Class: Creating Mandalas for Meditation

Mandalas are an ancient art form found in many cultures around the world. Also called “Energy Circles”, they are a creative and wonderful way to promote relaxation and meditation. The community is invited to start the New Year off right by joining local fiber artist, Bailey Earith at the Farragut Town Hall to learn how to create and use mandalas to decrease stress.

Enjoy the calm and beauty of this Native American and Tibetan art form as you create a decorative paper mandala. Students will learn to create their own unique mandala from decorative papers. This project is the perfect combination of meditation and art. No experience necessary.

When: Thursday, January 12 6:00-8:00pm

Price: $15 plus a $7 materials fee

Register at: Farragut Town Hall

11408 Municipal Center Dr.

Farragut, TN 37922

(865) 966-7057

About the instructor: Bailey Earith is a nationally-known fiber artist whose work can be found in collections around the world. Her work has been published in numerous books. Her mission is to bring peace to the world through art. She loves to help students reach their creative potential regardless of age or skill level.

Class: Creating Mandalas for Meditation

Free Art Event: You're Invited!

Three Knoxville area art groups collaborate to present free performance

Date: October 23^rd at 1:30 pm

Where: On the Krutch Park Extension lawn on Gay street across from the Regal cinema.

Artists involved: Momentum Dance Lab with Bailey Fiber Art and Tin Soldiers Productions

What: "Paint in Motion" improvisational multimedia event

Momentum Dance Lab, Bailey Fiber Art, and Tin Soldiers Productions are collaborating to present a free multimedia event.

On Saturday, October 23^rd at 1:30 pm on the Krutch Park Extension lawn (on Gay street across from the Regal cinema), members of Momentum Dance Lab will present a moving painting project where dancers will paint fabric with their improvisational movement. The painted fabrics are based on color palettes designed by fiber artist, Bailey Earith. Videographer, Tin Soldiers Productions, will be on hand to film the performance. The public is invited to attend this free, community arts event.

After this public event, Bailey Earith will manipulate the painted fabrics in her Farragut studio to create a piece of 3-D wall art. Tin Soldiers Productions will document this process and edit the footage from Krutch Park and Bailey Fiber Art Studio into an art film. This project will culminate in a multi-media performance piece at Momentum Dance Lab’s annual show, “Art Moves” which will be presented at the KMA on March 12th and 13^th, 2011.

Momentum Dance Lab strives for excellence in dance through artistic exploration, professional training and original performances. MDL offers opportunities in most aspects of dance production and arts administration, while creating innovative outreach programs to enhance our community. www.momentumdancelab.com

Bailey Earith is a nationally known fiber artist whose work can be found in collections around the world. Bailey enjoys creating fabric art that has visual and/or actual textural elements. These elements often include beads, vintage buttons, feathers, hand-painted fabric, manipulated fabric, cords, yarns, and found objects. Bailey's art is eco-friendly. She creates with recycled and repurposed items as much as possible. Bailey hopes viewers will experience a sense of joy and well being upon seeing her work. www.BaileyFiberArt.com

Actor, writer, director, producer, videographer Jeff Delaney is founder and operator of Tin Soldiers Productions in Knoxville, TN. Tin Soldiers produces plays, short films and documentaries. Mr. Delaney has an extensive resume of production and performance credits.

Free Art Event: You're Invited!

Rain Video: A Gift of Peace

This video is amazing and well worth your time. Turn up your speaker volume and enjoy!

Rain Video: A Gift of Peace

Mandala #398: Million Mandalas for Peace

I am honored to have been chosen as Mandala #398 on the wonderful site: Million Mandalas for Peace!

http://millionmandalasforpeace.blogspot.com/2009/06/mandala-398-by-bailey-earith.html

Mandala #398: Million Mandalas for Peace

Hope is in the Cards

I just heard about this wonderful program: Hope is in the Cards, a grassroots effort to generate 300 million upbeat messages throughout our country. The idea is simple - get everyone in America to mail one positive card or letter to someone else, right now. How cool is that? Check out http://HopeIsInTheCards.org, but even easier? Send a positive card or letter to someone today, or write the word HOPE on the back of anything you mail. This is really a neat idea. Please spread the word!

Hope is in the Cards

Guest Blog by Linda Pucci, PhD.

Use Art to Find Solutions and Get Unstuck

By Linda Pucci, Ph.D.

Feeling stuck? Try grabbing your kid's crayons and draw your way to a solution!

As a psychologist and life coach, I often work with people who are feeling stuck. Their usual right-brained, verbally-based approach to problem solving hasn't worked. They go back and forth between alternatives, and around and around in circles trying to figure out how to fix their problem.

That's when I often encourage them to turn to art to find the solution. Although consciously they are stuck, unconsciously they have the resources to solve their challenge. But because our unconscious mind is highly symbolic, to access it we have to speak that language.

Art—whether it is drawing, painting, doodling, sculpting, collages or fabric art—provides a way to unleash your unconscious mind and find solutions.

Sometimes I'll ask someone to depict their problem through artwork. I'll ask them to capture their problem's shape or color. Usually after some initial hesitation, and getting beyond concerns about "artistic ability," they are able to easily do it. Even without their realizing it, they are symbolically capturing all the things that problem represents to them.

I may then ask them to depict what things will be like when the problem is solved, and again, they capture their understanding of the solution through their artistic representation. We can then begin to look at the symbols and figure out what resources to use to shift it.

Sometimes I'll ask them to find a resource symbol and create it artistically. The symbol created is multi-leveled and always has intense personal meaning. Their artistic rendering often becomes a powerful ongoing symbol for them in their lives, and many times people will frame their drawing, or display this highly meaningful artwork as an ongoing reminder of this resource.

The symbolic nature of artwork means that it is a visual (and sometimes kinesthetic) image that captures all the nuances that often can't be captured in words. The artwork and the process of creating it allow them to design solutions, and to see their challenge differently. They can now begin to change their approach and get unstuck.

Linda Pucci, Ph.D. is a psychologist and life coach at Inner Resource Center, LLC in Maryville, TN. She has 30 years of experience helping people get unstuck and find solutions they had not thought possible using her solution focused approach. For more information and free resources for your personal growth go to http://www.InnerResourceCenter.com

Guest Blog by Linda Pucci, PhD.

"Inspire your Heart with Art" Day

In honor of "Inspire your Heart with Art" Day, I present one of my newer works: "Abundance".  This piece uses a gourd as a foundation.  Mounds of fibers in assorted textures and colors spill forth from the mouth of the gourd.  Nestled in the fibers are assorted crystals.  The movement and energy flow like liquid.  Abundance!

 

"Inspire your Heart with Art" Day

Accolades at Sealed with love.com

Elizabeth Harper has a wonderful blog on topics of holistic health, wellness, spirituality, and self-empowerment.  She was nice enough to link her energy with mine.  Thanks.

Vibration
Bailey Earith is a professional fiber artist. Her blog contains so many interesting posts and snippets of information that it truly resonated with my creative soul. One of the most intriguing is a small piece entitled, Cymatics:The Mandalas of Sound. Cymatics is the study of sound wave vibration and its effects on physical matter.

http://www.sealedwithlove.com/index.php/love/blog/

Accolades at Sealed with love.com

Engaging in Creativity Increases Longevity

Great News!  I will live forever!

"...There's evidence that their (creative) professions, more than any particular lifestyle choice, may have contributed to their longevity. "The very act of engaging one's mind in creative ways directly affects health," says Dr. Gene Cohen, director of the Center on Aging, Health & Humanities at George Washington University. In 2001, Cohen undertook a study of 150 adults ages 65 to 100 to examine the effects of various pursuits on their well-being. The control group was engaged in noncreative community activities and the other group participated in community-based art programs. After one year, Cohen found that the group engaged in creative activities, such as painting or singing in a choir, had started fewer new medications, experienced fewer falls and made fewer doctor's visits than the control group. "Anything that stimulates the brain, reduces stress, and promotes a more balanced emotional response will trigger positive changes in the body," he says..."

http://www.newsweek.com/id/173346

Engaging in Creativity Increases Longevity

Cymatics: the Mandalas of Sound

"Welcome. I'd like to introduce you to the Great, Great, Great Grandmother Goddess of all Mandalas. It is what science calls "Cymatics". It is the study of sound wave vibration and it's affects on physical matter.
In Cymatics, we have two forces at work. We have matter and we have energy/sound vibration.

The photographs above are examples of many experiments of sound vibrational frequencies upon different types of matter, which could be sand, liquid, gel or any number of different powdered substances. Each wave frequency creates another unique pattern in the matter. When the frequency is turned off, the matter falls out of pattern into chaos. You can read a little bit about the history of Cymatics here or in the side bar under "Mandala Sites". 

Prepare for your mind to be blown away :-)

There are questions that come to my mind... If we could discover the vibrational frequency of a plant, animal, person, thing, planet...could we recreate it? Could we discover the vibration of health, of peace, of joy?"

http://millionmandalasforpeace.blogspot.com/2008/12/cymatics-mandalas-of-sound.html

Cymatics: the Mandalas of Sound

How to make a Mandala

"It's a meditation you know. Anyone can do this- even those with little to no artistic experience because it's not about creating art. Any art that is created upon completion is incidental to the feeling of release that you will experience while getting lost in the mandala process.
Many people bottle their emotions and have nowhere to release it. Unexpressed emotion will only lead to misery and dis-ease. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow - but it will eventually cause problems that could be relieved if you could only find a creative outlet in which to express yourself.

To create a mandala, you must fist release all judgments about your ability to aesthetically put pen to paper. Throw those thoughts out the window because no one has to ever see it but you, (unless you choose to share it) and it's totally your prerogative to destroy it once completed. It's a good idea to try this in a safe, quiet environment, (soft pleasing music is fine) because you want to be able to work on it until you are finished.

To draw a mandala, start at the center, which is in essence, your core. Start with a dot, a circle, a cross, any symmetrical shape that you can work around in a circle. What you are going to do after making your first mark, is to make another mark, a small mark or pattern that can be repeated in a concentric pattern around the center. After that, make another mark and continue in another concentric circle, repeating layer after layer. Make it as big as you want, as detailed as you want, the only thing is that you just stay mindful of the marks you are making. (don't allow yourself to become distracted, and if you do, gently bring your mind back into focusing on what you are doing) None of the marks need be perfect, ever. They just need to be.

Remember to keep from judging yourself on the choices you are making for the design, the straightness of your lines, or roundness of your circles. Just stay with the pattern and keep moving round the circle..."--Stephanie Smith http://www.biffybeans.com/2008/12/oh-mandala.html

How to make a Mandala

Relieve your Stress with Mandala Art

"Mandalas are circular, usually symmetrical designs that create a center of focus. They can be made of paper, mosaic, sand, clay or just about any medium. Many mandalas occur naturally-such as flowers, the sun, sliced vegetables, snowflakes & pools of water. In the East, mandalas depict philosophical & spiritual insight & are used as a tool of meditation. In the West, the benefits of mandalas were first recognized by the Swiss psychologist Carl Jung. He saw them as a symbol of "the inner process by which individuals grow toward fulfilling their potential for wholeness & resolving conflicts." Through his own work, he recognized them as an extension of the person creating them. This is why circles have come to represent wholeness or completion, & are a fundamental structure of our identity."

http://howtodo-health.blogspot.com/2008/12/releive-your-stress-with-mandala-art.html

Relieve your Stress with Mandala Art

Artworks lift bodies and spirits

"...It's important, in hospitals, to surround the patients with serenity and beautiful things," said outpatient Virginia Fry. Environment for healing

Any trip to the hospital can stress out visitors, whether they are patients undergoing a routine checkup or family members pacing in the waiting room. The art that furnishes a room can create a more soothing environment.

"It's nice — as a family member or a patient — to take a break from the clinical experience and enjoy something beautiful," said Essick, who is in charge of every aspect of the art in each of Community Hospital's 13 facilities. ..."

http://www.montereyherald.com/news/ci_11161394?nclick_check=1

Artworks lift bodies and spirits

Whole Brain Thinking

"Do we still have unimaginable potential just waiting to be
unlocked? When you examine the functioning of the human brain, the
answer is a resounding, "Yes!"

In education, the left side of the brain is promoted much more than the right. Much attention is paid to arithmetic and word skills, while art and music receive little, and intuitive
development doesn't get any."

http://anacoana.blogster.com/whole-brain-thinking-210908120606

Whole Brain Thinking

My interview with Madcap Logic

Thanks For Giving Art, Bailey Earith

"Bailey Earith, first found joy when she discovered fiber art. A broad term that covers quilts but is more than that. Her creations involve beads, vintage buttons, feathers, hand-painted fabric, manipulated fabric, cords, yarns, and found objects.Her work is viewed and collected globally.

However, she continues to find, and share joy. As an Artist In Residence with the Tennessee Arts Commission, she uses art to reach kids with disabilities...."

Read rest of post http://blog.madcaplogic.com/?tag=bailey-earith

My interview with Madcap Logic

My Gift to You: World Peace & Prosperity Activation Recording

I lovingly invite you to take a few minutes for yourself and listen to this EnergyRICH® World Peace and Prosperity Activation Recording. It is very powerful and meaningful. It was gifted to me and now I gift it to you. Enjoy!

http://www.energyrichcoach.com/audio/specialcall11032008.mp3

My Gift to You: World Peace & Prosperity Activation Recording

Is art Therapy?

"...Engaging in the creative process, the arts, is healing and should be integrated into healing environments - into hospitals, outpatient treatment centers, doctors’ offices, the VA, residental centers, long-term care facilities (nursing homes), home care, and hospices.
When you engage in a creativity activity, aka the creative process, you become your own therapist. The therapy (which you facilitate) is to access that space that is intuitive, invisible, intangible, healing, and brings you comfort and pleasure by creating a tangible object..." (Quote from Marti Hand)

Is art Therapy?

The science supporting creativity in healthcare

The Benefits of Integrating Creativity in Healthcare

A growing body of research demonstrates that creativity and spirituality can heal by changing a person’s physiology, attitudes, emotional states, and perceptions of pain. Engaging in creative work has been shown to lower blood pressure, heart rate and breathing. Creative acitivities rouse the hypothalamus to activate the autonomic nervous system, which balances vital signs and hormone level. Engaging in the creative process stimulates the amygdala in the brain to release endorphins and other neurotransmitters, thereby, reducing pain and triggering the immune system to function more efficiently. Creative interventions shorten hospital stays and decrease the use of pain medication. In addition, by engaging in creative work, patients and family caregivers experience reduced stress and anxiety levels, and a heightened sense of well-being.
Scientists are taking a closer look at the effects writing, painting and listening to music have on the body. ... http://martihand.wordpress.com/creativity-in-healthcaremarti-handarts-in-healthcarehealthcarenursing-3/

The science supporting creativity in healthcare

Classes at Migun-TN

I am very excited to be able to offer you information about classes that may be of interest to you!

I will be teaching a series of classes at Migun TN (by Fresh Market - Farragut). Each class will offer a different learning experience and project. Each class (ie date/time) stands alone. Someone can take the same class multiple times to make additional items and explore additional techniques. Participants will be able to forward their spiritual journey through creativity in a supportive environment. Each class is offered at the nominal fee of $25 and includes all materials. As an added bonus, students will receive a pair of beaded earring from Bailey Fiber Art Studio upon completion of 4 classes.

Schedule is as follows:
Dream Catchers 11/13 11-1, 1/9 11-1
Mandalas 11/14 11-1, 12/11 11-1
Journals 11/21 11-1, 12/4 11-1, 1/16 11-1, 1/22 11-1
Spirit Dolls 12/5 11-1
Energy Talisman 12/12 11-1, 12/12 6-8pm

E-mail me to register.

Classes at Migun-TN

12 Keys to emotional health

Here are 12 tips from the experts for reducing stress, managing negative emotions, and improving your emotional wellness.

Collect Friends (perfect for the art experience)
Enjoy Solitude (Perfect for the art experience)
Get Fit
Seek Pleasure (Perfect for the art experience)
Find a Passion (perfect for the art experience)
Plan for Problems
Seek Constructive Criticism
Take Healthy Risks
Manage Success Well
Don't Go It Alone
Write It Down
Protect Yourself from 'Energy Vampires'


For complete article see http://www.medicinenet.com/emotional_wellness/article.htm

12 Keys to emotional health