no apologies

My therapist made me do it. I had fought, bitterly, against it. Every fibre of my being screamed at me that she was wrong. How dare she treat me like a child? I did not start painting because it was a hobby, or a joy, or even a distraction. I began drawing because I had to, because she forced me to, and, literally, it saved my life.

I had to have a break from work when my mental health issues began to cause difficulty. I was assigned professionals who passed me around while they decided if I warranted intervention or assistance, sicknotes, medication, or just more fresh air. My mood was reaching its lowest point in many years, and I believed I would die.

That is really the best way to describe how I felt: I believed I would die. It was the pure and utter conviction that my life would surely end. Possibly, by my own hand… probably. It was an undeniable truth to me at that time: the only way was out. There was nothing more than this wall of darkness, staring down at me with a leering, supercilious mockery. Nowhere to go. Nowhere left to run.

It was not so simple as draw, and your life will be saved. Creative expression was not something that came easily to me, after a lifetime of believing I had no artistic ability. It felt awkward and false; truly visible evidence of the imposter within me showing their unacceptable face. It was like shyness, but with the raw vulnerability of nakedness; I had no way of doing this any differently. I had no method, only madness.

It was the death of perfectionism. With no skill, my ‘failure’ was inevitable. While that sounds terribly melodramatic, it removed all fear of consequence. It felt like the creation of freedom, the simple willingness not to be good at it. It gave me the room I needed to make something of this piece, this thing which into I must pour my heart, and my hurt.

I had no paper and no paints, and at first, I used these excuses to procrastinate. For many days and weeks, it was easy to pretend these obstacles prevented progress. Her voice haunted me in the moments approaching the deafening quietness of solitude; that soothing, reassuring certainty that perhaps there was a way out of this locked box of nightmarish nothingness. I was always afraid I did not say the right thing in our therapy sessions; terrified I would evade being cured, by a simple sin of omission, or a Freudian slip. Here, on my own, I could no longer have that fear. Whatever ended up on the creator’s page, simply lands there. No rights or wrongs, no competition or comparison.

So, I began, not with watercolours or oils. Not with pencils or with charcoal. Not with canvas or even paper. On the day I began, I had a pack of coloured Sharpies, and a white metal magnet-board. Sharpies and metal, it was. No thought, no plan, no focus. I just let my mind wander with my heart and my hands. Sometimes, it felt angry, sometimes it felt calm. Often, it was confused or uncertain. I just kept going until the space was full. I could not correct myself along the way because every mark was permanent, and that felt difficult at first. Soon, it became what felt alright, and then it started to feel good. I used colour and I used darkness, baby steps and rising confidence. It quickly grew from something I had been prescribed to being something that gave me a new breath of life.

It was my escape, my freedom, my peace. Drawing my strange shapes became the air my lungs had craved; breaking down the walls that had suffocated me for so long. The journeys of solace I began taking in my drawing time gave me respite in the rest of my daily struggles. The colours that grew around me, grew within me. My heart was opened in a way I would never have thought possible.

In these moments, I realise that it is my soul being healed when I feel the glow of creation. It is my innate spirit being committed to the page (or magnet-board), and that is why art is therapy. Not because we are being treated like children, but because we need to rediscover these children within us, who have been lost, or forgotten, or silenced. I draw to reconnect the dots of my being. I draw to be my true self, in a place where she can roam free. It is a mess, and it is dramatic and ridiculous, hot and cold, crazy and calm: it is all of me, brought together at once, and consumed in a single blink of consciousness.

When I draw, I am unashamed, and empowered: I am unapologetically alive.