Live Beyond Stress and Illness

A year ago I attended an art therapy workshop. I’m no artist, to be clear. In fact, I grew up with a brother who could draw the most amazing pictures and to this day I envy his ability to work with all sorts of artistic mediums.

I attended the workshop mostly because I knew it would challenge me to be gentle with myself, loving with myself, and accepting of myself—three big feats when one is attempting something they already know they are not very good at.

One of the pieces our instructor invited us to draw was a picture of ourselves getting fruit from an apple tree. Sounds relatively simple, right? Well, in my haste I drew the tree and myself, as well as dozens of big juicy apples only to discover that in order for my arms to reach the fruit in this picture I would have to significantly extend the arms I already drew.

“That wouldn’t work,” I thought. “It will look unrealistic and I will look like Gumby!” So, instead, I drew a shoe, put it in mid air flying up to the apples as if I had thrown it there to knock the apples down from the tree. I also drew a number of fresh apples on the ground by my feet and placed many more in a basket to represent the ones I had already successfully captured. “Pretty resourceful,” I thought. And so did my instructor.

She examined my drawing and told us all about how the number of apples we drew represented the amount of abundance we believe is out there in the world. She pointed out that although I initially created a drawing where the fruit was out of my reach, (which would typically signify a belief that abundance was out of my reach) I demonstrated my ability to be resourceful in bringing abundance into my life. I liked that synopsis! But have to admit, I was still kicking myself for not having thought out my drawing better to have had normal length arms that could effortlessly reach for the fruit.

I took away a valuable reminder that day. I am resourceful. There’s more than one way to bring apples into my life and to criticize my approach is fruitless. I should celebrate my ability to recognize that there is always more than one way to reap abundance, more than one way to accomplish our goals, and more than one way to maneuver around situations in life that threaten us with stress.

I forget that sometimes, and especially when stress enters into my life. And yet, if I remembered how resourceful I CAN be, especially in times of stress inducing situations I probably wouldn’t cater to the seduction of stress. I’d simply remember myself, the apple tree, my shoe flying in mid air, my basket of already caught apples, and give thanks for the resourceful ideas and solutions that come to me day in and day out that I don’t always give much attention to.

I believe that managing stress is about being resourceful with our time, energy, bodies, thoughts, beliefs, behaviors, actions and connections. When we come to know how resourceful we truly are and can become-- stress will undoubtedly loosen its’ grip on all of us so that we might be free to grab onto our apples, (abundance) and take a juicy bite that nourishes our heart, body, soul, mind, and imagination.