One of the best coping mechanisms I’ve ever discovered is art. It heals me in ways that are sometimes unexpected and yet always pleasant. It’s like when I draw, I leave the places and surroundings of life and I become immersed in this world where if I can imagine it, it can exist. Maybe it’s a form of escapism? Taking my mind from what can feel dark and gloomy and going to a place where full of colour. It’s amazing really.
I’ve loved drawing ever since I was a kid. Whether it was scribbling on scrap paper or just doodling in the margins of my school work (I had a full on ‘conversation’ through notes and doodles with a teacher in year 10/11 and it was so funny for both of us) or In a purposely brought notepad. It gave me a place where I could just -be- and decompress after a long morning or afternoon. Sometimes I would just sketch random thoughts or cartoons or other days I’d copy logos or reference from books.
I left Weston Road in the last term of year 9, I was broken by that point and probably had some kind of PTSD from the whole thing. It wasn’t until my Mum saw my doodles and sketches, she knew I loved to draw and colour, that I realised that actually, I wasn’t bad at this. I took art as a GCSE and then at AS level, passing both as well, and the more I was doing, the better it made me feel. Since then, art has been such a big thing to me and it’s something that I find helps to calm the negative things and shows me something positive instead.
Obviously writing helps a lot as well as I’m actually giving myself the one thing that during my childhood I never had as such, it gave me a voice and a positive outlet for those horrible thoughts and feelings that I’d been told to believe were my truth. It gave me purpose, beyond being someone to torment and make miserable and it gave me the courage to make the life I want rather than the life I was told I deserved.
I want to spread the idea about the healing aspect of art, writing and music. Don’t keep it all bottled up, trust me it never ends well and I’ve got the scars to prove it, and just do what feels right to you.
Remember, art heals.
Til all are One
Wendy xx
