10 Ways I Use the Arts in My Work as a Transformative Coach

The arts figure prominently in my work as a transformative coach and workshop facilitator.

I utilize a range of creative processes sourced from a variety of arts disciplines to help individuals digest experience, express difficult emotions, articulate complex ideas, access inner wisdom, deepen awareness, and unlock potentials.

Here are 10 examples of how I might guide you in a private coaching session or workshop, using arts integration techniques:

1. After a trance or guided visualization, “summarize” your inner experience in images.


2. Upon waking each morning or prior to a dreamwork session, write your dream in words, then draw your dream in images.


3. Recount your spiritual autobiography — historical influences and current expressions — as the “roots and shoots” of a tree.


4. Articulate your core “issue” (or chronic feeling-state) using only images.


5. Stage an important memory (peak experience, pivotal moment or low point) as a theatre scene using other workshop participants (or objects in the room) as props and/or characters. Direct the scene as it actually happened. Invite other participants to change the scene to observe another possible experience and/or outcome.


6. Articulate a difficult or complex experience using only non-verbal vocalization and gesture.


7. Express your awareness of yourself through visual metaphors, including biological, mythological, historical and fantastical archetypes. Examples: What kind of flower are you most like and why? Draw yourself as that flower.  Which Roman goddess are you most like and why? Make a collage of yourself as that archetype. What historical era are you most resonant with and why? Create a costume for yourself in that style. What kind fantastical creature are you most like and why? Construct that creature using only found objects.


8. Set a goal or intention. Craft an object or collage a pocket-size image that symbolizes you reaching this goal or achieving your intention. Write a song that emphasizes this intention and sing it while holding your object.


9. Using simple materials like paper bags or socks, craft rudimentary puppets of two characters. One character possesses all your great qualities; the other, all your “disowned” or “shadow” qualities. Script a theatrical interaction between the two puppets with a story arc that overcomes a conflict and arrives at a positive resolution. Alternately, improvise a dialog between the two puppets while a partner observes and afterwards feeds back to you her observations.


10. Prior to or during an important life transition, create an altar that represents where you’ve been, where you’re going and the threshold space you currently occupy between the two. Choose objects, colors, materials and spatial arrangements that symbolize the physical, mental and/or emotional dimensions of your experience; the personal, familial and/or social contexts your transition affects; and qualities you desire to experience during your transition.