Empowered Ease
Welcome to Empowered Ease, hosted by Jenn Ohlinger—a holistic coach, founder of The Moonflower Collective, and critical care nurse dedicated to revolutionizing women's health. Join us each week as we delve into the transformative stories of healers, health practitioners, and everyday women like you, challenging the patriarchal framework through empowerment and holistic healing. Through engaging storytelling, our podcast highlights each woman's unique journey toward embracing their feminine gifts, trusting their body, and prioritizing their mind, body, and soul. Discover how by empowering ourselves, we can pave the way for stronger relationships and a more balanced world.
Empowered Ease
Crystal Hurley Healing Through Art, Trauma Recovery, and Creative Resilience
Hi!! I would love to hear from you!
What happens when a traumatic event leads you back to a forgotten passion? After a life-altering car accident, Crystal Hurley, therapeutic art and self healing coach, found solace in painting, which proved to be more than just a hobby—it became a powerful form of therapy. Join me as I share her personal story of overcoming post-concussive syndrome through art, and how this rediscovery inspired her to establish a nonprofit aimed at helping others find healing through creativity. Each brushstroke brought new layers of emotional release, clarity, and a renewed sense of purpose, transforming challenges into opportunities for growth.
Art has a remarkable ability to express the unspeakable, and we explore how various techniques provide not just catharsis but also profound emotional healing. Listen as we delve into therapeutic painting sessions fueled by raw emotions and the liberating process of scream painting, where perfection takes a backseat to authentic expression. Discover the magic of neurographic art, a unique technique that helps ease mental blockages and promote emotional balance, offering a fresh perspective on problem-solving and self-discovery. These creative practices are not just hobbies—they're lifelines during life's most turbulent times.
Meet Crystal, a shining example of resilience through art, whose passion for scream painting has been a beacon of strength for her and her son. Through her inspiring journey, we uncover the transformative power of artistic expression and self-care techniques like morning affirmations and breathing exercises that draw out subconscious thoughts. Crystal's story ignites hope for others to explore their own creative potential, and her nonprofit endeavors promise to extend this healing influence far and wide. Join us as we celebrate the empowering capacity of creativity to uplift, heal, and transform lives.
Her Link Tree
https://linktr.ee/GracefulArtNP
Her Website
http://gracefulartnselfawakening.com/
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Okay, tell me a little bit about how you developed this rage painting or kind of how your nonprofit came about.
Speaker 2:First and foremost, I got back into painting, into my art, um going it'll be four years this summer, but, um, it started because of a car accident that will be four years in april. That happened and I suffered like a, a very big concussion that I didn't even hit my head that hard, I didn't know I hit head, I did not pass out or anything like that, and the wreck was not that bad, um, but apparently I slammed my head against the window and, um, a couple of days later I started having the symptoms of having a concussion, like really bad, and it lasted weeks and it just kind of continuously got worse so, which became post-concussive syndrome, and with that I had major migraines, light sensitivity, noise sensitivity, tendonitis, which is ringing, or any foreign noise inside the ear. A lot of people associate it with just ringing, but apparently it's any noise that's inside the ear and you can't hear outside. Um, and sometimes it's horror, so bad that it you just feel sick and you have to lay down. But with that it also messed with my speech and at first I didn't notice that I had anything wrong with my speech. I didn't know there was a delayed reaction in thought versus what was coming out and processing thought versus what was coming out and processing. But after a few weeks and a month I started noticing it and it was became so frustrating that being frustrated about it, being upset that I wasn't able to communicate, stressed me out even more. So being stressed out caused it to be worse, which also caused the post-concussive syndrome symptoms to be worse, and all that lovely stuff.
Speaker 2:So, going through speech therapy and physical therapy, both my therapists suggested I get back into art because they started noticing that I have a very creative mind, because I would notice little objects and pictures on the ceilings that has a little black dots all over. That you find in doctor's offices and hospital ceiling tiles, yeah, yeah, and I would just find random objects and going into like the CT room where you get CT CAT scans from, I would actually they have pictures and pretty art up on the ceiling. I started finding. I started finding animals in the trees that nobody else saw. Well, they didn't notice them and I started pointing them out to them. So now they actually point the animals out to other patients so the patients can be a little bit calmer going through the CT machine and so they're like you have such a creative mind. Do you need to like have you ever painted or done any art? It's like, yeah, I did when I was younger.
Speaker 2:Um, what about writing? It's like oh, yeah, I love writing, but with, um, the light sensitivity and everything, I also had a problem with my eyes. I say that I broke my eyes because my eyes don't focus like they're supposed to anymore, where if I'm looking off in the distance and then I go to look at something close up, at first my eyes would not refocus at all, and in order to get them to refocus, I would have to close my eyes completely for a couple seconds and then face whatever it was that I was going to be looking at and then open my eyes. Um, but with that looking at words or numbers or anything that's small writing, even the clock, the digital clock on the, the stove in the microwave, would double over and get blurry, so that everything would mush together and it's frustrating, oh yes, and so if I looked at it for more than like a minute, I would get extreme migraines because my eyes were trying to focus and trying to line everything up, but it wasn't.
Speaker 2:It wasn't working, so it overstimulated my brain and my optic nerves so I couldn't write.
Speaker 1:And when.
Speaker 2:I did write it. It was very interesting to watch later how my words went around the page. Oh yeah. And so I tried drawing as well. But I had the same issue, because in the middle, or if there's like five lines, you find the one. You eventually find the one that's the right line and you just follow it. But that takes a lot of time and a lot of frustration. So I started painting and at first I just painted like fluid paint and just did little flowers and stuff like that.
Speaker 2:I did watch tutorials to get myself back into painting because I've been out of practice for over 20 years, so I watched a lot of stories. After a few months I had a friend um go, hey, you know you're not stumbling over your words as much as you were before. I'm like what? Like, yeah, your, your speech is becoming so much clearer. I was like, really, and they go yeah, are you painting and they go, are you painting every day? I was like, really, and they go yeah, are you painting? And they go, are you painting every day? I was like, yeah, I am, because I started giving my stuff away because I had so much.
Speaker 1:And, as you, started painting more, your speech got better. What was the timeframe on this that you saw improvement?
Speaker 2:Well, I it was probably a couple months like two months at the least was when everybody started noticing a difference. But if you look, if I look back at it, it was very gradual, very slow process to where I wasn't as stressed, very slow process to where I wasn't as stressed. I felt a little more relaxed, even like at the time I didn't realize it. But looking back I can see that there was a time where I started getting less frustrated. I started not worrying about stuff that wasn't constantly on my mind. It wasn't constantly on my mind, and being in doing art and painting helped with that. And after a couple months of the speech problems, um, people started noticing a difference and within six months it was completely clear. But if notice, today there's still times that I have to pause because I'll start stumbling over my words or the specific word won't come to me right away. So I have to pause, but I'm actually able to get out the things that I'm trying to say, whereas before, like four years years ago, I wasn't able to. So yeah, that's amazing.
Speaker 1:So tell me how far out from your accident were you when you started painting?
Speaker 2:I started painting. My accident was in April 2021. I started painting um right before uh, I'm trying to timeline it with school um, it was probably towards the beginning, middle of summer, so probably about the end of June. Early July is when I actually started painting um and but like trying to do the writing and the journaling and the drawing was probably accident was in April, june. I started all that in May or try to okay, um, and then my painting itself.
Speaker 2:I started very slowly around the end of June to early July and then by November, in that December, a lot of people started noticing the big difference. Wow. So it was when somebody pointed it out. I was like, oh my gosh, that's amazing. So I continued it and then in 2022, like mid-2022, everybody started suggesting that I start selling my artwork.
Speaker 2:I'm like I am not that good, but my speech improved so much more over the next six months, um, from december to like june of 2022, and, um, my balance even even got, even improved. And when I'm having like really bad migraines, I will go and I'll go paint and it helps ease the migraines off and it'll help ease the tinnitus and stuff off as well, because when you're not doing anything, those things become more noticeable to you when it's bothering you. So when you do something that you enjoy, like painting and just getting your mind to focus on something else or not focus at all, your symptoms improve. It might be just for that 10 minutes, but for that 10 minutes you're not having to suffer from all that that pain or anxiety, if that makes sense.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that. That's beautiful.
Speaker 2:And um. So through all that, I did start selling my art and in 20, was it 2023? I decided I was going to join a uh, a creative it was creative mastermind, um, and that helped creative women grow their creative businesses, and so I started that in 2023. And then that was January 2023 and to help me grow what I was assuming was going to be my painting business. So. But as I started, I was like, how, how is my art itself going to help other people? Because I wanted to help, I started wanting to help other people with their problems, like I had similar to mine in a way that art helped me.
Speaker 2:But at the time I was like how somebody just buying a piece of painting going to help in situations like that? Yes, paintings, um, do make people, people, people, people happy just looking at the art and it resonating with them. But in the back of my mind I'm like, no, there's got to be something more to my art that I can help people with. And then all of a sudden, like duh, it's been very therapeutic for me. So therapeutic, therapeutic, therapeutic art Is that such a thing? I Googled it and it is. There's actually like art therapists.
Speaker 2:I didn't know that, and so I started digging deeper into the therapeutic art side of everything. Deeper into the therapeutic art side of everything, and with my speech therapist and my physical therapist, they taught me breathing exercises like breath work, and some meditation exercises too, that you don't have to sit still for. So I wanted to try to incorporate that into into doing my art, which I did without even realizing it at first. But I wanted to find a way to actively sub and consciously do that together with art and breath work.
Speaker 1:and mindfulness like being more intentional with the way you use it and when you're using it to, to intentionally help you release that stress and to help you get those emotions out.
Speaker 2:Because what I started noticing at the same time that my speech was getting better, I started noticing before I started painting again. I started noticing that old um, old things from my past abusive relationships and stuff like that started coming up. All the flashbacks started coming back up with things I thought I dealt with, thought I got over. Well, in honesty, I just buried it down deep and was like I'm not going to let it bother me anymore. But your body says knock, knock, knock. I think a lot of us do that right.
Speaker 1:Hello, I'm not going anywhere.
Speaker 2:Yep, I started digging deeper into therapeutic art and the mindfulness side of everything. I started peeling back those layers of myself and my past and purging it out. Instead of just burying it deep, I started letting it out, working, working through the emotions connecting with the past trauma. So, in when you connect with it and you acknowledge it, yep, hi, that happened. Hi, abusive incident yeah, you, you, even though that happened to me, you made me be able to stand up, you made me stronger for that. So that's you connecting to that incident that you felt bad about and that you tried to hide.
Speaker 1:And then like revisiting and reframing your trauma.
Speaker 2:Yes, Instead of letting it, instead of it taking you over, okay, you basically stand face to face with it and make, get to the point to where it's not bigger than you and you just shrink it down and eventually it's your same size. So then you can face off with it, so to speak, and work through it. And when you work through it, after connecting to it and acknowledging that it happened or that you feel that way, you can work through it and help yourself, live past it and acknowledge that's part of you. It's not who you are's not, it doesn't make you and it's not you, but it did happen and it's made you stronger for it. And once you realize that you can be stronger and that you can step over that and step past it actually not step over it, because if you step over it, you're just letting it linger- so you're having to open that door and take that step and take that leap to go through your trauma, to go through those negative thoughts and the negative emotions.
Speaker 2:And when you do that, that weight, that weight that you carried for so long, starts falling off. And I do that with a lot of things. I did that with my past. There's still times that some things still come up, but it doesn't bother me as much as it did before, and that gets easier as you do it. Yes, yes, because I'm not going to sit here and tell you that those things will never, ever bother you again, because that's not. I can't promise that, you know. Yeah, but when you work through it and you acknowledge it, it helps you to where, if it ever comes back up again or something similar happens again, you have a better way of dealing with it, working through it and not letting it beat you down what a resilient way to approach, like a way to practice resiliency.
Speaker 1:Take your negative feelings and make them a positive experience. I love it.
Speaker 2:Well, and towards the, towards September of 2023, I got my cert. I got my certification in therapeutic art in August 2023. And my certification, my certificate yeah, my certification certificate for self-healing, the breath work and the meditation process of the therapeutic side of it, and I've started putting it together. So, towards the end of September, of course, I was questioning myself like how, how do I know and how can I show people? This is probably how do I know and how can I show people? This is probably why what happened next happened. But I was like how can, how am I going to be able to show people that it actually works for now? Because I don't have anything now. That's really going on. Well, you've got to be careful with what you wish, what you ask for, because the very next month, october 2023, my abusive giving him custody of my son and restricting my visitation and taking my visitation away until further notice. And how he did this was he. You know, he basically lied and falsified information and I was not aware if there was a court date or anything like that. So I wasn't there. I wasn't at the court date in August 2023 to um plead my case, plead why I wasn't in Alabama and why I came back to North Carolina and so in October he came up here and presented the judge up here with those papers and on October 27th I had to watch my son leave um, and I've been fighting it ever since. So I'm so sorry.
Speaker 2:Painting with, actually thank you. Spring painting was actually born from that. Because I did paint and um, I did try to help myself through this time and at first I thought I was and you know, lying to yourself, not being in denial that you're not OK. So one day I got into an argument with my boyfriend and I could have sworn. I was pissed off, mad at him and I was like, forget this, I'm going outside. And I was like you know what, instead of just going outside, I'm gonna grab my paint, I'm gonna grab my easel and I'm gonna grab my canvas.
Speaker 2:And at this time it was a. The canvas I had was a two foot by three foot canvas and I I came into my art room and I sat in front of my paints. It's like I can't just grab paints. What color it? Um resonates with what I'm feeling right now and at the time it was such a huge cluster of emotions and feelings and frustration and at the time I didn't know that. It was like a whole bunch of everything at the same time, being upset about what happened, with my son being frustrated that he wasn't there for Christmas or New Year's, feeling like nobody understood what I was going through. Nobody understood, nobody was. I felt like nobody was taking me seriously. I felt like nobody was taking the situation seriously. So it was a whole bunch of everything piled together and then me and boyfriend got into an argument and it just started to overwhelm and explode. But before it exploded, I came in, I got sat down with my paints and whatever color came to me with what I was feeling is what I grabbed. I grabbed the paint and I mixed them with um. I mixed them so they would run more easily on the canvas and I packed my backpack and my canvas bag and everything.
Speaker 2:And at first I was like, oh, I grabbed brushes and things because I was like I had no idea what I was going to do. I just knew I was going to go paint. I knew I needed to scream and so when I got out there I set everything up and at this point I took a stick and dipped it into one of my paint bottles, and I was just writing on the canvas with the stick, and then I was, and then I threw paint on there. And the more I threw paint, at first I was just like easy dripping the paint on there, like. And then I was like I started throwing the paint on there. I took the paint and rubbed it all over my hands and started punching the canvas, even with my non-dominant hand. And then I saw a pine cone and I picked that pine cone up, I drenched it with paint and at first I was like toss it just barely, because I was like, oh, I don't want to break the canvas. I think I can do a little bit better than that. Let's see how much this canvas can take, because I've already punched it, I've already smacked it with a stick and the canvas still held up. So I was like all right if it breaks, you know what? Whatever, if this canvas just falls apart, I don't care, I've got to let this out.
Speaker 2:And so I started throwing, throwing the pine cone. And at the same time I was throwing the pine cone, I was just screaming and I and at one point I even was like I can't believe this is happening, like why, you know, yelling at my ex, yelling at boyfriend, yelling at myself, um, yelling at god, even and um, and stomping on the ground on the devil's head, you know. And then I realized that I actually wasn't mad at my boyfriend. But so I started throwing that, that pine cone, and I hit the canvas every single time and I just threw it harder and harder, and harder. And this one time I threw the pine cone so hard it went over the canvas and just barely touched the top. It just scraped off and bounced and went flying through the woods and I just started laughing and I was like, oh, my god, I can't believe that happened.
Speaker 2:And all of a sudden I realized that all that frustration and what everything negative I was feeling, all the anger, all the um just wanting to hit someone was gone. And that's when I decided I was like you know what I like, where I am right now, I'm not going to do anymore. And I stepped back. I was like Holy cow, that is amazing. I can't believe I did that, um. And then it was all the trees, the way they were.
Speaker 2:At that point At first I was like, oh, I'm going to put grass there, I'm going to put this here and this there and, um, after a meeting I had because I stopped painting outside because I had a meeting I had to go to um on zoom, so I stopped for an hour and then I was like, oh, I know, I'm not done for today, and so I started doing the details on the trees and everything. And at five o'clock that evening I stopped and I was like, well, I know it's not done and I took a step back. I was like, oh my, I took a picture of it. I was like, oh my god, I can't believe I did that. Oh my, and it just sat with me and it was like overwhelmingly beautiful and surprising that that came from me.
Speaker 2:And, um, then later that night I'm like, no, she's done, there's nothing else I need to do with this. I don't, it doesn't need grass, it's perfect the way it is. And, oh my god, like everybody loved it and I wanted to keep it. But, um, my boyfriend said that I need and he's right, I needed to put that, that emotion, out to other people so they can experience it as well.
Speaker 2:And at first I didn't know that anybody was going to feel what I felt at the time I was doing it. But I went to an event and I set it up, not expecting to sell it, and everybody that was that was the main attraction Everybody just graduated like, gravitated towards it and like, oh my God, wow, you, all the emotions in that. I was like, really yeah, you were like mad angry laughing. I was like, yeah, actually was all that and so cool that people could see that I thought it was really cool and somebody actually bought it and they bought it for. They bought it for 250 bucks. Awesome, that's amazing. Um, I hate that it's gone but at the same time, I'm glad that somebody got it that loves it.
Speaker 1:I am making.
Speaker 2:I am making prints of it and I have it on the background of my computer.
Speaker 1:It's all good, you saved a copy of what it looks like.
Speaker 2:I love that, oh yeah, oh yeah, I did it's. I have it everywhere.
Speaker 1:It's on my Facebook page is oh, so people can see what's your Facebook page.
Speaker 2:My Facebook page is Chris Hurley.
Speaker 1:It's C-R-Y-S-H-U-R-L-E-Y like the brand Hurley and then on my nonprofit page it's Graceful Art Dash Nonprofit.
Speaker 2:So if people want to see it. They can check it out. Yes, and so that's how Spring Painting was was born and I started doing it more. It took me a little bit to do another one, of course, because you aren't always wanting to scream, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah um so thank goodness, you're right, and so I do paint, paint, but, like, my paintings are different than my screen paintings and each screen painting is completely different. You don't have to make a beautiful picture, you don't have to have a scenic view or anything it can be. You can leave it as chaotic as you want, or you can bring the positive and bring in less chaos into the painting if you'd like, and or you can do like mixed media endings like that one up there at the top. I know y'all can't see it, but it basically I did, um, I did it in texture, so it is very textured and.
Speaker 2:I did it in different layers, with the purging first and um different layers of textured paint which I made myself, like I use salt for texture or sand, oh cool. And on top of doing each layer, I started taking magazine clippings of words, like positive words, and pictures, even stickers, of different things that made me happy and that made me think of something happy, and I put it onto the canvas as well. And I didn't cover everything up, but some things did get covered up and just little bits here and there covered up. Some are completely showing. And I even started seeing a woman's face start to form, even started seeing a woman's face start to form. So I embellished on it and like I made um her hair, so to speak, and the different textures and different objects, like I put a butterfly, a 3d butterfly sticker, to where her hair would be, so it looked like a hair clip. So, and then one of my trees are also in it in there, so it can be anything.
Speaker 2:And another one I've done is like I used watercolors, and the watercolor one was done on my son's birthday, this in 2024. And I had to use my inside paint voice because it was dark and I was here by myself and I didn't get to talk to him and I wanted to cry. So I grabbed a tablecloth and put it out on the floor. I grabbed the canvas and at this point I was like you know what I'm gonna do watercolors and I got the canvas wet. I started dripping the watercolors everywhere and then took a straw and started blowing it different directions and it came out really cool. It took a few hours and then I did neurographic art on it.
Speaker 1:Explain what the neurographic painting is, because that's really cool too, it is.
Speaker 2:The neurographic art is basically it's neuro, like your brain, your neurons from your brain, like what you were talking about earlier. It helps you. You can do it different ways. The therapeutic way is to take your problem that you want to solve, that you don't have an answer for, and write it on the back of the canvas or the paper, whatever you're doing it on. Write it on the back and then, um again, breathing and letting yourself just go and you take a pen, a pen, a marker, whatever you want to do, and take and draw a line from one side of the paper to the other. But when I say draw a line, you don't purposely draw a straight line, purposely. Draw a curved line. You don't purposely draw a straight line, purposely draw a curved line. If you feel like you need to go up with your hand in your pen, you're supposed to go down because you're transforming. You're supposed to go the opposite direction of what your mind wants.
Speaker 1:You're fighting your urges.
Speaker 2:You're trying to do the opposite of every instinct Letting go of control, letting go of control to where you're reframing your thought process, because the lines of neuro art is your thoughts and um. When you reframe them and stop going in the direction that you're used to going and change the direction of what's normal, that helps you reshape and reform.
Speaker 1:So it's kind of like a doodle. You like start a line and then the whole time you're trying to do the opposite of what you're instinctually wanting to do and you just let that flow.
Speaker 2:Yes, and the idea of the lines isn't. It's not like. It's not like taking a line and just drawing it until you stop. All over the paper it's different lines and it can go up down, sideways or whatever.
Speaker 2:So you fill the paper with like several of these, yeah, from one end of the paper to the other yep, and like you don't want to bring that line back to the same side, because you're taking that thought and you're weaving it in and out to the other end, to the other side of your problem, and so you're trying. So the idea of neurographic art is helping you figure out how to work a problem out, even if you're not thinking about it at that moment. You eventually were like oh yeah, you know what it's, just comes to you.
Speaker 1:It's hard to explain, it's like you're like tricking your brain into being open to something different is what it sounds like yes, that's exactly.
Speaker 2:You're exactly right. And in the neuro graphic art there's different shapes. Going deeper into the therapeutic side there's also, each is like.
Speaker 1:there's a meaning associated with some of the like shapes and things that you're doing oh, how interesting to do that and then look it up.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 2:And like the therapeutic side of it too. Again, I did this for like the screen painting, but for from the therapeutic side from the problem, solving part of it and not just making it pretty. Art is the colors. You can choose whatever colors you want, but the colors if you do red on one side, you have to balance it out and do red on the other side and and you have to do like you can't do one section, you have to do like three or more sections, like when I say sections, it's like different parts of each side of the line, so you can have three parts you color in. But if you do that, you have to do the other side.
Speaker 1:So it needs to be symmetrical with the colors. The lines are not symmetrical, but your colors are symmetrical. Yeah, okay, what does that do? Do you know?
Speaker 2:um, it helps you balance out your inner self and your emotions. But, but I did forget one part when, before you do the colors and stuff and the shapes you want to take, the intersections. And intersections is where the lines cross over each other. Okay, and round out the corners, because those sharp edges of the corners, where your thoughts overlap, where they turn, yes, are sharp edges, and those thoughts they're like, oh, oh, where you're stuck, uh-huh, it's just like binding. So when you round them out, it makes it um, oh, it makes it um, smoother and easier to navigate through the thoughts so you let yourself go freely fighting your instinct.
Speaker 1:Instincts, lines all over the paper. Does it matter how many lines you put nope, nope, so as many lines you're feeling from one side of the paper to another corner of the paper and then you go through and no line is supposed to.
Speaker 1:You're not supposed to mimic the line, okay, so no two lines are the same yep, you let yourself flow with each one, fighting your instinct, trying to do the opposite. Then you go back and you soften all the sharp edges and turns with what, like the same color, you go over you just draw over it.
Speaker 1:Yep, I think the one I saw of yours almost looked like you had thickened some of your lines, like drawn over the lines some more, yep, and that's where the intersections are Okay so, oh, okay. So where they cross over each other, you're thickening those areas up. Yes, it actually okay. So we're describing this, but if you know what neurons in the brain look like, um, do you have this picture on your website too?
Speaker 2:I, I do. Uh, I don't think it's on my website yet, but it is on um Facebook and it is also on the nonprofit page, graceful art nonprofit and on the Chris Hurley page.
Speaker 1:It ends up actually looking similar to like what a neuron looks like up close under a microscope. That's why it's so interesting.
Speaker 2:And then you balance out the color.
Speaker 1:Yep, it's called what? Nero? Okay, it's really cool. I mean it turns out looking really cool too. It reminds me of some of the doodles I would do in high school, but like with much more intention behind it. Yes, yes and so, like I said, so that's an exercise for when you're feeling stuck and like you need a solution.
Speaker 2:Okay, Yep, yep, that it definitely can be. That's one. That is one factor of neuro um, graphic art. And then, you know, people also turn it into just, oh, I forgot, I didn't put it back on the wall, but, um, like, what I did here is I didn't go into the therapeutic process of neuro art itself. I did the colors, but I didn't know I was going to do neuro art at first. Again, it's just what came out. It just you go with the flow and whatever you feel like at that time, go with it. And that's what I was like okay, I'm gonna do neuro art and then my neurons. At first I was just going to like, doodle on it and then, like, as I did a line, it just ended up being a neuro line and I just did more. And then, um, after I did the lines and rounded them out, I also put positive affirmations and positive words around the different ones.
Speaker 2:And I put my son's name in the middle.
Speaker 2:So when I hung it up and when you look at it like this, you really can't see much, you know, you just see colors in the lines. When I hung it up, with his name being right side up in the middle and I was just looking at it, there is a dark figure that looks like a person and um. In the person you can see the face just looks mean and it just goes around his name off to the side, behind all the lines, and then there's another face, just a face like almost like they're trying to eat him up um, going down towards his name, but also again above, where all the um thick lines are um, and when I look at that I'm like, oh my god, it's like keeping him from from evil, it's keeping him safe, because where his name is is like, if you look at his name, it's right here, just where it's all bright oh yeah, if you look at the painting, it's like in the center and circled by like some really bright, vibrant colors with the dark outside Right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, red, and then, like the, the figure that I was talking about is over here. You probably can't see it here. Yeah, it's off to the right Upper side of the painting and the face that looks like it's eating him is like on the right upper side, but slightly lower than the big figure. I was just looking. I was like, oh my God, that's really cool. It's really cool how the colors and the lines just form different things, and I know if somebody else looks, looks at it, they're not going to see the same thing, and that's fine, because that's the great thing about art, you know.
Speaker 1:I was like that's kind of the point. Right there you're pulling your own demons out of there. I love it.
Speaker 2:That's so cool so cool.
Speaker 1:Well, crystal, this is amazing. I, I think this is so cool, so you teach other people this. Now, what kind of? What kind of people are you teaching?
Speaker 2:I'm my focus in. The reason I did this nonprofit is why I'm building the nonprofit is because I'm trying to reach. I try to reach anybody that needs help with releasing their emotions and and want to do it in a creative, fun way, in a different, healthy way. But my main people that I'm wanting to help the most are those that can't afford to go out and spend $150 to $250 an hour at a, at a therapist or anything like that to help release some of the things that the negative thoughts and the things that are going on in their lives. I wasn't able to, and if it wasn't for insurance I wouldn't have been able to go to the physical therapist or the the speech therapist.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you kind of stumbled upon art therapy by chance, and I don't think that's covered by insurance.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, I found one company that is oh, that's cool, nearby Yep, but it's not completely covered by insurance. Yeah, it's like half and half.
Speaker 1:That's so awesome that you're trying to provide it for people for free. So do you do these? Um, when you do, when you do these workshops or classes with people where you teach them this art therapy and your scream art, do you do it all in person? Do you do any of that virtually?
Speaker 2:yes, I am wanting not to just reach my local community, but I'm also wanting to venture out and reach online the online community too.
Speaker 2:So when I do this like I again, because this is brand new and last month I did, on the 19th and the 26th of January, I did in-person classes, but on the 18th and the 25th, on Saturday, I did my online class and I did it in a private Facebook group and it was a paid ticket one, so to help raise money for getting supplies and getting my um fees and stuff going for the non-profit um. So right now I am offering low priced ticket classes beautiful, excuse me, and what I? What I'm, because this was brand new to me doing the online and doing in person. I am tweaking it a little bit and, um, I do, when I do online one, I also want to be able to do the in person the same weekend or in the same time frame, but the online one would be inside a private facebook group where even the in-person people that participate in person would also be able to access the online, the facebook group or the private group, as well, awesome, I love that.
Speaker 1:And then you use the. We are going to use any money you make to put back into the company to get art supplies, and so if someone's interested in learning more about this about either donating or, you know, getting in class with you or putting you in connection with someone that could benefit from this how do they get ahold of you?
Speaker 2:Well, you can either go and message me on Chris Hurley, you can DM. Go and message me on Chris Hurley, you can DM me there. Or you can DM me at graceful art nonprofit on Facebook, or you can go to my web, my website, which is graceful artcom. The end like the letter N, so it's graceful art and self healing. Sorry.
Speaker 1:I'm going to put this on the notes to the show notes, but so it's graceful art the letter N and then self awakeningcom. I love that Beautiful. So I ask everyone this um, ms Crystal crystal, but what is your go-to self-care when you're having like a hard time? What's the thing you do that helps you find peace and picks you up? Do your number one, yeah, I would guess, no less but.
Speaker 2:But no, if, if I'm not able to, if I'm not able to paint or if I'm not able to go outside, um, I have my sketchbooks, I have you can do it on a piece of paper. I will do um, the neurographic art. If something's bothering me, I will try to write. Do it the therapeutic way, write it the problem out on the back, who is doing it? Or like what's causing it? Um, and then do the lines and try to figure out the um, the solution, and um. But let it come to me. I don't try to force it, because if you try to force it you're gonna overthink it and then you're just gonna get overwhelmed with all the thoughts that come to you at once.
Speaker 2:I bet that's part of the therapy is learning how to let it flow, because it's not easy for us, and then you're just going to get overwhelmed with all the thoughts that come to you at once.
Speaker 1:I bet that's part of the therapy is learning how to let it flow, because it's not easy for us.
Speaker 2:No, it's not, but, and that's why, like, if you still yourself going a certain way up, nope, let me go this way, because you're redirecting your thoughts and your, your thought process. The other thing that I really like to do, other than doodle and my paint the screen painting is, uh, zentangles. I love zentangles. So, yes, like those type of things is my go-to when I'm stressed out and can't paint. Um, another thing that I try to do every morning. I don't do it every morning, but I try to do the affirmations Um, you know, I am strong, I am creative, creative, creative. And um, you know I won't. Or um, I am, you know, I won't, or um, I am, you know yeah, I love my affirmations as well, morning and night I do.
Speaker 1:I don't do them every day, but I do them a lot.
Speaker 2:So yeah and um. Another thing that I do, or try to do when I feel like I've woke up, in a bad mood, is I would go and draw my breath and basically all it is is I draw a line. When I breathe in, the line goes up. And breathe out, the line goes down.
Speaker 2:And if I'm, if I'm holding, like, if I hold my breath for the count of four, three, four count, I go up until I let the breath out and then I go down until I stop exhaling. And if I pause, if I pause and just you know, hold it for a minute and not do anything on the breath out, I go straight across and then back up when I inhale again. And when I'm done with that I'll go back and look at it. And sometimes when you look at what you've done whether it's painting, whether it's drawing, whether it's writing or the neuro lines or the Zentangles or even drawing your breath when you go back and look at it, you will notice something that came up when you were doing that that you didn't realize. At the moment you're like oh crap, I didn't realize, I was thinking that, and if something like that happens, I'll write it down next to the line where I noticed the thought was oh cool, I like that.
Speaker 1:That's a cool one.
Speaker 2:I never even thought, whether it's negative or positive, that I write it down next to the breath line.
Speaker 1:I think drawing your breath work sounds like a really interesting idea it is.
Speaker 2:It helps you. It helps you relax from feeling like today's gonna go bad. I love that again.
Speaker 1:It's reframing your thoughts and just re, you know, redirecting your thought process, especially for people that are like more physical people who need to express things physically or have, just like, more creative brains where they need that creative. I love that. That's beautiful. Well, thank you so much for coming on the podcast, crystal. Is there anything else you want to add before we go, crystal?
Speaker 2:is there anything else you want to add before we go? You can. If you want to find more, you can go to my link tree, which is link tree backslash. Graceful art NP. Np for nonprofit.
Speaker 1:I love that. Well, thank you so much. I cannot wait to see what you do. I think you're just at the beginning of all this beautiful stuff.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, I am and it has. It has helped me out so much. If if I wasn't doing this and the stuff happened with my son and I wasn't doing anything like this, I would have gone like mentally crazy. I probably would have had a mental breakdown. But doing my art and finding my screen painting has helped me realize how strong me and my son both really are and help me figure out and see other ways of going about doing things with getting him back.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that. What a beautiful story of resilience. I hope you get to touch many other people that can benefit from your services. Thank you so much.
