I am pregnant with emotions and thoughts and I am excited each time I give birth to a new image. It is part of me for the world to see. I look at it and understand myself more. I have struggled and been patient until its birth. Now I am in awe of the visual image I have brought into the world.









"What's Love Got to Do With It?" This is the title of one of the chapters in Bruce Moon's book, "Introduction to Art Therapy - Faith in the Product". As I opened the book the last thing I thought I would be reading about was Love. Who knew I would find thoughts written out that mirror what I have been fervently thinking about lately. I began reading and came to a poem by David Whyte, ". . . These are hard paths we tread but they are green and we must love their contours as we love the body branching with its veins and tunnels of dark earth. . . " Moon, the author, talks about being awakened from an emotional numbness and realizing his true reason for being an Art Therapist. He says, "Our source as art therapists is love." Moon goes on to say, "How do we do it? How do we rise from our beds each morning and make our way to work, knowing that our hearts will be shattered as we watch that four-year-old little boy scribble out the pain of his father's belt . . . knowing that our souls will be battered as we witness the acrylic blood stream down the canvas as that young woman portrays the nightmares that live within her . . . knowing that our sense of security will be tattered as the seventy-year-old stroke victim offers us images of what waits for us in our future.
What is the source? How do adolescents survive life altering injuries? How do administrators maintain their sanity in the midst of insane health care systems? How do art therapists endure? What is the source?

'Everything you need you had the moment before you were born' (David Whyte)
I believe that our source as art therapists is love."
Though this may sound basic or trivial to some Moon goes on to say that even though it may sound unprofessional, it is true. His belief "rests upon this notion, the doing of art is an ACT of love." "I am aware of course that any attempt to explore this idea is an exercise in discussing the immeasurable, illogical and utterly mysterious.", Moon confesses. To those of us that have faith and believe in God though we cannot see Him or measure His greatness this may not seem illogical at all.

Today, we see many versions of what is called "love". And it is sad to think that a woman might put more efforts into acquiring a real Louis Vuitton bag than into working for love. And a man might put more efforts and patience into learning guitar than into working on attending to his wife whom he says he "loves". Moon informs us that "The Greek philosophers divided love into three subcategories: agape- divine love; philia- strong attraction; and eros- erotic, sexual love." Many people today don't even strive for an agape love. You know why? It takes work. It takes perseverance. It takes commitment. "Love is THE WILL TO ATTEND, TO THE SELF AND TO OTHERS." "That love is an act of will suggests that it is less an emotion or feeling, and more a manner of being. . . Love must be expressed through actions toward others and oneself. Will also denotes that such actions are done out of free choice. To attend to another is an act of volition. I do not have to love, and I cannot be made to love. I choose to act out of love." So it would seem that if you marry someone you make a commitment to love that person. And that person is not responsible to continue to "make you love them". Making someone "stay in love with you" is an impossible task. Therefore, if you come home and say, "I don't love you anymore to your spouse." You are saying that I out of my free will choose to not act out of love. In fact it is a reflection of the lack of perseverance, commitment and focus of the person who uses the words "I don't love you anymore." as an excuse to leave his or her spouse. But our society hears that and says "poor thing". He doesn't love her anymore. And from there women believe that it is alright to have affairs with men who claim to not "be in love" with their wives. And men believe it is alright to leave their wives who they promised to love forever as long as they use the phrase "I don't love you anymore or I am not in love with you anymore." When in fact if they were to be honest, they should say, "I am lazy and want instant gratification. I choose not to work or persevere or act out of love." Moon suggests that "It is not possible to authentically attend to another if you are not attentive to yourself. . . Although loving is an act of will, and a choice, the force itself is without goal or purpose. We love for the sake of loving. We attend to another for the sake of attending. We do art for the sake of doing art. Such love brings no increase in personal or professional power or prestige. It brings no material gain. It brings only itself, and that is the most mysterious aspect of love." Those who are not attending to themselves look to others for fulfillment and sometimes marry others searching for fulfillment. But as Moon says "the force of love is without goal or purpose." Another person cannot cause you to love yourself whether you are dating or married. We have forgotten that love is more than words. Love deals with actions. The creation of art is an example of an act of love. "As the artist dips the brush into acrylics and moves pigment to the empty canvas, an image begins its journey from deep within to without. . . This is a process of attending to the soul." People may be pregnant with emotions and thoughts that are finally birthed with the help of the midwife, the art therapist, and an image is born. It is an unique image. It is exciting and an expression of love. It is a part of you. You discover yourself through viewing your new creation. "Creation and attending are acts of grace. They cannot be forced, and they are not deserved. They simply are." This is similar to God's love for us. We are saved by grace. We cannot earn His love and we cannot lose His love. But unfortunately, there are many people that believe love can be lost not only from God but from others. When in fact, I cannot lose God's love and I cannot lose another person's love. If someone says they "do not love me anymore", they are saying to me, "I am more important then my commitment to you and our family". Standing at the alter there are very few men that would say "she made me love her." They may say "I fell in love with her." But what they really should say is "I choose to love her." For later on many to often use the excuse "I fell out of love with her". And too many people nod their heads knowingly with a sympathetic look. When actually someone should say, "You cannot fall out of love with someone. You are choosing not to act out of love anymore." 'In, The Art of Loving, Erich Fromm suggests that for love to exist there must be five human elements present. They are: discipline, concentration, patience, mastery, and faith.' "This of course implies practice, repetition and struggle." Has anyone had someone tell them that if you are struggling in your marriage then maybe it was not meant to be?" Well, the people that say those words are lacking in true understanding of what love and the art of loving entails. "The relationship between art, art therapy and love is utterly tied to the presence of discipline, focus, patience, skillfulness and faith" which again takes practice, repetition and struggle. Many athletes practice repeatedly and struggle to perfect their skill. Not many people think this is unusual. So why is it odd or irregular to have to practice repeatedly and struggle to perfect loving someone else??? The answer is that it is not irregular. It is normal. However, our society that loves instant gratification has changed the image of marriage and love to be something easy or else not meant to be. "Anything that we attempt to do, if we only do it when we are in the mood, or when we feel like it, may be amusing, it may pass the time, but it will never be art." It will never be love. "This presents a difficulty in our culture for in large part we have lost our aptitude for self-discipline." When my husband called from his business trip to say he was leaving, I think I actually heard some of the most honest words he ever spoke. He said, "I just don't want to work that hard anymore." He was admitting that even though he showed discipline, focus, patience, skillfulness and faith when it came to becoming a chef during our marriage that he (even though he married me and committed to love me forever) was actually not willing to put in the discipline, focus, patience, skillfulness and faith that it takes to master the art of loving someone else, his wife or his daughter.
"Our culture has become one which deifies relaxation: i.e., time off, time away from the rigors of disciplined routinized work. We have drifted toward a society possessing precious little self-discipline. This deficiency can be seen in a host of sociological phenomena: drug and alcohol abuse, domestic violence, dysfunctional families, the divorce rate, etc. Without self-discipline life is random and chaotic - what Viktor Frankl describes as the, 'existential vacuum.' "Without discipline there can be no art. Without discipline there can be no love, and there will be no focus.." And ". . . focus seems to be an endangered species in our world today.""For many people, patience is as difficult as discipline and focus. Our whole way of life fosters and rewards quick results. . . speed is not of the essence when it comes to art and love. In fact, doing these things quickly may be the antithesis of doing them skillfully." It is hard for people today to be still without distraction. Moon talks about teaching a patient of his to learn to be still. The patient complains that he is bored. Have you ever thought about where boredom comes from? Well, Bruce tells his patient, "I believe boredom comes from an absence of quality relationships. If you have good relationships in your life it doesn't matter where you are, or what you are doing, you are never bored." Bruce is right. I thought about this statement in my own life and found it to be true. And as Bruce is making his patient build a canvas from scratch by cutting the boards with a miter saw, stretching and stapling the canvas and even applying the gesso which requires waiting time for it to dry he tells the very impatient patient, "Well, good relationships take a long time to grow. You have to be patient with them, they can't be hurried. That's the same with doing art, you can't make the gesso dry faster than it will. You have to be patient." He also goes on to say, "If the art . . . if the therapy . . . if the loving is not of ultimate concern, the novice can never really learn it." If people marry without the love being of ultimate concern, then they as marriage novices will never really learn how to be married and how to love. It takes work to master being a skillful husband or a skillful wife. Your efforts should not be put into molding your husband or wife so that they are an easy person to love and it will take you minimal effort and practice and patience to feel as if you are in love with him or her. Your efforts should be put into allowing God to mold you. You are the clay not the potter to mold your spouse. "If you have ever tried to work with clay on the potter's wheel you know very well that nothing is achieved without patience. Learning to throw on the wheel takes time, so much time. It takes time to wedge the clay properly in order to remove all the air bubbles. It takes time to master the process of centering. One must patiently try and try, and try again to insert the thumbs properly in order to open the clay. It takes time to perfect pulling the clay upwards. If you attempt to hurry, or take a shortcut through any one of these steps the piece is ruined." A piece is broken. A marriage is broken. There is no shortcut to mastering life or love or art.