Aesthetic Response Endocrine

Okay, so we've just done some exploration of the endocrine system with Kelly.

So now can be a time for aesthetic response through creativity, exploring through watercolor paint.

You will need some — this is watercolor paper, but you can also just use regular paper.
I have a flat brush and also a pointy brush, and then I've got some watercolor paint and also some water.
And then I also have a tiny little dish of salt.

This will create a really interesting effect afterwards. So once we've done our painting exploration, we'll sprinkle some salt on, which creates this beautiful mottled effect — something we can't entirely control, but we can be open to the element of surprise.

So let's begin with just putting some water on the page. Water can move in interesting ways; there's flow.
I can't always see it, but I trust that it's doing something — just like my endocrine system.

Also, with watercolor paint, the paint will follow where it is moist in very interesting ways, so we can play with wet on dry, wet on wet, dry on dry. Let's just see.

So we start to bring some color to the page, just watching where it goes with fascination. It can look a little bit like dendrites.
It can travel; the paint can travel. These beautiful ways connecting.

You can play with color and what's happening in the spaces in between.

The flat brush can go from skinny to thick.

And then sometimes the surprise will happen on the page. We can't always control what's happening — much like this time of life.
I can't always control, but I can respond. I can respond with curiosity and openness and playfulness.

So trust your intuition. See what colors want to appear on the page.
You can experiment with different kinds of brushstrokes. Look how these two are blending together. This is fascinating. See where it wants to go.

Filling.

You can also open to the sounds — very gentle sounds — the water, paintbrush on the page.
You may also like to sprinkle some water and just see what happens.

One of the images that Kelly mentioned was stars in the night sky.
All of these little chemical messengers moving through our bodies, relaying messages, up-regulating, down-regulating, this beautiful luscious complexity just like ourselves.

You can switch paint brushes if you like — fine brush strokes, accenting, playing together, moving together.

I'm imagining as the water flows through these different streams of paint and water, I'm imagining different hormones in my body, moving through my bloodstream and my interstitial spaces, bringing just what's needed to these different areas.

We don't understand what they're doing or why they're behaving the way they do. We may not always be comfortable, but there's always movement, there's always flow.

Here, too, the paint can scrape over the dry areas, leaving some spaces in between.
You can just get curious about where the paint pools and where it thins.

There's no wrong way.
The only thing we can do is trust the process.

I'm going to play until that feels complete.

Places where it is kind of wet will create interesting effects.

And your only instruction is to wait — wait until your painting is fully dry — and then you can brush it off, and we'll see what happens.

Okay, we're back. Let's see how we did.
Just have to gently brush away that salt.
Kind of really crusts on there, but then it creates these lovely patterns.
I'm just going to clean that away.

Now that your painting is all smooth, I would invite you to grab a writing utensil of choice.
I have this one which has a little brush tip, and you can write in all of the interstitial spaces any of the words that stood out to you from the talk about the endocrine system — so any words or reflections or anything that felt particularly juicy to you.

Alright, as a final option of crystallization, you might like to add the words “I am” to your page somewhere.

And just take in all these words:
“I am crystallization.”
“I am resource.”
“I am responding, receiving, or saying no.”
“I am energy rising.”
“I am flow.”
“I am dynamic.”
“I am essence.”
“I’m just the messenger.”

Thanks for choosing to create with me today, and I hope you have a fun time playing with this. Take good care of yourself.