Art for Healing

Here is a story about how making art or doing anything creative (even if you don't consider yourself to be an artist) is good for your health. Just find something you love to do, gather your materials, and play! https://www.npr.org/2019/12/30/792439555/making-art-is-good-for-your-health-heres-how-to-start-a-habit

@jenniferhunter I seriously am not creative in what most would consider any form of art, but that article mentions cooking and baking! People think I'm a great cook but most of the time I do go by recipes, perhaps elaborating on them a bit. If you can read, you can cook. So maybe cooking/baking is fulfilling that in me. I was in my glory at Christmas making oodles of cookies to give away. I knew I was making more than we would ever use but I enjoyed the process. I also enjoyed decorating the house, I do a lot of decorating.

Unfortunately with just the two of us here, I have little opportunity to exercise the cooking/baking part of my "creativity". Sometimes I do make cookies and give them to the lovely family across the street -- three children so they love it.
JK

@contentandwell Hi JK! Yes! Baking counts! I used to do that with my mom making fancy cookies for Christmas. My mom also taught me how to do cake decorating and make roses in icing when I was 6. I did that in 4-H and won trophies several years in a row for my fancy cakes. I used to make marzipan animals for the cakes for a picnic scene, and one year I made a Cinderella coach covered in rose vines with decorated cookies for wheels. I have also done several wedding cakes. I don't do this much anymore since I don't eat much sweets and can't eat wheat. I think a fancy dinner presentation on a plate counts too. Decorating the house is artistic and it makes you feel good to be in that space. Thanks for sharing your story.

@jenniferhunter This is a great article! Thanks for including this in your post; I learned a lot from it.
Ginger

@jenniferhunter I’m not great at presentation, just on taste. My sugar cookies (the absolute best per my son and daughter) just get color appropriate colored sugars. When my daughter and I were decorating some at Christmas she put black sugar on some angels! She said they were angels of death. She loves to be a tad outrageous. We had fun doing them together.
She’s not a kid of course but I will send her hearts for Valentine’s Day.
JK

@contentandwell Baking and cooking are forms of art especially when you start to experiment with different ingredients I do this sometimes some work out better then others Black angel wings I dont know about that

@lioness my daughter can be very funny with a very dry sense of humor. She is also very political. I think her despair may be part of the reason she does not plan to have children.
JK

@contentandwell That's all my son had and plans for no more lots to think about

Medical schools are taking medical students to art museums to learn observation skills by looking at great art work and discuss what medical issues might be illustrated in the work. Here is an interesting article about Michelangelo's sculpture of David and what a doctor can learn just by looking. It also talks about Michelangelo getting special permission to study and dissect cadavers in preparation for the sculpture to learn about anatomy which wasn't common knowledge for artists at the time. https://www.indystar.com/story/entertainment/arts/2020/01/15/michelangelo-david-reveals-medical-mystery-500-years-later/4431309002/?fbclid=IwAR3sOsNLh22GFoOkd1-_P6ncX0O7sF0eabeCo9eXVtoarlVckVomqKw3FCc

@jenniferhunter And I think the reverse may also be true! I find that as someone who does creative things, my sense of observation is heightened as compared to others. We tend to notice small differences, and can excel in a combination of medical/legal and artistic pursuits. The right and left sides of our brains being utilized together.
Ginger