Playing with paint

Last week I decided to sign up for a new activity, which started tonight. The title: "Exploring your Creativity". I haven't taken art classes since I was in middle school so it's been quite a long time. Any artistic endeavors I've attempted in past years have usually been quite intentional - when I set my mind to do something I can usually do it. But simply doodling and drawing for fun or to take my mind off of things that might be bothering has never really been my outlet. The problem is that I don't really have an outlet - my brain is usually in overdrive, worrying about things that are beyond my control. I figured I needed an activity that would take my mind to another place and use parts of the brain that are understimulated. Tonight did just the trick. There has definitely been a lot on my mind lately and it was good to simply allow myself to be an "anti-perfectionist", to draw squiggly lines, and play with finger paint. Dabbing my fingers into primary colors I wiped them in various patterns across half of a blank sheet of paper, then folded it in half to create a mirror image of my paint splatter. The results looked a lot like the ink splotch images psychiatrists use, and in away the activity sort of felt like therapy. The realist, INTJ that I am sometimes struggles with non-realistic things, but this activity helped me release some of that for two hours. Hopefully as I continue taking classes some of that artistic creativity will splash into other areas of my life. I'm looking forward to it!