Incorporating creative strategies into your goal of developing a growth mindset will keep you motivated to continue on your healing journey. Creativity allows you to self-express, and in order to do this, you must learn to self-connect. When you’re able to connect with yourself at a deeper level, healing becomes easier because you will know intuitively what you need in any given moment in order to move forward.
One way to creatively begin building a growth mindset is to draw a visual representation of what the future holds. This is a therapeutic way to start focusing on the present and considering the future while releasing the past. And, since your eye will be draw to the final product, it can sometimes be a more effective form of self-reflection to reference as time goes by than simply writing down goals.
First, decide where your visual will be most effectively displayed. Do you want it to be easily referenced on a wall or on your fridge or mirror, or would you like to keep it a bit more private? If so, you might consider creating it in a sketchbook or art journal.
Take a blank piece of paper or start a journal and select a page. Begin to fill in positive things you know the future will bring. You can include anything you’d like – a depiction of those things that are waiting around the corner as you move into a more peaceful state. Have you always wanted to visit someplace on the other side of the world? Have you wanted to write a book? Start a webpage? Become a pet owner? Spend more time with loved ones? Think of your visualization of a resolution of sorts to care for yourself and do those things that are important to you.
Again, place this drawing somewhere you will be able to reference it when needed or include it in a journal or drawing book you’re likely to continue regularly. As you begin to experience those things you’ve drawn, you will soon realize the picture no longer represents a bucket list of everything you hope to do, but an image of all of those things you were able to do because you released trauma.
*If you want to add a bit more depth to this project, sketch a visual representation of your goals but leave the page colorless. As you complete each, fill in that particular portion of the drawing with color.