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The Health Museum in Houston has a Healing Arts program spearheaded by Rose Tylinski, a local artist with additional education in Arts and Health.  Through this program, Creative Studio hands-on workshops are offered once a month that “bridge the gap between art and health, fostering mental, emotional, and physical well-being through creative exploration” (from the website https://thehealthmuseum.org/programs/healingarts/). This past Sunday, I attended one of these workshops around the theme of “Resilience”.  It was a therapeutic experience that went deeper into my psyche than I imagined that it would, and I walked away feeling lighter and richer for the experience.

Upon entering the Creative Studio, our eyes were greeted by a scene that invited the imagination to play.  Colorful fabrics of many types organized in folds laid up against each other.  There were a handful of books that invited exploration to find images or words that might be included in a creative project.  Embellishments such as bright wooden butterflies or flowers greeted the eye, as well as a variety of yarn and a poster illustrating types of stitching. There were stamps of letters or natural elements such as vines, leaves, butterflies or insects.

Our eyes were also drawn to a table on the right that held a variety of snacks.  Bright green and purple grapes glistened on a fruit tray next to fresh berries. Cookies tempted from another tray, and a handful of chips were arranged below.  Buckets of sodas, ice and bottled water graced the end of the table. The attendees were greeted, checked in, and invited to pick snacks and drinks as they settled in at a crafting table in front of a TV.

The workshops feature artists that come to share their perspectives on the topic and assist in the creative process. Rose introduced the artists and the topic, and began the presentation.  The first exercise we did was breathwork, breathing into our bodies following a gif onscreen that guided how long our inhales and exhales should be.  Rose explained what was going on physically, mentally, and neurologically through this process.  Breathwork such as this activates our parasympathetic nervous system, allowing our body to rest.  She explained that our stress and trauma in our lives, even our ancestral and generational trauma, lives inside our bodies. Through our breath, we can move our bodies from the state of stress into one of relaxation.  She drew connections between the vagus nerve and the neural pathways, connecting the physical to the psychological realms, and all of this to the topic of resilience.

Next, we were asked to focus on a time where we experienced Resilience.  Pads of paper and pens were passed out to invite participants to journal their thoughts or draw pictures of this memory.  We were asked to dig deep into that memory, bringing in the feelings, colors, smells, sensations of the moment.  When I think about resilience, I think about how I bounced back from the challenges of my first marriage.  I focused on one moment in time, and my memory came out in the form of this poem:

Resilience

Resilience looks like

Green grass and gold brass 

The realization I needed

To leave my first husband 

After a physical assault 

These memories live

In my old backyard

Where I ran after 

I got away

Where he followed me

And grabbed my phone

Silver in his hands

Because he knew I would 

Call the police

And he threw my phone 

Across the brown fence

I had nowhere to run

And he had pulled out a gun

Threatened my dog if I told

But later, he was away

And I would sit out there

In my yard in the green grass

Smoking cigarettes and

Feeling that sense of

Being torn apart

“What God has put together 

Let no man tear asunder”

A quote I remembered

I believed our souls and hearts

Were merged when we were

But now I feel the pain

Of being cleaved apart

Like a lightning bolt

Giving me the ability 

To stand alone, apart

And I became strong

Golden, like a star

Blazing across the sky

Under the lights of the moon

At the beginning of the workshop, I had been flipping through the books and found this picture in one of a full moon framed within the small branches of a tree that reminded me of a view one would have from a backyard.  I had pulled that out, and when it was time to create our art, I cut it out to symbolize the upper trunk or head of a woman.  I chose fabrics that included colors present in my poem, with a background of green to represent the yard.  When I put it all together, I created a fabric square with colors, shapes and embellishments that represented a woman being split by a lightning bolt.  On the left side, the feelings and dreams of a bride were symbolized by fabric in the shape of a wedding dress with roses at the end, and on the right, I chose blue fabric and butterflies to represent the beauty of transformation. I added some words from the books that to me represented the depth of the journey and how it changed me.  I used the stamps to create a title for the piece, “Split”, with the stamped letters offset to further illustration the cleaving of a separation of souls during a divorce.

One of the concepts introduced in the workshop was that by combining the memory of a past trauma with a new pleasurable experience, like working on a craft, we are restructuring the pathways in our brain.  Our brain creates this new network that links this positive experience with the stored memory, and this promotes healing.  I did feel that the weight of the memory of this negative event in my life was much lighter and less powerful after this experience.  I walked away feeling that it would hurt less to think about now, and that my trauma was transmuted by this crafting experience.

In the end, we were invited to join our squares together in a community quilt.  The community aspect is a part of the workshop, and we reflected on how much we shared, although our life experiences were all different.  I chose not to join my square to the group project, because I wanted to take it home and keep it as a reminder of my transformational journey.

The workshop price also includes admission to the museum, and I took the opportunity to wander through the museum after, including the Body Worlds exhibit. During our workshop, we could hear the sounds of a heartbeat coming from the giant heart display on the other side of the wall. As I visited this giant heart, walked through a giant brain, and contemplated a neuron display, I thought about the connections we had made today in the pathway between those elements.  We had taken a memory from the brain, worked it through some heart spaces, and created a new neural pathway that connected the two through our art expression.

Lately, I have been on coinciding journeys of healing, spiritualism and creative expression, but I hadn’t before considered how they were tied together in my body like this.  It opened my mind up to consider other ways I could incorporate all the elements together.  I am excited about the idea of trying this on my own but also signing up for future workshops like this at the Health Museum.  I feel fed spiritually, emotionally, intellectually and creatively from this experience, and would encourage others who are on similar journeys to try it for themselves.

I invite you to listen to “Circle of Women” by Nalini Blossoming while reading this, as an inspiration for this story.

This past Saturday, March 8, was International Women’s Day. I found myself at Sawyer Yards with my beautiful friend Leilani, browsing through the open studios and talking to the artists. There was a painting that caught my eye. The artist, Cheryl Russell, explained to me that this piece, “The Gifts of Inanna”, was inspired by the goddess. She told me a bit about Inanna’s story. Inanna was a bit naughty, and wanted to go rule the underworld. On her descent to the underworld, she had to pass through the seven levels of hell. At each level, she had to surrender one of her gifts. When she reached the underworld, she was naked and powerless. In the end, she experienced a death in the underworld, but she was ultimately revived due to the loyalty of her servant Ninshubur, who called on assistance from the other gods (this part Cheryl did not tell me, but I read up on Inanna’s story later). I would have loved to bring home the original painting or even one of the Giclee prints of this piece, but in the end, I settled for a card and the conversation.

Later that weekend, I sat for a while with this card reprint, a candle, and some music inspired by Inanna. I read more about her story, and reflected on how her mythology related to the events of my weekend in its entirety, and what messages her story had to share with us for International Women’s Day. International Women’s Day gives focus to issues such as gender equality, reproductive rights, and violence and abuse against women. This year’s theme, “Accelerate Action”, calls for action that can unlock equal rights, power and opportunities for all and a feminist future where no one is left behind. Inanna’s story of overcoming challenges in the underworld is seen as a powerful symbol of female strength and resilience, making her relevant to contemplate on International Women’s Day.

In addition, her story speaks to the struggle for power and autonomy. Inanna is a goddess who actively pursues power, often challenging male deities and asserting her own authority. One of her most famous myths, Inanna and Enki, tells of how she tricks the god of wisdom into giving her the Me—divine gifts of civilization and power. This reflects the struggles of women who fight for recognition, knowledge, and autonomy in societies that often try to restrict their access to power. Her willing descent into the underworld mirrors the struggles many women experience—whether through personal crises, societal expectations, or systemic oppression—where they must endure loss and transformation to emerge stronger. The surrender of her “gifts” symbolizes how women are often stripped of their power, dignity, or identity to fit societal roles. Eventually, she stands naked and vulnerable before her sister Ereshkigal, much like how women are often judged harshly for their choices, bodies, and ambitions. Inanna’s myth is one of struggle, loss, and resurrection—mirroring the lived experiences of women fighting for their voices, reclaiming their power, and redefining their roles in society. She represents the cyclical nature of women’s challenges and the triumph of resilience, wisdom, and transformation.

Friday night I had started my weekend out with a therapy session, in which I worked through some aspects of my “shadow self’. Soon after this, I drove to Dickinson to join a Soul Sister Circle where we worked through a discussion of our shadow work together. In this experience, the ten women in the group revealed their deepest secrets and vulnerabilities. Inanna’s descent into the underworld illustrates this concept of shadow work, which involves confronting the repressed, hidden, and often painful parts of the self. As Inanna descends, she is forced to remove her crown, jewels, and garments, which symbolize ego, social masks, and false identities. Similarly, shadow work asks us to strip away illusions and confront our authentic selves. When women gather in sacred spaces and engage in shadow work, they re-enact Inanna’s myth—descending into their depths, supporting one another through the journey, and emerging stronger, wiser, and more whole. Inanna dies in the underworld before she is resurrected, symbolizing the death of the old self that often occurs in deep healing work. Shadow work is not just about uncovering darkness but about integrating it, leading to rebirth and empowerment. Inanna teaches that descent is necessary for true transformation and that by embracing both light and shadow, women can reclaim their full power.

Even though our struggles were not all the same, we found we had more in common than we thought, and in each other we found a place of peace, of encouragement and support. Inanna’s revival is only possible because of female solidarity—her loyal servant Ninshubur seeks help from other gods when no one else will. This speaks to the importance of sisterhood and mutual support among women, especially in systems that seek to isolate or disempower them. With the help of our soul sisters to offer collective healing, encouragement, and wisdom, we can find a way to accept those parts of ourselves and integrate them into our journey of transformation.

On Saturday evening, I attended a second women’s circle, this one on the theme of Ostara. In this circle, we took turns sharing on the themes of renewal and new beginnings. Both Inanna and Ostara represent aspects of the divine feminine that facilitate transformation but in a different flavor: Inanna transitions between realms, balancing light and dark, while Ostara transitions between winter and spring, ensuring renewal and balance. Although Ostara and Inanna come from different traditions (Germanic and Sumerian), they share powerful archetypal themes of renewal, fertility, transition, and resurrection. The seasonal cycle of death and rebirth, present in both their mythologies, makes them spiritually connected symbols of transformation.

All of these events were occurring during the current Venus Retrograde, which I found incredibly symbolic. Inanna is closely connected to the goddess Ishtar, and ancient cultures associated both with the planet Venus. The myth of Inanna descending into the underworld mirrors the astronomical phenomenon of Venus appearing to “go backwards” across the sky, symbolizing a period of introspection and confronting one’s shadow self. Inanna shedding her garments at each gate of the underworld represents the need to let go of old patterns and identities during a Venus Retrograde period. During this time, individuals are encouraged to examine their relationships and personal power dynamics, much like Inanna’s journey through the underworld where she must shed her power to access deeper truths. 

The myth symbolizes that just like Inanna, Venus retrograde is life’s invitation for us to journey to our own underworld and confront our shadows in love and relationships. It can also be a time where we uncover the truth that’s hidden behind our relationships and reclaim our power. We are shown the people who are true of their intentions, and where we should break our ties with people who do not have the best intentions for us. When Venus ends its retrograde cycle, it is an invitation for us to take the lessons and truths we’ve uncovered from our own underworld journey and reflect on how we can apply them to our lives.

She reminds us of our ability to rise, transform, and reclaim our sovereignty.

My youngest son jumped into the car, excited to be going to the park after school.  We buckled up our seatbelts and prepared for departure. As I pulled out of my driveway, I noticed a bird flying past my open window.  It was unusual the way he was flying, like he was being propelled through the air.  His wings weren’t even beating, just pressed against his side.  What bird flies like that?, my mind wondered.  I should know what kind of bird that is, being that I fancy myself a birder, but I couldn’t think of it.

As we pulled out of our neighborhood, that same kind of bird (it can’t be the very same bird, can it?) is flying past our window again, wings pressed against his side as he soared.   “Look at that,” my son says. “Look at how that bird is flying!” We marveled at it together.  “I wish I could fly like that,” he says wistfully.

I CAN fly like that, I almost said out loud. I learned how to do that before. No, you did not, my rational brain said back.  But I did.  Remember? When?, said my rational brain. The memory was so real.  I could feel the way the air felt on my shoulders, the way I learned to lean my body to keep my flight momentum. I tried to place that memory, to convince myself it was real.  I could not think of when it would have been, where I might have been, that I learned to fly like that. But I am sure that it happened.

See, I was right, said my rational brain.  This never happened. It must have been a dream, then. Do I dream of flying?

The other night, my husband wanted to watch a movie with me.  In the movie, the woman finds herself going feral. She is running with the dogs in the night, or perhaps it is all a dream.  She has strange experiences and desires, becoming more animalistic in her thoughts and habits. Her body even changes, or she imagines it is changing. Through this experience, she is transformed.  She remembers who she really is and gains the courage to stand up for her dreams.

I wonder what it’s like to be a wild woman.  I think I remember that I was, somehow, but the memory is lost to me, like flying without wings.

Our dreams are believed to be the place where our subconscious mind can emerge. Lately my dreams have been about journeys, trips that I was supposed to make or was going to make.  These dreams have been frequented by people who never used to make an appearance in my dreamland, like my high school best friend and my first husband.  Am I circling over lost ground, trying to make sense of how I got here? Last night I dreamt I was picking up litter with a mystic, who looked into my soul and told me things that I knew to be true to my core. There is something strange in the air.  I find myself waking up in the middle of the night with a knowing that I never had before, but I can’t seem to hold on to what exactly the knowing is about.

Over this past month, I finished a Reiki certification and attunement process.  I am a baby beginner, though, and I feel like my Reiki is broken or it is very weak. I am like a fawn trying to stand up on its gangly legs.  In this moment, I am not sure what I am doing.  On the other hand, though, I am over here making a plan, getting my legs under me.  Just when I get nervous about taking the next step, it appears in front of me, in the form of a friend reaching out who is offering just what I need, like a space to practice and those to practice with, opportunities and connections, encouragement and experience. The universe is assisting in birthing this business that I am not sure I can deliver on.  It is nudging me like a mother deer, showing me that I, too, can stand on these new legs. Or fly without wings.

At a recent work conference, we explored the idea of “inspiration”. One of the speakers got really deep with this, and explained the entomology of the word “inspire”.  He told us it meant “to breath into”. Lately I feel emotional and creative energy rising up into me. What am I breathing into now?  What is breathing into me?  Maybe is the spirit of the wild women I have been hanging out with, the ones who can talk and paint in light codes, those who can interpret the codes and bring them back to source. It’s the ones who are healers, and the ones who need to be healed. Maybe it is the spirit of the wild ones, the animals that live out in the woods by my house.

I take a walk in the woods on the night of the new moon.  It’s that time of year when the weather can’t decide what it wants to be.  On one day, it is hot and we are needing our sunscreen and hats.  Other days, a sweatshirt hoodie. Last week we were freezing standing outside for a few moments, and on this day, the day of my walk, it is perfect and beautiful, sunny but also somewhat cool. This walk starts out with the unexpected find of a pink heart mushed into the dirt, maybe a toy or a giant eraser that fell out of a nearby geocache.  As I continue to walk, I find more hearts, these others composed by nature, or shaped by natural forces: a piece of wood, a bit of Styrofoam, a heart-shaped rock.  The universe is telling me that I am loved, that it will provide, and I just need to trust.

I am working through this creative journey through a book called the Artist’s Way.  In the book, there are tasks at the end of each chapter to work through, something like therapy.  One task was to write a list of 20 activities that you like doing, and then the date that you last did them.  Most of the activities I listed were things I had done in the past month.  But there were a few that I had not.  One of them was backpacking.  I keep a camping backpack packed and ready to go in my closet, but it has been collecting dust.  I haven’t put it on and gone for an overnight hike in almost a year and a half.  I think about this backpack. I have a desire to put that pack on and go for a solo overnight.  I think about what it would be like out there in the deep woods of the Lone Star Trail, hearing the wail of coyotes from a pack that surrounds me, and the wild woman inside of me is beating on the door of my heart, saying “Do it!  I dare you!”

One of the weekly tasks of the Artist’s Way is to take yourself on an Artist’s Date, something that you do by yourself over a span of say, a couple of hours, that perhaps fills you up creatively.  Through this process, I have been exploring some places inside myself that I have never been before, and finding some unexpected bliss.  I discovered a passion for ecstatic dance.  I feel so absolutely delighted inside myself letting my body just move however it wants to, and visually absorbing all the people around me doing the same.  When I dance, I concentrate on different chakras, and releasing energy into the world.  Sometimes, when I am really into it, I have found myself growling, yipping, making animal noises that I forgot I could even make. I didn’t realize that feeling was in there, but feels really good to get it out.

And sometimes, on a full moon, I have been known to sit along a creek bank on a magic hill, where no one can see me.  I sit and play a small steel-tongued drum, silently inviting all the fairies and wood sprites to come out of the neighboring forest and come sit with me.  I can almost see their hazy forms appearing along the woods edge, creeping closer to me, and the birds seem to chirp louder to keep up with the sweet sound of my drum.

And as I make my way back along the creek, walking alongside my shadow, I look back behind me.  In the dirt behind me, there are no human tracks.  Only a blending of the tracks of coyote and deer, predator and prey, and I am not sure which one is mine.

Or perhaps I am in the sky, flying without beating my wings.

I went for a walk around the lake the other night on the paved trail I walk on often. On my walk, I noticed a rock that stood out to me. There were several planted trees near the park, and all had a nice bed of mulch and dirt, and just one tree had this bright, white and light brownish-ish, egg-shaped, hand-sized rock in the mulch. I thought about picking up that rock and claiming it as my own, a gift from the universe, or at least from this trail that I spend so much time on, but I didn’t want to have to carry this heavy rock the rest of the way home.

A couple of days later, I had forgotten about this rock but happened to be back in the same area, taking my lunch break at the park. I had time for a short walk, so I started down the path, and my eyes were drawn to that rock again. On the way back to my car, I decided to pick it up and take it home.

That evening, I took a good look at the rock. It was thick, made of clear or white colored quartz, with a vertical pink line visible in the middle. I washed the rock in my sink, trying to scrape off what I thought was a layer of grime from its backside. The rough debris did not come off, and I realized these rough edges, although not originally part of the rock, had become a part of it over time and has given it character, like the pink line. They are both signs that this rock had been through some trauma but had come out not only intact, but with depth of character.

I feel that rock’s essence as I contemplate my own journey through life.

Over the weekend, I had attended an Inner Child Healing workshop, and we were assigned some homework. Last night I worked on some of these homework assignments. One was to buy our inner child a gift. I had a hard time not feeling awkward choosing a child’s gift in the store, and I also found it to be a struggle to buy something just for myself. The only way I was comfortable with this really was to combine this trip with a holiday gift and grocery shopping run, with the things I was buying for myself blending in with so many items I was buying for other people.

When I got home, I opened the packaging on the two toys I had chosen and attempted the next part of the assignment: play with them. Playing was also awkward. I tried to remember how I used to play, enlisting the help of my young son to help me remember how. Along the way, I realized that not only does he not really play with toys himself anymore, but that he didn’t really play with toys the same way I did. Eventually, we made play time work out, and then I placed the toys on my altar to remember this moment by.

Later, I lit a candle and held on to an object that reminded me of my inner child. It was a Playmobile angel character with a blonde hair cut like mine as a child, dressed in a white robe and covered in glitter from a failed art project we had attempted with it. My son pointed out to me that this character actually looked a lot like a photo he had seen of me as a child. I knew what photo he was talking about because I could see it in my mind, too. This object helped me to connect with this inner child from that photo. I moved the hands to a position where it was reaching out to me. Then, I wrote from the perspective of this inner child, with my non-dominant hand. It was rough, but I understood the cry for help. I then responded to this writing with my dominant hand, with me as the adult writing back in a way that reassured this inner child, comforted it, parented it.

After this, I meditated for a while, holding on to some crystals: two small egg-shaped stones that I use to represent my relationship with my mother that is a source of inner child wounding, two amethyst crystals, and two pink moss agate stones. Both of the latter are good for forgiveness and healing, and I concentrated on these feelings during my meditation.

Following my meditation, I drew some Oracle Cards. The first ones that I drew, out of the Sacred Feminine deck, were Healing, Progress, and Intuition. I felt that these cards accurately represented the outcome of this inner child work I was doing. After this, I drew from another deck, and I drew two cards that have been coming up for me lately. “Star Mother” asks, how can you mother yourself? That is exactly what I was doing in the written exercise. The other card, Anna, Grandmother of Jesus, suggests a divine plan is unfolding. From a third deck, I drew a card that said, “Have Fun”, and it showed a picture of an adult profile next to a smaller, younger version of the same person, a child profile. I think this card was a reference to the work playing with the toys, and a reminder to keep that youthful innocence.

Later, I thought back on that rock I picked up, and how it seemed symbolic of my journey from my childhood to now. I felt the innocence of youth in its sparking whiteness, in the white robe of the character that I held up to represent me in my thoughts, in my connection to church and scouts as a child. I felt that pink line of cuts to the heart from the relationship with my mother, and the resulting debris that stuck to me as a result as I made my way through life as an adult dealing with unhealed inner child wounds.

In the middle of the night, I woke up because my dog was making a strange noise. She had gotten out of bed, and was rolling around in the living room, making happy noises like she was playing. Who was she playing with? I got up to check this out.

As I stepped into the space she had been in, I felt an energy around me. It was so pleasurable that I felt really good inside. I was filled with a feeling of peace and of deep healing. I stood for a few moments within this energy, feeling it absorb through me. My pains, especially my arm and shoulder that has been hurting for two months, suddenly felt better. I am not sure if this energy was something real or something I was simply believing in, but I think about Misty’s words when I asked her before about something similar: does the distinction matter?

The feeling of deep healing persisted as I went back to bed, as I woke in the morning and lay still, listening to the sound of crickets singing in the backyard, to the sounds of my family waking up, and throughout my preparations for work, through my workday. That healing feeling could be stemming from the inner child homework, the meditations, the crystals, the validation of my emotions through the cards, the reflections of the rock, the moment with this energy in the middle of the night, or all of the above, but overall, I feel so much peace, serenity and healing today and I am glad I took the time to spend in all of this.