This piece has been co-written by our guest writers: Anshuma Kshetrapal (M.A. Psychosocial and Clinical Studies, M.A. Drama and Movement Therapist) and Shruti Garg (M.A. Drama and Movement Therapist)
“Drama Therapy? You perform for people? Are you an Actor?” This is perhaps the most common response we receive when we tell people that we are Drama Therapists by profession.
And although misleading because we are actually trained mental health professionals, we actually appreciate the curiosity that people have begun to express when they hear the term ‘drama therapy’. Curiosity is after all a great beginning. The word ‘drama therapy’ might be new to many of us, but the tools that we use and the philosophy and science we follow in the drama therapy sessions draw from ancient schemas of human beings. All people have the capacity of art, it's in our blueprint. We have always created and expressed, using whatever material we had around us.
For most of us, ‘drama’ might represent the divide between an actor and an audience, a stage, a performance, something contrived and rehearsed or something exaggerated. This leads to a common perception of drama as something ‘out of reach’, ‘unknown’, ‘strange’ or even ‘scary’. However, if we look closely, drama is innate to our existence. As infants, until we had learnt words, we used facial expressions, sounds and body movements to express ourselves.
From another, more cultural lens, particularly in India, different communities perform different rituals, songs and dance that have passed from one generation to the next. When a child is born, we sing; when a child transitions from childhood to adolescence we perform specific rituals to mark this transition; when the crops harvest we sing and dance; when there is a death we perform rituals to mourn as a community.
If all of this sounds unfamiliar, let's look at how we communicate today, in social media. Beyond words, we share our unarticulated common experiences through creative memes that we can relate to and share with our friends! These creative visual images and humour, becomes a container for our thoughts and emotions that we otherwise find hard to express. We all use various art forms in our daily life to express our thoughts, emotions and ideas without consciously realizing it. Looks like we all have the capacity and ability to engage with drama.
Now, coming to ‘drama therapy’... it is a form of ‘psychological therapy’ based on both philosophy and extensive scientific research on human psychology just like ‘talk therapy’. However, it uses various tools of drama like: enactments, theatre games, storytelling, visual art, rituals, dance, music etc. along with verbal communication to facilitate therapeutic interventions for the clients. Drama therapists are mental health professionals who might/might not be artists. Clients who engage with drama therapy also need not have had any prior engagements with any art forms. All one needs is an open mind!
As drama therapists we are aware about the impact of various art forms on an individual’s brain, mind and body and we use this knowledge to design ‘experientrials’ according to the needs of our clients. There is no right or wrong way to dance or sing in a drama therapy session, rather it is a safe and non-judgemental space to express ourselves the way we feel comfortable with the support of the art form and the group/therapist.
As for both of us, we follow a client-centred approach and design the sessions according to the themes and issues that a client brings. All the experientials are adapted according to the needs and capacities that arise in that present moment. The idea is not to give advice or a quick fix, but to provide a space to explore one’s own feelings, emotions and thoughts so as to become more self-aware.
Read More: Editing My Thoughts, Underwater
One might wonder, “Why do I need to do dance and all when I know how to communicate through words?” One simple answer to this is: what cannot be expressed through words, can be expressed through art! Drama and movement support us to get deeper access to our own emotions, issues, trauma, physiological symptoms and not to forget, our inner knowledge and resourcefulness. Creative tools provide us with an ‘aesthetic distance’ from our experiences and situations which means: we are able to observe them from a distance, experiment with different ways to approach the same situation, make changes to it if we wish to and find safer and indirect ways to process otherwise difficult or unacceptable emotions.
Sometimes, in our lives, we can remain stuck in one particular role and drama therapy can give us an opportunity to experiment with different roles that we are capable of playing but are not able to due to socio-psychological barriers. For example: there is person X who has experienced difficulties being assertive. However, in a drama therapy session, they might get an opportunity to play the role of an assertive and authoritative king and see if they can understand why being assertive is difficult for them. Therefore, the person X is able to explore a different side of theirs in an indirect way. An important aspect of drama therapy is ‘action’ which means we are actively exploring our emotions and experiences through our whole body.
Our culture and education system rewards and trains us for cognitive and verbal processing more than emotional intelligence or body-based processing. As a result, we become disconnected to our bodies, resulting in body-mind split as we grow up. However, it is important to engage with both body and mind together for our mental health wellbeing, because our bodies are involved in experiencing and processing this world as much as our brain is. As you are reading this article, there are shifts happening inside your body as your body might be responding to different paragraphs in different ways. Are you sitting in the same posture or are you breathing in the same way as you were when you started reading this article? You might or might not be. When you are sleeping, your body is moving along with your breaths. So, why not engage with our body and mind together in the process of healing, when both are involved in our lives equally?
We like to say, “Drama Therapy is for everybody”! One can participate in the drama therapy sessions irrespective of their age, gender, sexuality, mental health issues, learning abilities etc. One does not need to have any prior experience in any of the art forms. The clients who come to us, vary from individuals living with severe mental health concerns to those wanting to be better at their jobs. We work with schools, hospitals, corporates, NGOs, artists etc.
Drama therapy is a budding field in India and in the absence of awareness and regulatory bodies, we can find untrained practitioners calling their work as drama therapy loosely. However, we need to understand that conducting an art/dance/drama workshop is not the same as conducting a therapy session. The former might turn out to be therapeutic sometimes but is different from the latter, which is an ‘intentional’ use of the therapy tools to facilitate healing. Drama therapy can be an intense profession and we practice regular supervision and self-work to ensure client’s safety and professional ethics. While looking for a Drama therapist or any other creative arts therapist, one should ensure that they are certified and trained.
Read Next: Beyond Talk Therapy
If you are interested in drama therapy/ creative art therapies as a profession, you may check out some of the certificate/diploma courses run in India. Anshuma is currently teaching three courses and we would be more than happy to share more information about them. Soon, Shruti and Anshuma will also be offering a range of workshops to introduce people to this exciting, insightful modality. If you feel like you could benefit from drama therapy sessions or need to know more about it, feel free to write to them. They are available via email: info@thecogc.com.
Also, we're accepting guest writers! If you want to be featured on our website, Contact Us or DM us on Instagram or Facebook.
Comments