“I am not afraid of storms for I am learning how to sail my ship.” — Amy March, from Little Women
The week before last felt a bit stormy. My sleep was off and everything felt more stressful. I like to turn to nature for a sense of perspective and solace when I feel like that. So I took a trip to Island View beach. I walked, threw rocks into the ocean and took pictures. Generally I just let the sound of the waves and of the wind take away some of the negativity I was carrying.
I recently came across a book, Poetry That Heals, written by a woman who lives on Gabriola Island who writes Haiku poetry. She talks about writing Haiku poetry without judging or labeling an experience while still conveying deeper meaning and feelings. So here is my attempt at writing a Haiku written about my stormy week:
Dark clouds, rough water
Eyes on a bright horizon
I throw weighty stones
Speaking in metaphor, opens up a new language. Instead of saying, it was a challenging week, I talk about the stormy day. Instead of saying that I am stressed and carrying things in my mind and heart, I say, “I throw weighty stones.” Instead of saying I am looking for hope, I say, “My eyes are on a bright horizon.”
The mix of metaphor and sensory experience captures my experience and transmutes my challenges into a different energy: the excitement of capturing the words that describe my experience, developing a voice to what is going on inside me. Also, there is a resonance between what is happening in nature and inside myself.
Naomi Wakan talks about Haiku taking her into the experience of life, paradoxically away from “living entirely in words.” (2018, p. 19). She moves away from thinking a poem into existence but instead senses into it. Here are some Haiku’s found in her book that spoke to me:
wishing fountain outside the cancer clinic some heads, some tails
~Alice Frampton
family visit he tried to fix what's wrong with the answering machine
~Winona Baker
Poetry can convey such emotion, experience, and immediacy through description and sparse, carefully chosen words. Less words means you are carving into your writing to find just enough to describe your experience while still being impactful.
Poetry allows me to express and feel and then find some middle ground. It’s like I’m taken out into a sea of choppy waves and poetry carries me back to the shore where I am grounded. When I write poetry, I go through a process of feeling my feelings, and finding the right words. It is an alchemy of sorts because my energy shifts. The writing process excites me, provokes deeper thought, and provides a catharsis. I also see it as a form of meditation.
I’ve always been interested in poetry as therapy. In fact, I think writing poems has been a significant part of my healing journey. There is something about the depth of feeling that I can’t always express to other people but I can put down on the page in a poem. As well, all feelings are welcome in poetry so you can move outside of your comfortable ones and get familiar with others.
Margo Fuchs Knill and Sally S. Atkins, authors of Poetry in Expressive Arts, talk about the healing powers of a poem: “Poetry invites connection, interactive emotional, intellectual, aesthetic responses that can unite heart, mind, body, and imagination.” (2021, p. 35/36).
Here is one of Margo Knill’s poems on poetry, titled “Poetry” (2021, PG. 37)
speaks without explaining crisscrossing the tangible, allowing our minds and senses to be here while there, and encouraging us to give the inconceivable a chance.
Somewhere between expressing yourself, finding the right words, and connecting with the world, poetry finds a way to help YOU heal. Having a mental illness can be fraught with many fragments of trauma, with inner confusion, with doubt. Poetry (and other creative arts) can create understanding and integrate experiences, therefore creating more solid emotional ground. We all need to understand our inner world in relation to the outer world. It is a balance between not living too much in the head and not living too much externally, or away from ourselves.
Here’s me on my stormy day. I am tired and yet I’m smiling. In my recovery this week, I got bogged down by trying to control my sleep. I created lists and many rules. Not realizing I was creating so much more anxiety in my body. I erased the lists, took on a curious mindset, and released all the struggle. Some nights I’ll sleep well. Other nights I won’t and I will be okay – tired – but okay.
I’ve created a “night nest” on my couch for those nights I wake up extra early as suggested by my therapist. I have put a good book, art supplies for doodling, essential oils that smell good. I have cozy blankets and a heating pad. We will see if I can switch my frustration at night into a different experience when I meet it with acceptance. I am still figuring out how to lure myself out of my warm bed when I awake early. I find if I can get up early and at least move to the couch I break the association of my bed with lying awake and this seems to do the trick of helping me sleep longer. My body is changing as I am in my mid-forties and is also changing as I lower medications. These things impact sleep. What’s really important is reducing anxiety around it.
I have talked in previous posts about response art – what an art therapist might make in response to a client’s art or session. This inspired me to write another Haiku this week with new photos from another Island View walk. Different week, different perspective.
sunny skies, calm day
everywhere the sounds of Spring
I exhale deeply
Mental health recovery is about finding your resources – places, creative activities, and rhythms – that help you heal. When you feel a storm brewing inside, where do you go? What do you do to feel better? How can creativity be your vehicle for what ever rocky road you are travelling? Do you notice when your perspective shifts and things feel bright again? How can you use one of your resources as an anchor when you feel out of balance?
However your week was, I hope that you find a path back to calmer waters 💙Meegan
Sources:
Knill, Margo and Atkins, Sally. (2021). Poetry in Expressive Arts. Jessica Kingsley Publishers: London and Philidelphia.
Wakan, Naomi. (2018). Poetry that Heals. Shanti Arts Publishing: Brunswick, Maine.
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