The Path to Home - with Art Journaling Practice

“The only path that can carry me home is the path of self-compassion”

~Tara Brach, Radical Compassion

When I was 27, I went through a dark period of a mild depression. It happened during my 4th year on my spiritual path. I was following a spiritual master (an Indian guru), being his disciple in his Bhakti yoga community. I was meditating, chanting and praying everyday, organising meditation classes, public events and retreats with other disciples on the path. I knew this was the life I signed up for when I first joined the path. At the beginning, I was excited to dive deeper into the practice of meditation, to be around the people that have been meditating for decades and to go on oversea retreats to meet disciples of the same path from all over the world.

But toward the middle of the 4th year, the honeymoon period wore off completely. The more energy I gave in to all of the services and activities (on top of an 9-5 job I had as in interior designer to pay my bills), the more I felt disconnected with everything. The negative stuff that was bottled up inside me for years that I hid from everyone apparently overflowed. I resented always feeling pressured to say yes to things or feeling guilty for saying no. I pushed myself to “keep going” to “transcend”, but all I left with was feeling of unworthiness. Over 2 months into my depression, I realized I was burned out… and lost.

I became my guru’s disciple in my early 20s. I barely knew life but already wanted to escape a “normal” life and seek a “holy” place to belong to. His Bhakti yoga path appeared in front of me. I was the youngest girl on the path back then and this used to make my ego feel enormous. I left the path around autumn 2017, felt so lonely and wanted to learn to be connected in the world again.

Art journaling, a practice I stumbled upon during that time, became my haven for self-expression. I was always into art all my life, but when I was in my spiritual path, I didn’t draw as much. The third month of feeling depressed, I found a blank journal being forgotten at the corner of my room and started to document things through sketches, magazine cutouts and images.

My art journal turned into an intimate space to express emotions and tell stories. The practice helped me regulate my emotions and accept myself a little more unconditionally each time. Words, images, labels, titles and forms are all limited in describing felt experiences. So, in the attempt to just acknowledge and to be with my emotions in my body, my journal pages don’t need to make sense. If they turn out to be meaningful or artistically looking in anyway, these are all by-products of the process. The only intention to go into art journaling, for me, is to be with what is, express in creating and let go. The more I want to return to love, to the home inside of me, the more I need to let go of judgments and expectations towards myself, my art and the world.

As Tara Brach shared in her book “Radical Acceptance”, “We yearn for an unquestioned experience of belonging, to feel at home with ourselves and others, at ease and fully accepted. But the trance of unworthiness keeps the sweetness of belonging out of reach.”

These days, I am doing art full time and working on publishing my first oracle deck. I still teach meditation from time to time, but I have moved into hosting more mindfulness tea ceremonies recently. I run regular Art & Tea mindfulness sessions in Auckland Central.

Thanks so much for reading this blog post. If you have any insight or questions that you would like to share with me, feel free to write to me at innerbeautybysierra@gmail.com

In-person meetups in Auckland:

• Art & Tea mindfulness monthly sessions at SOMM: Tea ceremony in Cha Dao tea practice & Art journaling. All tea & art supplies included. Bring your own journal. No art experience needed. It would be fun to go on this journey together! Join me & others here.

Online materials:

• The Grounded Circle podcast - a podcast sharing conversations between my partner Dean & I. We share our insights & reflections on wellness, relationships & spirituality through our personal stories. We usually laugh a lot behind and during the scenes but what we don’t shy away from is talking about the struggles and the elephant in the room. Our recent episode is all about The Power of Friendships

• And lastly, The Grounded Circle’s YouTube channel has released a new guided exercise on Letting go of judgments. This video featuring my animation. Have fun checking it out here.

(Image is our monthly Art & Tea Mindfulness session at The School of Modern Meditation in Auckland, NZ)