Art and Meditation
Art and Meditation have a very healthy relationship. One can create art as a meditation when they are uncle to meditate and they can meditate while creating art. Confused? Let me explain. The conscious mind processes in two ways: Attention and Awareness. When you combine the two, you achieve mindfulness. When one balances the two your mind becomes stronger, more stable, and consequently more relaxed.
“Art is a guarantee to sanity,”
said Louise Bourgeois, a French-American artist who died in 2010 at the age of 98.
Mindful drawing uses pen, colours, paper, your breath, and a series of muscles in your body to achieve that state. Mindfulness is the practice of focusing on the present moment while calmly observing your thoughts and feelings. It can help to reduce stress, increase self-awareness, and deepen empathy with others. Just like mindfulness, art invites you to dive into the present moment, unplug from your daily concerns, and focus. Engaging mindfully with art can help one experience and appreciate art more fully. It might also help you attain some of the broader benefits of mindfulness.
Here are some steps to make looking at art, a meditative experience:
Step 1: Let the distractions fall away
You will never be able to experience the art in front of you or have a meditative experience if you are constantly distracted. Disconnect, disengage and let go. Try to focus on the artwork in front of you.
Step 2: Observe your reaction to the artwork
Once you have your attention fixed to the art in front of you, stay mindful about your reaction to the artwork. Observe how the artwork makes you feel. Is it making you feel happy, or sad, angry or anxious? Look at the art to learn from it.
Step 3: Take in the details
When you have all your attention focused on the artwork and your reactions to the art in front of you, start digging deeper. Take in the details. What forms do you see there? Do you notice different kinds of brush strokes? How many shades can you count within one colour? What is the painting trying to communicate?
Step 4: Repeat with another artwork—and take your time
Congratulations! You have practiced mindfulness while looking at an artwork even without being an artist. If you are exploring an art exhibition, repeat the above process with another artwork. Remember to take your time with this unique experience. The key is to let yourself feel.
What is the “flow” and how do you experience it?
When you are practicing meditation through a continuous and focused process of creating artworks, a variety of ailments, including depression, trauma and illness, can have a healing effect. This is effective across gender, age, or ethnicity. Art when practiced with a meditative mindset can help with pain, fatigue and anxiety and also enhance life expectancy.
Art helps us become centered and steady, just like meditation.
Scientifically, we have often experienced that happiness may be less a matter of feeling sharp highs (often followed by deep lows), and more a matter of nurturing a space that provides stability and a constant connection to our true selves.
Whether you choose to set boundaries for yourself with Mandala art, or do free flow paintings or just look at art, you know you are in safe hands. Let yourself flow with the artistic flow!