ART SAVES LIVES: Open House & Opening Reception

"We are a gallery and a center for healing and creativity - as we know it is all connected - creating the kind of intimacy that facilitates profound healing."

Did you make it out to the Middleway Health Foundation Open House & Art Reception on 2nd Saturday, October 8? It was a fundraiser for the Foundation with lots of art for sale, delicious small bites, lively music, and friendly faces.

Middleway Health Foundation is Middle Way Health’s nonprofit providing free mental health services to the community. It was born from a need to help close a significant ‘gap’ in public and private mental health services. The goal is to find those people who have ‘fallen between the cracks’ or are in danger of doing so. By taking these services out into the community where access is limited and obtaining accurate information, the Foundation directly connects people in need with available services so they can make their own informed health decisions. Clients have direct access to and benefit from:

Counseling
Psychotherapy
Meditation & Mindfulness
Support Groups
Health Counseling
Healthcare Provider Directory

The Foundation hosted a handful of local artists whose work was displayed throughout both the Foundation offices and Middle Way Health offices (virtually next door to one another). In fact, you can stop by to view the art in any and all open rooms. Just keep in mind that these are therapy offices with private healing sessions happening behind closed doors, so your peaceful presence is appreciated.

Aside from raising money for the Foundation (which currently receives no grants or government funding), our intention with the art gallery space was to highlight the significance of creative expression. Because creativity and art save lives; and beauty heals and inspires.

While we have two rooms dedicated to gallery art, we also have artwork for sale in our therapy offices. While every room has art, keep in mind that not all of the rooms will be accessible at all times. So if you drop in more than once, you might get a different experience each time.

What does that make us, then? Ever expanding our wings! We’re not just an art gallery and not just a healing center. We are a gallery and a center for healing and creativity - as we know it is all connected - creating the kind of intimacy that facilitates profound healing. We know the artists personally, and we are the artists. We create to heal and express, and we sometimes combine work and play to facilitate emotional balance. We also highly encourage others to experiment with their own creativity and authentic self expression.

Why art, expression, creativity, beauty? When we consciously stop to appreciate something outside of ourselves, this awareness creates a bridge, a connection, a relationship – thus we are no longer entirely separate from that which we are appreciating.

Art initiates conversation, opens minds and moves spirits. In this regard, art isn’t just ‘art’ but something that stirs the soul and awakens the psyche. We also create art by how we live out our days, a kind of 'performance art' of how we choose to appreciate our existence.

This kind of art isn’t something we make alone; it’s something we co-create with our environment. Our relationships and communities are a public work of art. When we consciously create these together, we get a better sense of who we are personally. And all of this facilitates healing.

The Foundation Gallery is also open 2nd Saturdays, or by appointment. Artists currently exhibiting are: Jonathan Baran, Hope Harris, Melanie Noel Light, Phil Littman, Michael Mikolon, Fran Quinzon, Sandra Warne.

For more on Middleway Health Foundation.

Trauma, Pt. III ~ Mastering It

In the last two articles on trauma we talked about how wrenching experiences affect us all, in big ways and small, and how not dealing with them impacts present and future mental health as much as past emotional wellbeing. But we’ve only covered trauma in general terms. To really understand how trauma affects you personally, it’s important to be familiar with the actual process, from event to reaction, response, and long-term effects.

Depending on your level of sensitivity, past traumas, and openness to dealing with the resulting shock and grief, what actually triggers the trauma response varies from person to person. The death of a loved one, near-death experience or severe accident for instance, are likely to be intensely trying for just about anyone. But for many of us, even more insignificant-seeming incidents can compromise us emotionally. And because those cuts and bruises can’t actually be seen, they usually aren’t properly cared for.

The stages of trauma, grieving or bereavement are: Flight, Fight, Freeze, Forget, and Fabrication.

In FLIGHT, we attempt to bypass or escape from the assaulting event.
In FIGHT, we stay and wrestle with the problem or antagonist.
With FREEZE, we remain still, hoping the trouble will pass us by or that we won’t be seen.
With FORGET, we try to disassociate and not remember, or repress it in order to not become attached to the event.
And with FABRICATION, we reframe the event or our part in it by telling a story about it.

If we are “successful” in any of these stages – fleeing from the trauma without major injury, winning the fight, avoiding trouble, gaining a healthy distance from it, or creating a higher story or self, we avoid becoming traumatized, and thus return to a healthier state of functioning. As well, we don’t have to go through all the stages for the best outcome. Often, finding some healthy resolution within one of the stages is enough for us to not get “stuck” in the trauma. Getting stuck means the pattern repeats without a positive resolution, making thriving an ever-elusive entity.

While we call them the five stages of trauma, they can happen when we’re simply overwhelmed. And this is what so many of us miss. If past traumas aren’t worked through constructively, “lesser” situations can trigger the 5-Fs response. And with today’s hectic, overwhelming lifestyles, there seem to be a lot more landmines out there. So if you continue to feel like you have to flee, fight, freeze, forget or fabricate through something in life, then you’re likely stuck in one or more stages of the trauma-response process.

For instance, it’s common for people to become stuck in the last stage, telling a false story about not just the event, but who they are. They may blame themselves for the occurrence happening in the first place and/or shape their identity around it, believing that they are inferior or unworthy. But there’s real freedom in allowing the process and getting through it constructively, thereby integrating the experience into your life as part of your growth.

There’s a common misperception, however, that we have to “let go” of hurtful experiences. But we can’t really rid of them in the sense that we have full control. There’s no magic process, spell or pill that will extract them altogether from the sum of our life experiences. And if they do go away, it’s more likely that they somehow and mysteriously let us go.

Not becoming stuck requires “digesting” the painful experience as an active process of integration. Meaning, it’s a part of you but it doesn’t define you, nor does it control your future responses and reactions. In attempting to learn from it, to gain wisdom and greater compassion for yourself and others, the trauma then doesn’t become an obstruction to your emotions or healthy engagement with life.

Letting the impressionable experience and your reaction to it move through you – while observing, learning, and exercising self-care – is a healthy, constructive way to deal with what threatens your peace of mind. And the more you learn to do this, the easier and faster it becomes, as you hone the craft of dealing with life’s turbulences.