Intuitive Painting
What exactly is that? Who came up with that?
Well nobody came up with it. It exists since human mankind. Remember those cave drawings? Aren’t they fascinating? Humans have always been driven to be creative. It’s part of who we are.
We are all born creative geniuses. The educational system dumbs us down, according to the results of a test developed by Dr. George Land and Beth Jarman to measure the creative potential of NASA scientists. The test was very successful but the question where creativity comes from remained. They subsequently used the test for school children. They tested 1,600 children between the ages of 4 and 5. The tests looked at the ability to come up with new and innovative ideas to problems.
The results shocked them: 98% fell into the genius category of imagination. Wow! The same kids were tested again five years later and only 30% fell into the same category. At age 15, it was only 12%, and as for adults… How much are we in touch with our creative thinking after years of schooling? Only 2%.
What happened? Years of schooling, that’s what happened. Learning how to pick A, B, or C to pass test. How creative is that? Right … not very much.
It’s safe to say that most of us adults have lost our creative touch. We don’t dance, sing, draw, paint, or sit around the campfire telling stories anymore. We are trained to follow rules and work hard. As an art instructor, I hear often from my adult students that they stopped painting when they were six years old. Around that age we start to judge and compare ourselves to others and when a teacher tells us that the kid sitting next to us made this wonderful painting and all the other classmates think so too, we look at our own painting and come to the conclusion that it’s not good. Not good enough. And that we definitely don’t fall into the category of the anointed ones oozing with talent, so the notion of being creative is abandoned.
It took the joy away. And sheer joy helps us to get into deep play, as Martha Beck calls it. It’s about losing yourself, forgetting about time and being a child again. That’s how we learn. We learn new skills. We learn how to deal with what’s in front of us and afterwards we feel accomplished. We all have seen puppies and kittens play. We love those. How many hits do those YouTube videos get when there is a puppy chasing its tail? So funny and charming.
It’s not all play for that puppy though. Being playful is preparing it for real life, for dangers, how to get food and all those things it needs to know. The same goes for us humans. We come into the world and have to learn all those complicated skills. We play, we are being silly, and we don’t care. People even encourage us with gestures, big smiles and telling us how great we are. Until …. yes until our sixth birthday or thereabout. That’s when we start to compare ourselves to others and start questioning our actions. We stop being silly—most of us, anyway. We stop wondering and if our parents tell us we ask too many questions, we stop that too.
Over the years, we lose our sense of wonder. We lose ourselves and many of us feel down and out. We have lost ourselves. Intuitive Painting will get you back in touch with your playfulness. Deep play is what we are going to do in the Intuitive Painting session.
You will get all the freedom you need to unlock your creativity using a brush, your fingers or a paper towel. Just play and have fun. It cleanses your mind like meditating. The only instruction you get is:
Get in touch with your inner child and ENJOY!!
Come experience intuitive painting with us at the Be Creative retreat at the beautiful Turf Valley Resort on March 3! Register soon – we’re getting very close to the event and we would love to see you there!
Today’s author: Elisabeth Vismans is a Certified Professional Co-Active Coach (CPCC), an Award-Winning Artist, and founder of Quality Within, helping women in transition to find their life purpose. She developed a unique coaching program using the visual language as an extra modality. She is also an Art Instructor and conducts painting and coaching workshops. Learn more about Elisabeth at her website: www.qualitywithin.com, or from her Facebook page.