stressful by design. Right? Mhmm. Platforms

that we're using. About by design, please. Right. I

mean, social media platforms, ecommerce websites, news websites.

I mean, basically, everything we interface with on a screen is designed to keep

us engaged as long as possible. Right? That's

where this term persuasive technology comes in. So the fact that

in your Facebook or Instagram feed, you can scroll forever and

ever and ever. Never you never you used to come to the end

of it. Mhmm. But, like, I'm much older than you, and so

I was an adult when I started to use these apps

and, you know, the beginning. And it was, like,

that's the end of your feed. So if you only had maybe 12 friends

or 45 friends and maybe 7 had posted

something, you would read 7 posts, and that would be the

end of your feed. Mhmm. Like, it literally did end where you could get

to, like if I have a homework assignment, I have 20,

number you know, I have 20 problems to do. I can finish and be like,

checkbox. I did it. And I get a little dopamine, and I get

a little bit like, whoop whoop and move on. But I don't

I I can never achieve my Instagram feed. I

can No. Is it? No. Permanent forever. It goes on and on and

on. I have to just decide to stop. Which is which is challenging. Right?

Another thing that it's designed to do is make it hard to stop. Right? There's

no limit to what we could discover or feel inspired by. Like,

I'm thinking of how hard it is to scrop stop scrolling Pinterest, and that's just,

like, craft ideas. Yes. But there's also no limit to what we could miss.

I'm thinking about that as a Pinterest person because of

the art. Isn't it funny how you start to get, like, wonder what

people are really like, what they spend a lot of time on? Yeah. Well, that's

a big one for me. Yeah. Of course. Maybe that's the the scale. Right?

I love the fact that there's a social media

platform like Pinterest that can show me endless examples of beautiful

creative ideas. And on the other side, there's

another app or another platform that can show me all the parties

I wasn't invited to, all the ideas someone had that were better

articulated than mine. Right? The the FOMO is

never ending, and then the possibility for discovering something

new or people like us or being inspired and

connected also feels limitless. So I think something that's really important,

at least in the way I I like to talk about this conversation, is let's

validate both that your time online is harmful and

it's also deeply meaningful. Yeah. So how do we hold that paradox?

Right? I think I think the pandemic really

changed something for many of us where we started using the

Internet in in a different way, whether our jobs went online or

whether that was just the easiest way to connect with other people or stay

tethered in our relationships. I know that's kind of when in my life,

it stopped feeling like the Internet was kind of optional. Mhmm. But I

think in this era where our lives are so entangled

with these tools, it's more useful to find a way to

collaborate with them, to hold the messiness of the fact

that it's it's not one thing or another. And that's where I think

art is a really useful tool. Right? What helps us hold opposites?

Sometimes it's visual, right? What helps us grapple with

2 things being true at once? How do we

reckon with the fact that we're using a tool that we don't have much control

over, right? Art is this thing that gives us the ability to

practice agency. Like, we can take materials and do what

we want to them. There might not be a lot of other places in our

lives, especially if we're parenting, where we get to control

things, but art can be that. Mhmm. Mhmm. Or you

at least you think I'm gonna draw a sun, and then you're like, well,

it didn't come out like a sun. So you think it's good. Control.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It can be realized, you know? Oh, wow. How do I accept

the fact that I thought it was gonna look like this and it's not? And

that's a huge part of parenting, actually. It's like, I just spent time with

my one of my best friends and we did not we were gonna have babies

together, and we had this big vision of what it was gonna look like. And

it was like, we were gonna look gorgeous walking down a boardwalk.

The baby's in front of us, perfectly coiffed hair and nails, and

just look amazing. Like, that was as far as we got in terms

of parenting, and we just did the same walk with and

our kids are grown, and we're just laughing at ourselves, like, what we thought it

was gonna be and, like, what it really was. And I think that happens in

art. How do you reconcile that? That happens with 7 year old perfectionists, right, who

get an art assignment from school or, you know, some kind of writing prompt, and

then they it's trash and they throw it away. And it's like, what?

How can we kind of, integrate that

dissonance? I thought it was gonna be this way, and it's not. I thought I

was gonna draw the sun and it wasn't like this. I think that is another

avenue that our could really help us accept and,

like, make make beauty out of it anyway. Keep going.

Absolutely. Mhmm. I mean, for adults and kids. Right? If you're

in school or if you have a high pressure

job, there might not be a lot of places in your life where you get

to practice being imperfect without consequences. Yeah. So

what if art could be the refuge from the pressure to to

hustle, to finish things on a deadline, to be

perfect all the time? Maybe your art is the place where there's no

pressure to get better or even show it to

anybody. So I think that's, I think, a way of rewriting the

stories of perfectionism with ourselves is allowing

perhaps creativity to be this outlet where it can be different. Right?

We can do something differently than we get to do in the other areas of

our lives. Yeah. That's so great. So you just so we have

this online world. We're reconciling the fact that some of it's great, some of it's

not great. What are some of the downsides of having

a lot, like, a lot of our foot in the online world

and maybe less of a foot in our regular

analog, like, visual, you know, actual human

experience. You know, what what's that tension and, like,

what's the drawbacks of it in your opinion? I

mean, I think a lot of us know them intuitively. Right? If we've spent the

last 10 or 20 years online. But I mean, the

ones that really come up for me and thinking about the context of

parenting too is, I mean, our attention is

fractured when when we're picking up a screen that is distracting us in

10 different ways at once. We're being fed information

that is designed to be as captivating as possible and usually that

means activating, right? So content that

is inflammatory, divisive, negative, scary

is usually pushed out more readily than something positive and hopeful.

Right. Right. And another piece, I think, is the

comparison, right? How many women have you talked to

who were perhaps one of the 15% of us who will end

up experiencing postpartum depression go through

their Instagram seeing momfluencers who are back to their, you

know, pre pregnancy weight. Pre mom, I bought and yeah. Like,

just, you know, they're doing they're showing what my friend and I made up in

our heads because there was no Internet no social media then. We made it up

in our heads that we were gonna be so gorgeous walking our babies

in our stroller and just, like, having it completely together. That was a

fantasy that was ridiculous, but I

didn't get to see it portrayed on the Internet and then

compare myself to it. It

because it it wasn't something that actually existed on the Internet. There

really wasn't. This was before iPhones, which is a hard thing

to imagine. But when I had my kids in 2,004, 2006,

there was no iPhone yet. So we didn't have the Internet in our pocket, and

there wasn't social media till, like, 2008, 2009. So those

for early years in many ways, I only had people in real life to compare

to, which isn't, necessarily healthy, but it

wasn't some sort of photoshopped smokescreen situation

on Instagram or wherever. So, yeah, it's a lot of

pressure to look at that and think

I should be doing it differently or better or some, you

know, can really be devastating. What's wrong with me that

my infant isn't sleeping through the Or Yeah. I should be able to wake

up at 5 and make the organic baby food from a

scratch. And my relationship should be perfect and romantic in this era or

or whatever the Yes. The image of the baby is. The

type of situation is, like, I just want a good night's sleep.

Is that what all of it is? Can I just get to sleep to 7,

please? Yeah. And that's, like, your only goal in life.

So that's yeah. Your bare minimum is so low

when you have young children that then you look around and you're like,

wow. I'm real I'm barely surviving, and

yet this is the ideal. And it's just not true, but

it sells. Exactly. Right. It's

it can be so damaging when especially if we're isolated, I

think, in early parenthood. And all the examples of what

being a mother or a parent look like are

curated. You know? Maybe there's a production team behind the scenes. Maybe there's a full

time nanny and a full time cleaner. Mhmm. Right? Maybe there's an editor

or or whatever else is going on. Yeah. But to good parents,

filters. Yeah. Mics. All of that. All of it. Uh-huh. And,

I mean, I also wanna give credit to the other side. I think

there's also the potential for incredible universality and,

like, reduction in stigma. I think there's so many more conversations that are

really easily accessible for people about mental

health through parenthood and the

challenges that people experience when they're going through that life

transition and calling out some of the

toxic cultural pieces that we're starting to to undo

the programming of. So I think on one hand, there's

the potential for for connecting and having a different kind of

conversation that's really real, and then there's also the curated side. So

again, it's it's holding the paradox, but back to, you know, what

the risk of of these platforms

is. Is it messes with our attention? It sets an unrealistic

standard. It might give us this sense that the world is

more divided and scary and dangerous than than it

actually is. You know, it can take away your sense of privacy.

There's just there's so many places that social

media can have an adverse effect on our social media. Slash

news slash, you know, messaging apps.

Like, it can kind of go on and on because I can get maybe

I am like, I'm not gonna go on the for millennials

and gen x, Instagram and Facebook and

Twitter. Right? But then the younger generations, it's definitely Snapchat,

Discord, like, different they have different ways to communicate. So it's

not necessarily the the the social media, but I could decide I'm not gonna

do those things. But I may still find myself

deep scroll in a Instagram I mean,

a a web search, Google search type of thing. You know? And now

I'm, like, trying to find solve a problem in my life, and I'm just, you

know, reading article after article or snip snippets of an article snippet.

It's like it it can be this thing that we go to to

get our emotional needs met,

whether it's through the platforms or

just even checking your email or, like, false productivity where you

think you're kinda doing something, but you're really not. You're

just trying to manage dopamine, manage cortisol,

you know, trying to get these little hits all the time. And I

was thinking about how, like, all the emotional problems

of the phone are true, but the

attention one is also really important. And I did an

episode on task positive network and default mode network and

talked about how we are not able to

stay in high task for a long period of time

because our brains really haven't practiced.

And so then we go into our phone, we get distracted really easily, a

text comes through or, you know, something, a ding, a

notification of some kind. Now we're back in our phone,

and you're not really creating a lot of productivity, true

productivity in your life. I think as moms,

a lot of the overwhelm with, like, I have got so much going on. I'm

so busy. Like, too. I have to be in 3 pieces at once. True. Sometimes

you do have to be if you have 3 kids and they also have a

victim at 3 o'clock, you literally have to be at 3 places at once.

But I think the overwhelm is often because you're underproductive

when you have child free time or you haven't changed your

trained your children to not need you

new when they're around you. So they don't know how to deal with their

boredom or deeper play or deeper creativity.

You end up not ever finishing stuff.

And that can feel so frustrating. And it's like another

drawback of just having technology. It's like this

influence on us that pulls us away from maybe what we really,

what would serve us the most. I don't know if you see that in your

work, like that feeling of overwhelm may be solved by

slowing down, connecting to ourselves through art, putting our phones

away. And yeah. Kinda speak about that a little bit.

I see that in my work and I see that in myself. Like, it's

significantly harder to regulate myself or

to make what might be the most effective choice when I'm feeling

overwhelmed or when I need to focus if I have like the

phone right beside me. Because I think a lot of us have

experienced kind of this injury of attention. Right? We know

the dope being hit or the sense of satisfaction

is quick and easy on the screen,

but regulating ourselves, whether that's in art or being in nature

or just letting or being in flow. Like, I'm gonna make

all these doctor's appointments or I'm gonna sign my kids up for summer camp or,

you know, if I can't sit quietly and get through

that work, make the decisions, think about, okay, in

June, do I wanna drop off at 9? Like,

these are questions you have to ask yourself as a mom. It's, like, random, but

you're in February. You can't you have to slow down and really kind

of do some self inquiry, like, okay. What

time do what is best for the doctor's appointments? It's okay. Fridays, that's

good. And then you're in you're thinking really clearly, and then you're in that, like,

oh, got that, settled that, signed up for that. And then when

you're done, you're like, oh, okay. I did so much of the stuff, and you

can be present with the next set of tasks,

your children or homemaking or your own career or whatever it is.

I just think we're so not accustomed to spending time

getting something done all at once. It's so fragmented

and that interruption. And I I I wanted you to

come on here because I I I would imagine

and I joined your program because I'm really curious about what this might look like

for me. But dedicating kind of an hour of my life

to open our creativity expression, being in a

community that's doing the same thing, I'm so interested in

what that will be like instead of I'm very productive. I can

focus really easily, and not everyone can.

But what does it look like for free flow? Because when you're

in that default mode, free flow creativity, it can

dip to problems like negative thinking.

And I might be soothing my negative thinking through

tasks. But what if I sit without a phone, without

tasks? I'm so curious to see what would happen. In nature, I can do

it. I'm very, like, creative and thinking of,

like, cool things that are happening in my life. I'm not, like, hiking going,

my life sucks and my husband's a dick. And I'm not usually thinking

negative thoughts in nature. But, yeah, I wonder what you

see when someone dedicates time to that

art experience or their art therapy experience. What happens? I

think it's a similar headspace. And you mentioned, like, the default mode network

before. And if anyone's just learning about this concept,

it's where our brains go when we're not actively involved in

a specific task. Right? It's the daydreaming or

the letting our minds wander, which is what happens, say,

if you're on a hike alone or perhaps

making art, but choosing not to listen to a podcast at the same time and

try to multitask. Right? And in that space, I think something

really profound can happen. Right? Other ideas

or reflections can start to get integrated. Right? I

love, for example, if I have a therapy session for myself Mhmm.

Taking some time just to make art afterwards instead of trying to

quickly jot down the notes about what happened or make sense of it. If I

give myself even 20 minutes just to make something without

a plan, my brain's gonna naturally start to make sense of

it and reorganize whatever just happened. And I think that

ability to give ourselves space to make sense of our

lives and let that happen at an organic pace and allow

those insights, those reflections, that meaning to arrive without

it being forced, that's something we lose when

at every possible turn, we pick up the phone to avoid

ourselves or to avoid boredom. We lose that,

that mind wandering, that daydreaming. So

having that time protected for our I know for me is where

I do a lot of the integrating and processing of all the other stuff that's

happening in life at any given moment. Yeah. Yeah. It

really can be like the value of walking, like

people who I walk a lot of walking practice. And

I also have an exercise practice, which I find that when I'm in high

cardio exercise for me, I don't think. Mhmm. It's

like, I once asked myself, like, when are you not thinking? And I

noticed it was like high exercise, sex, swinging my

kid on the swing, and throwing the ball to the dog. And it

was, like, these periods of time where I was, like,

in my body, in a rhythm, in, like, kind of

consumed physically and not I

was, like, kind of, like, not absencing myself, but just sort of free from my

head. It was, like, kind of in my body. Just then noticing, like, oh,

that happens when I'm in nature. That happens, you know, when I'm in a

real deep fiction book. Like, I'm just kind of in that, you know, I

don't I'm there. I'm like, oh, all of a sudden, I'm you know,

I have a string. It's measuring the length of my life. Like, I'm whatever book

I'm reading, I'm, like, super in it. I think

that art is a space that I was under undervalued

in that is an available place where we can just

not be in our head. Flow, I think, is the opposite

of scrolling. And that doesn't need to be

making a giant abstract painting. It doesn't need to be drawing something. I

think sometimes my favorite way to get into that headspace is to

do a kind of creative practice where the decisions are already made for me.

Like, love a paint by numbers, love a coloring book,

love crocheting, maybe without a pattern or without a plan, something that's

rhythmic and repetitive, tactile, right, where you're

not analyzing or choosing or needing to be the problem

solver for a moment, but you're just engaged in the same way. You

might be out for a walk or running or Yeah. In

any of those other, like, physical flow states. Yeah. That's

so beautiful because it yeah. Paint by number. I mean, it's true. It's like

we don't need to think that's silly pants or whatever. It's like, no. You just

kind of make a decision. You're just rhythmically filling in all the

twos with red. And it just like, that's

your big task, and then all of a sudden, you're like, woah. Look. All the

reds are done. I don't see any twos. Oh, okay. Like and then A pamperdome.

Right? Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. It's so satisfying. And,

it's not yeah. For no re it's for no reason, which is great. I just

think yeah. I liked also, you talked about

that you help people become the author of your own definition of wellness.

I would love for you to talk about that because I think that's really the

phrasing was so beautiful to me, the author of your own

definition of wellness. And I'm defining what I

have found is wellness for me, but I love that you're

like, nope. Everybody's gotta figure that out or you can. You're you it's available

to you to define that. So say what that is to

you. I think something really important to me in writing

something that lives in the self help genre was making sure

that I wasn't making assumptions about anybody's experience. Right?

Like, I don't believe in the realm of healing, in the realm of

wellness that there are any one size fits all solutions.

It can be really tempting to, you know, buy the book with a 10 step

plan and Yeah. To get through it or maybe even do the 10 steps for

a period of time, but then to feel like a total failure if you can't

do it in this prescribed way or you can't maintain

the inertia of somebody else's idea of what will make us

well. Yeah. And I think what is way more useful

than finding the right set of habits,

refining our ability to be disciplined, or getting it right

per se by someone's someone else's definition of wellness

to really look inward and figure out, like, what does it mean for me

to feel well? Maybe that is really different

than it was 5 years ago. Maybe it's different from my spouse.

Maybe it's different from, you know, the advice that

I'm seeing on social media all the time. Right. Well, and you hear that, like,

people are like, this is how you know, I mean, I'm a big

advice giver. I have a podcast that I mostly talk about

my ideas. When we sit quietly and we talk to

women about the way they interpret

that advice, it's like, I don't know the capacity for

that. I can't what does it mean to me to be how will I know

if I'm well? And how do I wanna get there?

I I like that. How will I know if I'm well? Yeah. What are the

what are the standards? Like, I get to define that too. And maybe

it's different from what I've been aiming for my entire life. I think that's

Oh, I'll know I'm well if I have a clean house and well behaved kids

and I am a size blankety blank and Yes. I don't

know. Wear just the right amount of makeup or something. You know? It's like,

that's my, that's the worst definition of wellness, all those things.

What do I know? And I I think it could be a conversation around values.

Like, am I content? Am I calm? Am I satisfied?

Am I curious? You know, do you have clarity when it's time

to make a decision? If those are the gaps, then

that is good clue to me that I have some work to do.

But I think if we just define not so much a part a process,

but what are the things that we're working towards in

our lives that would create more wellness?

Yeah. And if we don't author those

definitions for ourselves, then the default is gonna be whatever

performs well in an algorithm. And because, you know, the

wellness sphere exists online. Right? Social media

is photos and videos. It's really defined by what can be

shown, performed, seen, less what can

be felt or experienced. Right? There's a reason

when I search hashtag wellness on social media, I get

green smoothies, exercise routines,

things like Supplements. Supplements. Yeah. Right? Things that can

be sold, performed, shown. Yeah. Whereas

actually, and maybe I'll use the example. My favorite or one of my favorite activities

in the book is looking at, like, your metrics of success.

Right? Mhmm. Like, for many of us, it's things that can be counted, like

the number on the scale, the number in the bank account, the number of followers.

But what else can you count that points towards the things that

you really value? How many,

books have you read with your kids this week? How many

lines of a poem are in your notes app? How many coffee mugs are beside

your reading chair? Like, how do we want to measure well-being

that points back to what actually feels good in our bodies, in our relationships,

not just what social media or the culture tells

us. Right? Yeah. I decided to listen to 10 minutes of Bach a

day. I heard somebody suggest it,

like a celebrity of some kind, and I was like, I don't know. I'm a

try that. And it became really delightful and interesting, and then I would

end up listening to more. But then there'd be days where, like, oh, I forgot

to listen to my book today. And then I'm like, oh, get back to that

tomorrow. Then I was like it was like a month of that. And

I thought, should I listen to Mozart? Should I do 1 month of Mozart now?

Like, I was just kind of this my own little weird world thing that

I was doing just to see for myself. Yeah. I was like And so

your own definition also included the rhythm that felt right.

You know? It didn't have to be every day. I'm checking off the box or

giving myself a star in the chart. Mhmm. But also being

gentle around like, oh, I didn't do it today. Yeah. I was thinking about my

value. Yeah. I I forgot. I forgot. Wait. I was gonna do that. Oh, yeah.

Let's do that again. Let's see. And, like, maybe I do it for a little

while. I'm like, well, I was dumb. Didn't meant nothing to me. So then that's

not a thing for me. I'm not sure yet because that's been a long enough

time. Yes. I love that. Like, finding your own little things. I

decided this year that I wanna hike every Sunday morning.

Almost like a like a spiritual practice of some sort.

And then I was gonna see my friend, and I said, you know, would

you be willing to do a hike when we see each other? And, oh, I

love that. I was like, okay. Great. Because I wanted to, like, make sure I

kinda bring that in. So yeah.

Yeah. Can I make that be did I do it? Did I say what I

was gonna do? And yeah. I don't know. So it's interesting. It's not

about, did I sell 17 spots in my group program

or whatever? I don't those things end up not feeling,

satisfying. And Mhmm. Yeah. But especially how

many how many minutes did I spend on Instagram? No one's gonna gauge

that and be like, oh, I was so successful. I did 3 and a half

hours of screen time. It's like, you know, defining it

in ways that are a little bit more unique or interesting to us

or yeah. I think you're hitting up something really important.

The the flexibility that comes along with it. I think when it comes to

authoring our own definitions of wellness, it's also

allowing ourselves the grace that that will change and evolve. Maybe

this week, it's listening to Bach. Maybe next month, it's

hiking, allowing it to evolve as we evolve and

learn about what what suits our nervous

systems, our families, our needs, and also

allowing that to change as often as it needs to. It's not a sign of

failure if we can't keep the, you know, habit of waking

up at 4 in the morning going for years years at a time. I think

when our habits change or when our wellness practices change,

that can also be an indication that we're paying attention to

what is useful. Like, oh, something is different in this era of my

life, and I'm attuned enough to myself that I had the

flexibility to change with it. That's not a failure. That's me evolving

and keeping up with myself. And not comparing. Right? I was just thinking, like, I

have this friend who loves, Pilates, and I tried a little

bit. I just don't. I just don't. I just don't. I don't I like

yoga ish. Like, super good. I'm

sure I've done a tons and tons of times. I've never created a really

regular practice about it. It might not be my

thing. Like, I'm happy to do it, but it's not maybe my thing.

And that doesn't mean, oh, well, you don't drink green

smoothies and do yoga and, I don't know, meditate, even

meditate. That's the thing you gotta do. Meditation is just

awareness of thinking. That's it. Catching yourself when you've got

a runaway train of of thoughts and bringing them

back. That's it. That's all it is. So if that happens in art, great. That

happens in walking, great. That happens in cooking, excellent.

Amazing. Yeah. It's like we can find

that ourselves. I love that that becoming the

author of our own definition of wellness. It's so beautiful.

And it reminds me a little bit, like what you just said,

I and speaking of all the pressure we experienced, before

my wedding, you know, when everyone's experiencing the the pressure leading up to

that day and what that's supposed to be. I signed up for these boot camp

boot camp workout classes. I was doing it in the morning. You're

yet super fit. The the classic story. I thought

I would be a chill bride. I was not, but my sister-in-law asked

me about these boot camp classes. Like, oh, do you like it?

And I kind of was stopped in my tracks. Like, oh my god. I don't

like them. I didn't even think to check it if I liked it. It was

just the class that was available within walking

distance from my house. Oh my gosh. Yeah. I don't have to do something I

don't like. I don't yes. It's so good. Wonderful. Beautiful.

Yeah. I just am in empty nest now.

My youngest went to college. So this is like I'm in this very sweet little

transition time. And I just keep asking myself,

what do you wanna do? What do you wanna do?

What a beautiful question. Mhmm. It's been

really interesting because when you're a mom, a lot of times

for many years, you're thinking, what do they want to

do? What do they need me to do?

What would make them happy and not even, like, in a weird codependent,

gross, dysfunctional, toxic way? I think as a

parent, you kinda just get very focused on tending to

the needs of other people, like, kinda part of the job

in some way. You get a human who can't take care of themselves. You take

care of them. Eventually, they can take care of themselves, and they leave. That's the

whole thing. So you're taking care of them,

and then you can easily lose sight of,

who you are in the process. You know? I think the art

could be very good for people who are in that you everyone's

listening. Like, I don't have time for this shit. That you you do because

you don't wanna get to the end of the line and be like, who am

I? What do I like? What's what? Like, I've been asking these

questions all along, being very curious and interested. This is where I just really

don't have to think about anyone else's needs. And and my I'm

married still. And he's like, wait. What's happening? I'm like, I'm I'm

done caregiving in general. So

sorry, mister. But it is really been

cool, like, that question. Like, do I like this type of exercise? Do I

like this type of you know, some of my friends are like, I don't like

hiking. I'm like, really? How could you possibly not? And they're like, I don't know.

It's nothing about I don't like it. Dirt, sweat,

whatever. They wanna do something else, and

that's fine. We all get to decide, and we need

to allow ourselves space to explore.

It's such a beautiful invitation to explore with art, with

nature, with journaling, with inquiry in any other way, you

know, with music. I don't know what else. Cooking,

homemaking, that talk a lot about creating little

moments of delight around your house. You know,

just like little things, not to be consumeristic and like go buy a bunch

of shit at TJ Maxx. Not really that. It's like, if you

see a flower in your yard and you clip it and then you find, like,

I don't know, whatever cup and you put it in there,

you then you you did that. And then it's like you walk by it. You're

like, oh, that's my flower. It made me so happy. We can create all these

beautiful little moments, moments of delight in our life. You know,

how do you sit quietly in the sun with a cup of tea

and just be and slowing down and doing

art and participating in your programs is such a

beautiful way to, you know, create that those little

moments and access that even greatly. So tell

us about your book a little bit because it's really not just you

read it. It's like it's a workbook or work art. I don't

know. You describe it. Yeah. It it was important to me that it'd be interactive

in the same way we're talking about authoring your own definition of wellness.

Mhmm. It would be one thing for me to tell some stories, offer some

research, give some advice, but it's so much more profound when

that is integrated with people's own journaling and

reflection with their own art so that they get

to learn something about themselves that came from them, not me making any

assumption about what's true for them. So the Art of

Thriving Online, this workbook is about

using creativity to kind of reckon with your

relationship with your time online, with social

media. So looking at how it impacts

your attention, how you feel about productivity, privacy.

There's pieces on comparison and

fear, anger, disinformation, those emotions and

then it ends with conversations about place, right, being in

nature, being embodied, and belonging ultimately.

And so in each of the chapters, there's research, writing,

kind of some of my own personal stories, and lots of art and writing prompts

designed to help you get a sense of what feels

true and correct and needed for you. And then the book ends

with taking those reflections into

one kind of final personal statement, which I like to call a gentle

manifesto. Right? Because it's gentle. Right? It can be

disciplined or it can be free flowing. It can change.

But the idea really is to gather

together all of these reflections and expressions that you've had about this conversation, about social

media, and your well-being, and come to, digital

detox, here

here's a digital detox, here's a new plan, here's how you have to do it

or change. Oh, so beautiful. So

where can people get that? Is it on, like, regular Amazon type of

stuff or do you have to do their website? What's the story? Yep. You can

find it, wherever you like to buy books, the big

websites. You can find it or request it from your local bookstore or

library. It's also available in ebook, and I narrate the audiobook as

well. So if you're a person who likes to

process information in terms of audio, then that's an

option also available to you. Oh, that's fun. Okay. Good. So it's the art of

thriving online by Amelia Knott. So look that up. And then

tell us a little bit about your group program because I just joined it,

and I'm find I'm on I'm just really curious about it. So I

wondered if you wanted to talk about that at all. Yeah. I was so excited

to see your name in the registration, but, Angie Hassle Art Studio

is a program that I mean, truthfully, I started because I needed

the accountability of having something on the calendar

every week. But the idea with that group is there are drop in

sessions twice a week on Zoom. There's a theme.

So for example, this week's theme was befriending boredom, very

apt for our conversation. And there are art prompts, and you can

take them or leave them. It's an hour where you can explore the

topic that's been offered in art. No special

materials or skills required, or you could just use the space to work

on something you've been meaning to work on. Maybe it's journaling

or working on your Christmas gifts or whatever it is. But I

think for so many of us, just having the time carved out

and knowing that other people are showing up, like, that gentle accountability

is, for me at least, what helps me stay in my

creative practices. So gentle in the sense that you don't have to follow the

prompts, you don't have to have your camera on, you don't have to show your

art or connect with anybody. But the space is there

just to have a consistent practice of hanging out with yourself

through something creative. Yeah. I love it. It's so beautiful.

Yeah. Well, thank you. Every Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning. Okay. Yeah.

Yeah. I'm gonna do the Tuesday. I'm doing the Tuesday evenings. Anybody wanna join us?

Mhmm. The Anti Hustle Art Studio. Okay. That's

it. Yeah. It's it's not very expensive. It's, like, $25 a

month or something like that. Yeah. So it's like my program. It's $30 a month.

So we are trying to make these things affordable, ladies, so that

everyone can get access to them. Yeah. I'll also say just one more

thing about, Antigas Art Studio as well. If you ever can't attend,

some people wanna do the prompts on their own time. So you'll get email every

week with some reflection prompt, some art prompt. So come and

go as you please. But, anyway, if that's just Yeah. That's good. Yeah. Because maybe

about it. You can't. And and also get the workbook if you're not interested in

doing a group, just kinda, like, diving into some of these this work. I think

it's it's just another avenue to explore

ourselves, and I think anytime we can build in, it's

like when we have a habit of being

on our phone, being online, watching TV,

you know, binge watching or whatever it is or reading or whatever we

do. And then we want to change that.

You really do need to replace it. Like, the

urge is there, and then we train ourselves to do something different.

And when you have a program like the you know, or a

workbook or the, you know, anti hustle art studio,

that you're really teaching yourself what to do instead

in integrating those new practices. Like, oh,

I wanna do oh, oh, yeah. I'm not doing that anymore or not doing that

as much. So what else am I supposed to do here? And it's so it

needs to be gentle because otherwise, your brain will give up. We

do need it's sad that we need people out in the world

saying, do this instead. You know? But it's true. We

we're so reliant on the phone and online worlds

that we've kind of forgotten the other ways that

humans can explore themselves. And Yeah. In community. We

need other people. I think that's so often the the answer

to what happens when we're feeling disconnected or disjointed or not at home

in ourselves. Sometimes it's a a new habit or a hack, but

oftentimes it's like, where are my people? Where can I

be either in conversation, in connection, or just like

sharing space with people? That's what I find so useful about

that group specifically. Or Yeah. Well and the I was thinking, like,

for the holiday season, if people purchased your book and they got a couple

copies and they give it to a couple of friends or their family members and,

like, let you guys wanna do this and talk about it and kind of

create conversation and dialogue in your own community with the

that? It's kinda perfect right now in the season. So

good. Yeah. And you will find a book club guide in the back of the

book as well. There is Oh, goodness. The set by 7 options for how to

guide. It's How to get together, the art projects you could do as a collective.

Oh my goodness. To do alone, but there's also lots of stuff you can do

together. Oh, that's even getting better. So to highly

recommend. Wonderful. Well, thanks, Amelia. How can people find

you, follow you besides purchasing and joining your club? But, like, if they just

wanna check you out online, what

should they do? Come find me on social media. Given this whole conversation about

showing up online, I spend a lot of time on Instagram and TikTok.

My handle is at arttherapyirl

or irl for in real life, and my website is arttherapyinreallife.com.

Arttherapyinreallife. I love it. Okay. Well, thank you so much.

Thank you.