How does doodling help you meditate?
When you are doodling, you are in fact emptying your feelings on the paper, you concentrate on the activity which stops your mind from wandering and helps you achieve mindfulness. At this state, your levels of anxiety and stress decrease, because you are immersed in the present moment, in the Here and Now, leaving your past aside, and your future plans on the shelf, and letting yourself submerge in a beautiful and effortless activity that enhances your creative side.
On another hand, not every person can meditate by staying still for long minutes, and turning off their thoughts and worries. Therefore, this technique helps you train for a deeper meditation by familiarizing yourself with mindfulness and living the current moment.
This art, meditative art, does not require any artistic skills. Every person has a small artist hidden within and he just needs the right key to unleash him and allow him to grow and shine. Every person is creative. Creativity is different than innate talent. Not every person has the talent but every person can be creative.
Meditative arts are an easy form of art based mainly on doodling and repetitive forms. Whether you are creating a Mandala, a Zentangle, or a Zendala they all enter under the category of doodling. And everyone can doodle.
Now, look at yourself in the mirror and say:” I am creative enough” and hit the play button of this video to start meditating through art.
For a better result, please read the following recommendations:
- Take a comfortable seating position
- Cut off any distraction (T.V., mobile, etc.)
- Put on some soothing music ( here is a suggestion https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbkMSoKfIjU)
- Breathe through your nose (Fill your stomach with air on every inhale, and empty it on every exhale)
- Remember that the joy resides in the activity itself.
- No mistake is a mistake in art, but it’s an opportunity to create something new.
Materials needed:
(Check the brands I recommend)
- Stabilo point pens
- Pencil
- 12″ ruler
- A4 white paper
Directions:
- Putting your paper in a landscape layout, divide it into 5 equal sections.
- Fill the first section with intersected diagonals, getting as creative as you want by diverting the orientation of the lines you trace.
- Second step is to fill the second section with waves and circles.
- Third step, doodle intersected curved lines. Always using a different color for every new pattern.
- Fourth pattern is the basket weave. Divide the 4th section into four equal vertical sections, then trace a horizontal line every 1 cm.Start by tracing vertical lines on the first small square, then horizontal, then vertical until the end of the first row. For the second row, reverse the lines ( vertical under the horizontal and vice versa).
- Fifth and last pattern: spirals
Video Tutorial
Besides being a very relaxing exercise, doodling regularly helps discipline your sketching ability, and this will make a great introduction to Mandala drawing.
Drawing a mandala evolves around sketching a number of repetitive forms in a circular movement.
The basic shapes of the Mandala are very simple, such as a petal, spiral, teardrop, etc.
You can check them in the video below
Once you master sketching a simple Mandala, you can start creating advanced patterns.
Watch the video shared below and remember to subscribe and turn the notification bell on.
