"Released" Mental Health

I was reading an exerpt from an article on Brain Blogger   I mis-read a sentence.

"...... Art therapy could be an important avenue toward increased mental health in the..individual. Engaging in art not only allows the  ...individual to express his own emotions to others, but the canvas (whether a poem, song or literal canvas) can reflect back to him his internal state. This dialogue between the artist and his work serves an important therapeutic function.?

I thought it said "released", not "increased..!.Hmm and that got my attention!  I think released mental health is just as important as increased mental health.  The reason?  Because so much of our troubles today are related to resistance...We do not want to accept the fact that life is what it is, and we are, miraculously, what we are.

We are human.  We have feelings that we interpret as good or bad.  We have situations that also we experience as positive or negative, the negative most surely being affiiated with real or anticipated pain. And we resist.  I do too.

For some reason (many reasons) we do not want to feel our feelings.  So we resist.  We eat a whole pie. Kick the cat.  Act like a jerk.  We do wierd and puzzleing behaviors, even to ourselves, to avoid experiencing our emotions.  And we do simialr bafflling things when we do not want to accept life on life terms.  Stalking after a break up...spending money don't have, buying clothes that are too small...all because we resist the conditions that we have created in our lives.

So art? Art Therapy?  Where does this fit in?  I think, at least in the work I do, art therapy is a safe and very effective method to not only confront resistance but to actually play with it, and then eventually break through.  And in addition, it feels good.  Actually I could simplify that sentence and just place a period after the word "feels".  Art therapy "feels". It's my experience that engaging in a guided creative act is a fantastic way to gain access and actually experience,in a visceral  and visual way..freedom from our unnecessary resistances that can hold us back.

                  "No Resistance"

                    Encaustic Mixed Media, 2010