ColoringColoringCreated By: Created By: Erin KaplanErin Kaplan

Robert McDonnellRobert McDonnell

How Art Heals• Scientific studies tell us that art heals by changing a person's

physiology and attitude • Art and music put a person in a different brain wave pattern, art

and music affect a person's autonomic nervous system, their hormonal balance and their brain neurotransmitters

• Art and music affect every cell in the body instantly to create a healing physiology that changes the immune system and blood flow to all the organs

• Art and Music also immediately change a person's perceptions of their world

• They change attitude, emotional state, and pain perception• They create hope and positively and they help people cope with

difficulties• They transform a person's outlook and way of being in the world • For healing comes to us from within, our own healing resources

are freed to allow our immune system to operate optimally and that is always how we heal

• This is the contemporary version of freeing our healing energies and is now recognized to be crucial to healing

TerminologyInner

DialogueSelf talk

The conversations going on in the mind

Forms our attitudes and perspectives; consciously or

unconsciouslyAffects our bodies; can cause

up liftment or disease

Self Enhancemen

t

An empowered state of feeling great and getting

better/evolving consciously

Moves one further into advantageous , personal

evolution and uplifts our whole life and consequently the lives

of those around us

Mandala An archetypal image that represents wholeness of selfAny design emanating to or

form a center The designs used for

therapeutic coloring in Coloring Therapy

Part of the fabric of life

Coloring Therapy’s Coloring Therapy’s Three StepsThree Steps

Mandala Coloring• It is widely regarded

as a symbol of healing and total well-being

• Mandala represents the journey on the one hand, and the result or destination in the other

• Like ourselves, no two are colored the same

• The Mandala is a symbol of the spiritual source or center inherent in everything

• Mandala coloring is gentle fun while the same time accessing a meditative state that leads to self discovery

Discern the Inner Dialogue

• Inner Dialogue keeps our minds very busy and it can affect the body in the form of stress or upliftment

• Coloring pulls us into a state of mind where we can listen

• Every person in the world carries an ongoing dialogue with themselves, of 150 and 300 words a minute

• Coloring is an environment where we can improve our ability to listen and reprogram our inner dialogue

• Many people find meditation difficult to attain even though the benefits are well documented

• In Coloring Therapy, a state of meditative awareness is easily attained because the focus needed to suspend our inner dialogue occurs in the coloring

• Once you recognize your inner dialogue, you can begin to manage it and influence life in a direction that is decidedly beneficial

Suspend the Inner Dialogue

• In Coloring Therapy, the attention we put into coloring creates suspended inner dialogue

• This is an objective state of awareness where we are able to view and review our thoughts as we have them

• In suspended inner dialogue we are open and receptive to higher knowledge, healing, creativity, and consciousness

• Suspension of the inner dialogue can occur within moments of coloring

• In this place, we are reminded that we are not who we sometimes think ourselves to be

• In paying close attention to our inner dialogue we begin to realize how much of our "identity" comes from external sources such as religion, culture, the media, etc

• Suspending inner dialogue provides access to opportune perspectives from which to heal and self-enhance

Colors • Color affects us all. • We respond to the atmosphere

which a color creates around us. • Color is capable of healing us as

well. • Since ancient times, color and

light have been used by healers. • It is now thought that the reason

we are so strongly affected by color is that the human energy system is very responsive to light.

• Light is made up of the full spectrum of colors - the rainbow.