Advantages of art therapy

Each form of therapy has its specific advantages, including art therapy, which has three main objectives in the case of psychosomatic illnesses:

• Awareness,
• Discussion and
• Finding solutions

for the disorder or problem underlying the disease.

Unlike in talk therapy, the discussion here initially takes place on a non-verbal, symbolic level. Art therapy is therefore of particular advantage for people who do not yet have access to internal conflicts or who find it more difficult than others to discuss them verbally. Art therapy makes it possible to perceive and communicate complex problems without them having already been conceptually analyzed.

Participants express their feelings and thoughts symbolically in pictures, drawings or when dealing with visual material. The creative process alone stimulates a positive mood in many people. In addition, there is the experience of creating something creative that expresses you as a person, without any pressure to perform and without an evaluation. Because the real “achievement” in art therapy does not consist in fulfilling the value standards of others, but in being able to act in full contact with oneself in order to achieve inner harmony.

Effect of art therapy: perceiving and allowing changes

One of the characteristics of art is that it shows you reality from a new perspective. Art and art therapy combined can give you access to the unconscious. This includes hidden conflicts, traumas, and inner conflicts as well as healing paths and new perspectives.

In art therapy, you use the symbolic expression that is characteristic of the language of the unconscious to make contact with problems that represent a cause or trigger of your illness. In addition, you will train your sensory perception by dealing with colors and shapes, materials and instruments.