Exploring Art Therapy in the Community

Good morning, dear readers,

Today, Thursday, I write to you from my new corner, a cliff that feels like a branch of the sky. From here, I reach out to the divine and the created, to the source and its reflection, in this place where Gaia adorns the ground with flowers. The day wears a soft blue cloak, and the wind, strong yet warm, makes the trees sway from side to side, composing a parade of glorious harmony.

Today, a revolutionary feeling dressed itself in words, eager to sing to the four winds what had been quietly taking shape for so long. Something that had been slowly cooking while I left behind the deep exhaustion of recent years: a hurricane of projects, a train of personal changes, and a volcano of ideas that are finally beginning to find their course.

Recently, I embarked on a diploma in Art Therapy, which is showing me new tools for artistic expression and therapeutic support, opening a safe and sensitive space for the collective.

Expressive arts are a meeting point between sensitivity, consciousness, and art. Through various practices, they build a bridge between the unconscious, the body, and reality. They become a channel to express what lives in the deepest parts of ourselves, that symbolic and primal language we all carry inside.

Humans have always felt the need to express their experience, existence, and connection with nature. In this impulse, the abstract becomes tangible, weaving bridges with others. To express is to translate inner life into something visible; it is to give form to the invisible.

Now, I have the opportunity to work with the collective, sharing tools that allow us to look inward, shape our experiences, and transform how we perceive them. To step away from the noise of daily life and the inner dialogue that disconnects us from the present.

Words regain their meaning, not from doing, but from being. We speak the language of the body, of feeling, connecting with the matrix, intuition, and our raw nature. Because when experience changes, life changes. And with it, a new, creative, and genuine process begins.

We embark on a journey guided by ritual. The ritual marks the beginning of this exploration: recognizing our roots, who we are, to open ourselves to new possibilities.

From there, play emerges. In play, the abstract takes shape, the ephemeral becomes tangible, and art becomes a door open to the soul.

Imagination is a fundamental tool: the master key for creation and expression. It gathers the impulse to communicate what does not yet exist and to transform what already exists. It is a direct bridge between what we feel, what we think, and what we can create.

It is a space where the abstract begins to take form, where chaos and harmony, observing and listening, blend, and everything we inhabit inside becomes visible. From there arise forms, gestures, words, movements; all that we call art is just a way to let this inner world express itself, pure and true.

My intention is to create a cycle of encounters where we can explore these tools and open processes of liberation, awareness, acceptance, and expression. Spaces where the ordinary pauses for a moment, where opposites embrace, and time feels suspended. Liminal places where light and shadow, past and present, inner and outer meet in a dance of balance.

Strengthening aesthetic responsibility within this artistic process, I invite participants to approach their work with dedication, love, attention, and devotion. It is about connecting deeply with what is created, softening the gaze and the feeling.

This space allows us to approach the ugly, the painful, and the incomprehensible, but to do so from the transformative power of beauty, recognizing in it a force that connects and sustains us.

There is a phrase that deeply resonates with this process:

“Unlived life is not worth living.”

James Hillman speaks of the need for a “Southern” psychology, in contrast with the “Northern” tradition of seriousness and singular purpose. A Southern psychology would embrace the joy of life’s diversity. Hillman even proposes replacing the Cartesian
“I think, therefore I am”
with a new motto:
“I coexist, therefore I am — I celebrate, therefore I am.”

(Hillman & Ventura, 1992. Transdisciplinary Art Therapy Center)

And perhaps that’s what it’s about: returning to celebration.
To see life and move through it from a place of joy, innocence, and openness.
I am not alone in the world; on the contrary, I find myself in the world with others, creating, sharing, and sharing ourselves.

From this place, this new path emerges, intending to open portals of presence, listening, and tenderness, accompanying processes that bring us back to the body, to play, and to wonder.

Next Thursday, I will have the honor of initiating the first encounter on São Miguel Island, where we will begin weaving the first threads of this shared path of care and creation..

Wish me luck!

Besos