The magic of self-expression

I sat down with a white piece of paper ready to express what was bothering me. Because of my recent very bold and completely unplanned life-decision I felt an empty, hollow space right in the middle of my chest and wanted to allow it to show in my art. But before going to the "dark side", I decided to play with some free-form background. I started by making random marks with colored pencils, then spotted some concentrated watercolors that were sitting on my table. I smooshed some of those, then added gesso to tone down the colors. Next I pasted collage papers that were at hand's reach, splashed more color over the stencil and painted a sad girl with the dark space in the middle of her chest. 

What happened is pure magic. I realized is that just by playing with paint and brushes my mood changed. Suddenly I wasn't feeling that bad at all, so I glued the words that spoke to me at the moment.
I could definitely feel hope.

And then I decided that I don't like her face. I painted over it, added more color, changed the features and tried a ton of things, but it just wasn't working for me. Finally, without much thought I cut out a piece from a collage sheet I used to sell and glued it right over her face. For a second I panicked because it looked completely weird. And then the best thing happened... I stopped thinking and started playing. If the piece was "ruined" already I couldn't possibly mess it up more. It has been a long time since I allowed myself to just be silly and add weird shapes and colors. It felt SO GOOD. I was smiling and loving the process.
And at the end - I even loved my weird result.

How interesting - I went from feeling pretty depressed to feeling light and happy through the magic of self-expression. What a feeling of freedom! I'm sure you know what I'm talking about and I'm sure that it happens to you too. I can't believe that I allowed my soul to go without this feeling for so long. I can't wait to do it all over again tomorrow. Join me if you wish and play :-)