MessyJessyCreatesArt

So I'm in my second year of Lifebook with Tamara Laporte ( http://www.willowing.org/life-book-2014/  ) and have learned so much from Tam and all of the other artists.  They have helped me grow as an artist and as a person. This week's lesson was from Catt Zelda Geller ( www.streetlightpeople.org ) and MAN am I so excited!  I have been thinking about how to go about the whole Art Therapy Journal and this method was perfect!  I LOVE the way she puts together her smashbooks and makes them so personal. I used two of my pieces of art for the front and back cover.  I glued them to a plain composition notebook and reinforced the spine with some washi tape.  Since the art was printed on my printer at home, I sprayed them with fixative and then, after that dried, went over it with matte medium.  I then glued two of the interior pages together at a time using a glue stick.  One thing I love is texture.  Catt showed us how to crumple up the glued pa...

There is no doubt that art can be very therapeutic.  In fact, it helped me get through so many dark times in my life these past few years. The following are things I discovered about myself yesterday during my therapy session.  I had forgotten just how much these things impact me and are the root of my daily issues. I don't do well with change. I am still a perfectionist. I still have obsessive-compulsive disorder. I have major issues with uncertainty and the unknown. My memory REALLY sucks. All of these things cause great amounts of anxiety. I have little control over these things (OCD?) and I am going to figure out a way to take back control of my brain. One issue I have for dealing with these things is that I have really bad memory problems.  I have fibromyalgia and sleep disorder, both of which come with major memory issues.  I have been working on my anxiety issues for years but, with memory issues, it is like the slate is wiped clean every so ofte...