Open Access
Published: May 2025
Licence: CC BY-NC-4.0
Issue: Vol.20, No.1
Word count: 5,426
About the author
Stillness that moves: Fostering presence as an emerging creative arts therapist
Shanti Brown
Abstract
Presence, a state of being open and receptive to the moment (Geller & Greenberg, 2012), is fundamental to therapeutic practice, especially when working with the arts (Atkins, 2014). This autoethnographic study explores the author’s journey of cultivating presence through mindfulness, Focusing (Gendlin, 1969) and art-making. By examining the ‘time out of time’ (Moore, 2015) inherent in these practices, this study reveals how presence transforms the felt sense (Gendlin, 1969), deepens self-awareness, and offers practical insights for navigating intersubjectivity and uncertainty within creative arts therapy. Specifically, the study addresses the challenges of maintaining focused attention, including avoidance behaviours and lack of embodiment. Facilitative factors such as attentive curiosity, welcoming resistance, bridging ‘areas of attention’ (Tantia, 2014), use of imagination and art-making are also demonstrated, highlighting how fostering these capacities supports one to deepen presence within the therapeutic relationship.
Keywords
Presence, focusing, embodiment, intersubjectivity, arts-based research
Cite this articleBrown, S. (2025). Stillness that moves: Fostering presence as an emerging creative arts therapist. JoCAT, 20(1). https://www.jocat-online.org/a-25-brown
Introduction
Presence is described as being open and receptive to the moment on multiple levels – physically, emotionally, cognitively and spiritually (Geller & Greenberg, 2012). Such an experience can be understood as “time out of time” (Moore, 2015, p.332), or kairos, the Greek notion of subjective time that transcends the human constructed passage of chronological time, chronos (Stern, 2004). Chronos is linear, quantitative and predictable. Kairos, on the other hand, is qualitative and concerned with the unknown. It can be understood as a “moment of opportunity” (Stern, 2004, p.7). The therapeutic process reflects this “time out of time”, which requires a stepping back from habitual behaviours, attitudes and beliefs (Levine, 2005, p.45).
Presence is a fundamental quality of therapeutic practice (Geller & Greenberg, 2012), particularly when working with the arts (Atkins, 2014). Atkins observes that presence enables authentic connection and is a foundation for the facilitative relationship (2014, p.61). In creative arts therapy, presence becomes an encounter, a way of being with others, with oneself, and with the artistic product and processes that emerge. Presence is therefore a prerequisite for a process-oriented way of working (Eberhart & Atkins, 2014, p.130).
Rationale and context
When I first came across these notions of presence as a creative arts therapist in training, they resonated strongly, helping me make sense of my fledgling practice. However, despite my best intentions, I was struggling to establish a presence practice and started to wonder about the shadow of these shiny ideas.
As I explored the literature I was gripped by Daniel Siegel’s statement, “what I cannot tolerate in myself I cannot tolerate in someone else” (2010, p.212). Further texts alluded to the implication of the therapist in therapeutic presence. Geller and Greenberg (2012), for example, state that when the therapist is in a state of non-presence, the client is more likely to respond in a defensive or closed way. This is echoed in Henry et al.’s (1990, cited in Geller & Greenberg, 2012) study, which analysed moment-by-moment psychotherapy and found that therapists who were more self-critical were also more critical and hostile towards their clients, and this resulted in poorer therapeutic outcomes. Franklin (2014) highlights that unconditional presence to oneself must precede unconditional positive regard towards the client.
Methodologies and intent
The purpose of this qualitative study is to investigate presence, based on Geller and Greenberg’s emphasis that presence is not something that can easily be discussed but a “way of being” that needs to be fully experienced (2012, p.26). In this study I follow my curiosity about how I experience this way of being, and how it might be fostered through contemplative and arts-based practices. I investigate the barriers I face in bringing focused attention upon myself, the aspects that hinder or aid my ability to be present, and how this enables deeper self-awareness, which ultimately impacts my work as a creative arts therapist. As a phenomenological study, it is concerned with subjective understanding and depth of meaning (Leavy, 2017) and prioritises descriptions over explanations (Lester, 1999).
My research is heuristic in that it embraces my personal insights and experiences as researcher (Kapitan, 2018). Moustakas (1990, cited in Kapitan, 2018) states that heuristic inquiries hold personal challenges in a search to understand oneself and one’s world. This results in a strong autoethnographic element to the work, as I draw upon my own lived experience as an investigative lens to explore presence-centred phenomena. Autoethnography uses lived experience as a means of uncovering new ways of understanding wider cultural beliefs (Gray, 2011), which McIlveen (2008, cited in Gray 2011, p.69) emphasises enables the researcher to create research that improves the awareness of the work they undertake with clients.
Finally, this study is an arts-based inquiry through the engagement of art as a “way of knowing” (Leavy, 2017, p.191). Using the arts in my research allowed me to address questions holistically and was well suited to phenomenology due to art’s inherent descriptiveness and concern with aesthetic knowing (Leavy, 2018). Leavy (2018) reminds us that arts-based research has the ability to be evocative whilst fostering reflexivity and empathy.
Study design
Over eight consecutive weeks I engaged in weekly self-directed sessions that lasted two hours. The first 30 minutes of each session involved sitting in contemplative silence, using mindfulness and Focusing (Gendlin, 1969) techniques to help me remain in the present moment. I refer to this contemplation process throughout the article as the ‘drop-in’. I then created response art as a way to deepen, respond to and reflect upon my drop-in experience. I adopted Shaun McNiff’s (2015) principle of the unfolding process, where each gesture arises from the one that came before. This enabled me to respond spontaneously by choosing materials based on what arose moment by moment. The response images thus became a vehicle of investigation as well as its synthesis (Fish, 2018).
Mindfulness
Rappaport and Kalmanowitz describe mindfulness practice as “bringing awareness to the present moment with an attitude of acceptance and non-judgment” (2014, p.24). Mindfulness allows one to become an observer of thoughts and emotions (Rappaport, 2013), and nurtures the facilitative and invitational qualities of presence (Atkins, 2014; Geller & Greenberg, 2012). Geller and Greenberg agree that mindfulness can aid in the cultivation of presence but emphasise that the terms ‘mindfulness’ and ‘presence’ are not interchangeable despite often being confused in the literature (2012, p.31). Whilst mindfulness is traditionally associated with Buddhism and other Eastern practices, this study does not adhere to any specific mindfulness practice or school of thought. When I refer to mindfulness I am alluding to the process of non-judgmentally observing thoughts and sensations that arise moment-to-moment.
Focusing
Eugene Gendlin (1969) provides an experiential method for sensing what is happening within the body, known as Focusing. Focusing is a direct departure from talking about a problem to accessing a felt sense of a problem, which is pre-verbal and pre-conceptual (Gendlin, 1969). It is a physical, internal aura that encompasses everything you feel and know about the given situation at a given time and communicates it to you all at once rather than detail by detail (Gendlin, 1981, p.32). Gendlin describes how a felt sense is not the same as an emotion, in that it is less recognisable; it is an “holistic, implicit bodily sense of a situation” that contains more than can be said or thought (1996, p.58). The arts are particularly suited to working with the felt sense, as they provide a vehicle to help externalise this knowing, to carry it forward, and help it to be seen and known (Rappaport, 2013, p.98).
Figure 1. Shanti Brown, Holding vessel, 2019, natural found materials and polymer clay, dimensions variable.
Research as ritual
The weekly sessions, involving stepping into unknown territory, could be understood as ritualistic acts aimed at comprehending and manipulating the inner universe, facilitating a “critical metamorphosis” (Deren, 1965, cited in Moore, 2015, p.332). I opened each session by ritually placing natural materials, symbolising the multiple levels of experience (physical, emotional, cognitive, spiritual), into my holding vessel (a container specifically created for this purpose; see Figure 1). I closed each session by removing these materials, creating a sense of safety and intentionally transitioning in and out of the research space.
Format
I have selected salient moments from my process that touch upon overarching themes in my dissertation to include in this article. I have named these moments Entering, Hiding, Swinging, Sinking, Grounding, Expanding and Participating. The italicised sections were taken from my recorded descriptions of what occurred during the ‘drop-ins’, particularly while Focusing using imagination. The accompanying artworks were created directly after the corresponding ‘drop-in’. I have also included two poems that were written after the weekly research sessions had been completed.
Entering
Figure 2. Shanti Brown, Welcome mat (detail), 2019, found materials and paint on fabric, 790 × 570mm.
Sitting in this quiet space my thoughts are loud and critical. I try to pay attention to my breath but I feel highly resistant to dropping-in. I wriggle around, feeling my anxiety build. Then, an instruction, clear as day, lands into my awareness – “put down your welcome mat.” It is as if the image itself is choosing me (Allen, 1995). Following its lead, I spend the next ten minutes creating a welcome mat, cutting out a rectangular piece of cotton material that I dye a dusty pink. I lay it out in front of me. I fret and fuss about all the creases, tears and straggly bits. It is rough and unfinished. I feel an impulse to iron it but instead let it be just as it is in this moment. I breathe deeply, making peace with my mat. It invites me to let in thoughts, feelings and sensations. They spill onto the mat, lovingly caught, becoming a part of its fabric.
Warming up to body
My first drop-in experience highlights how unnerving it can feel to simply sit still and detach from chronos. My rational mind provides predictability and explanations that give me a sense of peace and control. Tantia explains that trauma is “felt and held in the body” – which results in an avoidance or lack of embodied experience – and recommends a more subtle approach to healing, outlining three “arenas of attention” that may precede embodiment (2014, p.96). These are: (1) attention to the environment; (2) attention to the body boundary; (3) attention to sensation within the body. Each arena helps establish a sense of safety. Creating my welcome mat helped me move through and bridge these “arenas of attention”.
Being with resistance
As I come into contact with a threshold of resistance, I recognise that I have the option to sit with my discomfort or turn away from it. Siegel (2018) refers to this as protective; explaining that presence depends on a sense of safety and therefore perceived dangers can be an obstacle as they produce a reactive state. Spiritual teachings often point out that the more we identify with thoughts, judgments and interpretations, the less likely it is that we are being present (Tolle, 2004, p.23). This invites me to explore some of my own ‘perceived dangers’.
Disembodiment
Johnson states that we live in a world that has become progressively disembodied (2000, p.11), which inhibits our ability to be present. Western civilisation, a culture dominated by our addiction to over-stimulation, pressure and speed (Brown 2014), has much to account for in this. The qualities of such a culture contribute to poor self-regulation and states of internal chaos, inattention, distraction and impulsivity (Brown, 2014).
Trauma and addiction specialist Gabor Maté warns, “the urge to escape exacts a fearful price” (2018, p.14). I see evidence of this in my personal life when I reflect on my teenage and young adult years, which were marked by my struggle with disordered eating, influenced heavily by diet culture. Having strong roots in Western consumerism, diet culture promotes restrictive ways of eating as a means to achieve idealised body types, ultimately as a means to be accepted in an image-obsessed, materialistic world (Thomas, 2019). This contributes to body instability, where the body becomes a “dumping ground for emotional anxiety” (Orbach, 2009, p.142). Body objectification results in a diminished internal awareness of what’s going on inside the body (Thomas, 2019), and when alienated from these signals the opportunity to properly care for oneself is missed.
Other compulsive behaviours, often normalised in our culture, such as endless scrolling on social media, substance use, shopping or overworking, highlight the wide range of ways we tend to avoid being present in our day-to-day lives. Michael Brown, author of The Presence Process, teaches that fiddling with our behaviour or circumstance on the outside may bring temporary relief, but not permanent resolution – not integration (2005, p.32). Maté also emphasises that dismissing “bad habits” or “self-destructive behaviour” hides their functionality (2018, p.14).
Hiding
Figure 3. Shanti Brown, Beneath, 2019, soft pastel, glitter and collage on paper, 640 × 450mm.
A felt sense hides behind my ribs. As I move in closer I notice a heavy blanket and see myself tucked underneath, curled up tight. The weight of the blanket mirrors my heavy heart. I am warm and protected but there is not much room to move. For now I lie quiet in this enclosed space.
Life circumstances
Reminded by my welcome mat to let-in, I used Focusing in this session to notice what was alive inside my body. It became a “moment of opportunity” (Stern, 2004, p.7) to be present with sensations linked with my experiences of grief and loss. I reflect back on the time in my life when my mother, who was only 41 years old at the time, suffered a serious brain injury and spent three months in a coma – the result of a large undetected brain tumour. Overnight, my greatest cheerleader – my mum – had become a silent stranger, who to this day lives with severe disability. Being the eldest of my siblings, I fell into a supportive role during this time, pushing my grief aside.
My drop-in experience highlights how feelings like sadness can exist as ‘always there’, or ‘background’ feelings (Rappaport, 2009). I resonate with Greenspan’s description of grief as ebbing and flowing like the tide, but without the predictability (2004, p.104). Acknowledging my grief also provides me with another lens through which to consider the destructive habits that play a role in numbing those ‘background feelings’ within my body. This helps me appreciate the intricacies and challenges of deepening “embodied self-awareness” (Geller & Greenberg, 2012, p.209).
Swinging
Figure 4. Shanti Brown, Swinging through sky, 2019, soft pastel, 640 × 450mm.
I sway gently on a playground swing. Beside me sits a dark shadow. In silence we swing alongside each other. I begin to swing higher and higher. The shadow starts rapidly expanding. As I continue to swing, the playground begins shrinking underneath me. The ground disappears and I am left swinging through dark expansive space. The shadow has become the night sky. The air is cool and I am alone. I feel gripped by fear with nothing to grasp on to. Suddenly the sky looks right back at me.
The void
Reflecting on my drop-in, I make connections between the fear of swinging through sky and a sense of meaninglessness. The disruption to my family’s life shattered my worldview and brought me face to face with Heidegger’s “thrownness”, which describes our existence as humans as one of “being thrown” into the world (cited in Bolt, 2011, p.3). The frameworks and philosophies that had previously scaffolded my life were replaced with a sense of uncertainty and despair. I liken the experience of this drop-in, where I am confronted with these feelings, to the ‘naked now’, which is Rohr’s (2009) term for the present moment. I am encouraged by Siegel, who reminds us that a tolerance of uncertainty and vulnerability helps therapists support clients in their own search for certainty (2010, p.23).
I consider arts therapist Bruce Moon’s reflection that our ultimate aloneness is an underlying truth of human existence, which forces us to be responsible for our life (2010, p.35). In fostering presence, I come face to face with this reality. Jim Lantz (1993) likens the tension between aloneness and connection to the experience of birth:
The child is cast out from the warmth of symbiosis with the mother. Within a few seconds, the baby is laid back on the mother’s belly. That is the rest of our lives, negotiating our separateness and our connection to others. (Cited in Moon, 2010, p.35)
Sinking
Figure 5. Shanti Brown, Submerged, 2019, modelling clay and collage on paper, 640 × 510mm.
Deep in my chest I am treading water. Eventually I give up the fight and sink down until I reach the bottom of a pool, where I sit. I feel the crushing weight of the water above and around me. Tears stream from my face, lending themselves to this larger body of water. I notice a tiny blue fish, swimming close beside. He is composed and curious, a sympathetic witness to these tender parts. Slowly I rise back to the water’s surface, where the sun now shines warm upon my face.
The felt sense
I notice how powerful it was to not run away from my uncomfortable feeling (tread water) but to surrender to it, and allow myself to experience it fully (sink below the surface). The paradox here is that moving towards ambiguity and the unknown resulted in a sense of clarity. This reminds me of Gendlin’s claim that when a felt sense opens and shifts, emotion may emerge (1996, p.59). What might not make sense to the rational mind can make perfect sense to/in/with the body. Imagery provided a handle for my experiencing, and in this context Siegel’s search for ‘certainty’ (2010, p.23) could be compared to a bodily ‘knowing’ – pure experience without the murkiness of judgment or attempts to understand or solve. This echoes Cynthia Bourgeault: “attention is like a brisk northwest wind blowing away the smoggy awareness we usually settle for” (2003, p.103).
Innate shifting
Gendlin explains how images are projections that the body creates to carry forward change in ways not possible in actual situations (1996, p.215). The changes in images, particularly when there is a sense of a resonating ‘yes’ about the image, are shifts in themselves, causing a change of felt sense. In the imagery one can discover an “incipient energy for movement” that is positive, connecting and healing (Gendlin, 1996, p.220). Gendlin describes this innate impetus experienced in the body as “life-forward direction” (1996, p.259).
I am reminded of a section in Rumi’s poem ‘The Guest House’:
Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight
(Rumi, 1997)
Greenspan beautifully describes this as the experience of “emotional alchemy” (2003, p.74). Becoming attentive to the dark emotions and remaining connected to their energy allows them to organically transform. Greenspan explains that in the alchemy of grief, “going down always precedes coming up” (2003, p.92), and that sorrow often unfolds into something precious – a gratitude for what remains.
Paradox of selves
Sitting in this non-dual space there is a multilevel awareness happening that involves focused awareness and open attention (Siegel, 2018). This helps me to acknowledge the feelings without being overcome by or over-identifying with them, and to allow the space for all parts of me to exist simultaneously.
Elusive I (A poem)
I am
The onlooker,
The swing-pusher
The bright-eyed, broken bits
Of sun-kissed
Fish-ness
The stage-setting sky
A daisy protagonist
Floating up-stream
This revolving I
Or we
A community of actions
Folds in on itself
A cosmic question mark
As body
An exchange
That tastes and intuits
Then asks all over again,
What is left?
That somethingness of nothing
The swoosh in between swings
An endless coming home to breath
Which empties and holds
All at once
The mystery
In multiplicity
Grounding
Figure 6. Shanti Brown, Abseiling, 2019, soft pastel on paper, dimensions unknown.
Figure 7. Shanti Brown, Ground hungry, 2019, photograph.
My head feels heavy like a bobble-head doll. I strap into a safety harness for an abseiling adventure, to explore the territory below. Slowly I transition with my awareness from my head, through my chest, stomach and gut, observing sensations. Suspended, my feet dangle mid-air, uncertain, flailing. I fear I am a bottomless pit. But as I descend even deeper, my toes touch damp, soothing grass. I land on this newfound land, letting my feet sink into the lush earth below. Tears well in my eyes with the recognition I am home.
Seeking ground
Dropping into the body is a process that takes time and careful attention. Tracking the awareness through my body in this drop-in became an experience of grounding, anchoring me in the present moment. I make a connection between my ‘abseiling’ and Gendlin’s (1996) ‘elevator’ analogy for deepening embodied experience. Gendlin describes an internal “descending elevator”, where a felt sense forms halfway down (1996, p.66). He argues that stopping halfway down (a step often bypassed by meditators) and addressing the felt sense here can lead to a better meditative state, as you are addressing what may have been off-kilter in the first place.
As I created response art using natural materials, I came further into my body, feeling nourished and deeply connected to Mother Earth. I reflect on David Abram’s teaching, that, by sheltering ourselves from the “harrowing vulnerability of bodied existence”, we also “insulate ourselves from the deepest wellsprings of joy” (2011, p.7).
Expanding
Figure 8. Shanti Brown, Curious little fish, 2019, ink, pencil and collage on paper, 420 × 297mm.
I am swimming in a little fish tank. I swim up to the glass walls, wondering what is on the other side, and suddenly shatter them down. On the other side I am surprised to find more water, but this time, oceanic, boundless. It is as if I could swim for an eternity in either direction. As I look closer there are objects and sensations here for me to explore and I swim up to each one playfully. I etch pathways of familiarity in the environment, still in awe of the watery more.
Expansion
Geller and Greenberg describe present experience as a “larger spaciousness” that is both bodily and on the level of consciousness (2012, p.120). This sense of widening or opening is a common understanding of presence within the literature. Chung (1990) explains that going beyond the self or ego creates an “expansion of awareness” (cited in Geller & Greenberg, 2012, p.120), and Eberhart and Atkins (2014) describe presence as being in relation to something more that extends beyond the self.
Thinking about the way the fish swam back and forth across the space, I am reminded of the neurotransmitters and pathways in the brain. Eberhart and Atkins (2014) emphasise that presence cannot be taught so much as it can be cultivated with practice. Neuroscience is able to demonstrate this through the phenomenon of neuroplasticity, where studies suggest mindfulness practices can rewire the way our brain functions, helping create new patterns of behaviour (Kass & Trantham, 2014; Treadway & Lazar, 2009).
Eberhart and Atkins emphasise the importance of curiosity and a “surprise-friendly” attitude in the therapeutic context, because of their abilities to grab attention and animate the process (2014, p.117). ‘Shattering’ the glass walls was a reminder that when trapped by narrow narratives, it is in presence that another way of being becomes available. Bourgeault explains that the logical “either–or” can be held by the heart in “both and” without the need to resolve, close down or protect from the pain that ambiguity can bring (2003, p.35).
Participating
Figure 9. Shanti Brown, Arms within arms, 2019, collage on paper, 640 × 510mm.
My arms feel tired and heavy. I notice how busy it seems inside, with people, buildings, machinery, arms within arms, holding, providing, planting and gathering – like a city that doesn’t sleep. “What do you need?” I ask. Then a giant tree sprouts through my arm seeking its atmospheric friend sky. I breathe deeply, sensing flow between the ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ until the boundary between dissolves altogether.
Interconnected
Fostering presence allows us to deepen interoception – to sense the aliveness of the body, and to notice the way it interacts with the environment. It’s a comforting realisation that when I slow down and let go of the need to control, life continues to move and function. Abram (2011) describes the sensing body as an ‘open circuit’ that completes itself only in the surrounding earth – a reciprocity between one kind of dynamism and another kind of dynamism. I notice how vastly different this connectedness feels from swinging through empty space.
Sacred flow
In dropping-in I become aware of how participating in the world – in relationship with art, environment or other beings – is a sacred experience. Rohr refers to this as the “divine dance”, where God is not only a dancer but also the dance itself, which we come to know only through “participatory knowledge” (2016, p.49). This implies, as St Augustine describes, God is “ever ancient and ever new” (cited in Rohr, 2016, p.39). In presence we have the opportunity to experience this ‘ever new’.
Intersubjectivity
Intersubjective theory suggests that the boundaries between beings and objects are more blurred than the individualist culture of the West implies. Intersubjectivity can be described as the shared, co-created moment of meeting (Stern, 2004). The intersubjective matrix “is like oxygen”, in that we breathe it all the time without noticing its presence (Stern, 2004, p.94). This intersubjective experience originates in a shared energetic field, and because our deepest nature is relationship, our individuality comes only secondarily to this fundamental nature of inter-being (De Quincey, 2005). As Marcel (1951) describes, person as subject can ontologically be viewed as figure on the grounds of presence and intersubjectivity (as cited in Dennis, 2015, p.115). In this reality we are no longer the sole owners or guardians of our subjectivity, for our feelings are shaped by the thoughts, feelings and intentions of others (Stern, 2004, p.77). Thus, the boundaries between self and others are inherently permeable, for “to exist is to co-exist” (Marcel, 2008, cited in Dennis, 2015, p.109).
Art and presence
Figure 10. Shanti Brown, Presence, 2019, ink on paper, 420 × 297mm.
Much can be said about the correlations between presence and art-making. McNiff highlights that, unlike our academic histories, work and personal lives, which are so often based on preconception and control, creative expression is about not knowing the end at the beginning (2015, p.25). McNiff, an arts therapist by profession, likens himself to a meditation teacher, believing that repetitive gestures are akin to mindful breathing. These gestures, within the art-making, help with relaxation and moving “out of the control tower” (McNiff, 2015, p.28).
I note how the presence fostered within my drop-ins organically crossed over to the creative response. Cultivating the trust to be in my body deepened my trust in the creative process. In this way, art-making became “a thoroughly contemplative process” (McNiff, 2015, p.28) that could be likened to the highly present-focused state of engagement referred to as ‘flow’. In flow, one’s concept of self slips “below the threshold of awareness” (Csikszentmihalyi, 1992, p.64). Flow is associated with a sense of happiness where one is so concentrated on the task at hand that there is no attention left to think about anything else (Csikszentmihalyi, 1992).
The confrontation with a blank page appears synonymous with coming face to face with the void in my drop-in experience. Just as in moving past/through the resistance to dropping-in, the art-making requires me to undergo a kind of ego death, where “artistic form emerges out of a chaos which seeks its own shape” (Levine, 2005, p.40).
Creating becomes an opportunity to participate mindfully within intersubjective spaces. In presence, my sensitivity to my aesthetic response is heightened. This collaboration between the seen and the unseen speaks to the power of poesis, which happens not in accordance with the intellect but through the surrender to a process (Levine, 2005). One example of this is the way in which my tendencies to seek symmetry and ‘fix’ scruffy bits eased over time. I embraced messiness, and the artworks also began to take up more physical space. The letting go of control and increased sense of inner spaciousness was mirrored in my art-making.
The image itself can play a part in containing the ‘now’ (Coles, 2014, p.77), and reflects the present experience in its ability to suspend time and hold contradictions. I can learn from the object, ‘it is what it is’. As Moon states, “Art brings our fears, loneliness, and anguish close to us. It does not rid us of the difficulties, but it enables us to live courageously in their presence” (2010, p.62).
Presence (A poem)
A gentle gaze
Offering
A practice
Potent
Presence peels away the layers
Befriends fear
Presence isn’t picky
Presence participates
Moves
Regathers
A paradox
With welcoming arms
A benevolent intersubjectivity
Presence whispers
Let go
Of everything you think
About presence
Ushers me back to a star-lit sky
The place that is space
To begin again
To be again
Implications for practice
This research process fundamentally informs my emerging creative arts therapy practice. The intersubjective discoveries, in particular, have shifted the way I view and experience my interactions with clients. Craig (2009) warns that in entering willingly into the private world of another and experiencing their way of life as it appears to them, one runs the risk of being changed oneself. In presence I don’t only ‘risk’ being changed but am inherently changed simply by entering the shared space. As a “frightening prospect” (Craig, 2009, p.72), courage becomes a prerequisite for both the client and therapist.
A therapist’s attentive presence fosters the therapeutic relationship and therefore the success of therapy (Craig, 2009). There is value, therefore, in maintaining awareness about my body’s energetic existence within the therapeutic space and the extent to which it facilitates and communicates openness. When there is a lack of presence, it is like “communication without communion” (Marcel, 1964, cited in Dennis, 2015, p.110).
Decision-making within therapy is not purely intellectual, rather it is a “co-constituted process” (Gallagher & Payne, 2015, p.74). Clinical reasoning becomes a joint action, between the therapist, client and environment. In turn, this facilitates the counter-weighing of the “high-order mental or intellectual process” of the typically Cartesian clinical reasoning (Gallagher & Payne, 2015, p.68). Practising presence has heightened my awareness of the shared quality of the therapeutic space, and the ongoing flux between client, therapist, art materials, art object and the physical space.
Discovering Tantia’s (2014) areas of attention has supported my ability to be present with clients, becoming an effective grounding process to use before sessions. It has also been an invaluable offering for clients, providing practical and safe stepping-stones to deepening embodiment. Tracking my breath, tuning in to my aesthetic responses or feeling Mother Earth beneath my feet are other grounding tools that have been supportive during and after sessions.
Empathy
Fostering presence also helps me to maintain ‘empathic balance’, which requires continual shifts between an empathetic focusing on other and self (Skovholt, 2012). Skovholt (2012) warns that the consequence of unbalanced empathy can result in insufficient or premature closures. Premature closure occurs when the therapist feels threatened or overwhelmed by the painful struggles of the client and stops the material before it is fully felt. It is a defence mechanism often used unconsciously by the therapist (Skovholt, 2012). Being present allows me to extend empathy towards my client, and to welcome and accept whatever arises in the shared encounter, for “clients deeply value our ability to feel their pain” (Skovholt, 2012, p.126). Wax (2018) supports this by suggesting that self-compassion is a prerequisite for extending compassion to others.
Equally, presence helps me to avoid insufficient closure (Skovholt, 2012), specifically, the potential for boundary blurring and over-identification. In presence I can extend gentle curiosity towards any countertransference that arises. This empathetic presence and emotional acceptance for oneself is a good base for effective client work and can help prevent burnout (Skovholt, 2012). Embracing my own experience of resistance has also helped me to accept and work with the resistance that my clients experience in a presence-oriented process. Incorporating rituals to open and/or close therapy sessions, such as making tea, taking off shoes, selecting an affirmation card or reciting karakia (prayer), has also been a helpful way of providing containment and physically/emotionally/spiritually transitioning between spaces.
Future applications
Creative arts therapists benefit from developing self-awareness about their own capacities for presence, and further research into the range of therapists’ experiences would be worthwhile. In particular, researching the relationship between therapists’ personal presence practices and their facilitative presence in sessions could be a valuable contribution to the field of creative arts therapy.
Conclusion
This qualitative study investigated my experience of fostering presence as a way of being through a ritualised contemplative practice. I used mindfulness, Focusing and art-making to support me to sit with uncertainty and tolerate discomfort in the present moment. I discovered that what I initially considered a barrier to presence was a vital element of the process – an invitation to meet my experience with attentive curiosity. In fostering presence my awareness of intersubjectivity was heightened, providing relief from feelings of isolation and meaninglessness. I can apply these insights to my work as a creative arts therapist by prioritising attentive curiosity when with my clients, practising mindful embodiment in sessions, and, finally, by trusting in the alchemy of emotions that is possible in presence.
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Author
Shanti Brown
MAAT(Clin)(Hons), PG Dip (Arts Therapy), BFA, AThR
Shanti is a creative arts therapist based in Ngāmotu New Plymouth, Aotearoa. She works in private practice supporting children and adults, with a focus on grief and trauma. She has experience in a range of settings, including primary and secondary schools, where she has provided both individual and group therapy. Shanti draws on a variety of modalities, including mindfulness practices, sandplay, Focusing, and Internal Family Systems (IFS). She is passionate about the role of compassionate presence in fostering personal transformation and emotional well-being.