“There are vibrations in the air. Something is happening worldwide,” she says.
“That sounds like the name of an article about music therapy,” I respond.
But Thalia Vitikos is more than a music therapist. She practices Expressive Arts Therapy. This therapy makes use of all art modalities in service to the client’s need and state. Without rigid prescription, it exists to invoke healing and help an individual tap into potential.
Expressive Arts Therapy builds on our inclination as humans to create, to imagine, to feel, to be. According to founder Paolo Knill and colleagues it is a “specialized and psycho-therapeutic discipline grounded in the imaginative tradition which all the arts have in common.” (from Minstrels of Soul: Intermodal Expressive Therapy)
The vibrations Vitikos may be referring to is a trend toward integrative approaches and thinking. She may be feeling the neuroscientific lens that points to an integrative system rather than mechanistic functionality. Or perhaps the field of complexity studies that builds a bridge to many disciplines – linked by complex systems and problems to solve. Collaborative learning, coaching, integrative medicine are variations on the theme. And perhaps there is an overall trend that many people and professions are plugging into – a matrix of connection.
Years of experience and an initial knowing told Vitikos that integration amongst individuals and within an individual is key. The vibrations prove her to have been right all along.
In 1665, Caleb Cheeshahteaumuck graduates from Harvard College – one of 450 students and the first native American to complete an undergraduate education there. What was life like for Caleb? What was his experience?
learning for reasons we may never know. And the end so premature – not fair. But Brooks reminds the readers of the reality of the times. If today – things might have been quite different. Caleb would most certainly not have died of consumption.
What’s it like to walk half out of your shoes?