Soul Play Painting Workshops

Welcome to Soul Play!

Breathe.

Feel the luscious delight of color moving across the paper.

Exhale and watch your shoulders drop.

Feel the energy in your body and notice where the brush wants to go.

Marvel that something deep inside of you knows exactly what to do.

Feel fully present and embodied in this moment.

When was the last time you felt this way?

It is time for you to return home to yourself.

Let’s Paint.

Where like-minded people come to create together Online.

Join others who are open to diving deep and shaking off the shackles of not-good-enough beliefs to fully embody their creative source!

  • Release the inner critic voices that keep you stuck and small and embrace your compassionate creativity.

  • Unblock stuck feelings and thought patterns and realign with your true self.

  • Feel alive and awakened as you learn to trust your inner guidance.

  • Reconnect with your playful sparkly creative magic!

Here’s how it works.

  • We start with setting your intention and centering.

    You’ll be invited to set an intention for the workshop, what you desire to create or release during the painting process. Using mediation you’ll be guided to drop into your body and become aware of sensations to further relax. Movement and somatic gestures deepen body awareness, allowing you to become more present.

  • Commence the painting!

    Pick-up a brush and follow the flow of energy. Follow with curiosity whatever color or movement calls to you. Paint what your soul whispers, not anything that “looks good to please others''. What juicy bliss! The color surprises you, an odd shape appears that makes no sense. You are in flow. Whatever shows up on the paper, welcome it. This is your unique process, trust it!

  • Inquiry will deepen the understanding of how the painting process is often a reflection of our own “stuff”.

    When you get stuck, you’ll often find that what you’re struggling with mirrors other areas in your life. With skillful guidance, you’ll be invited to explore what’s challenging you and connect the dots to how it’s showing up in your life beyond the painting process.

  • Final Reflection and closing.

    We will gather as a group to share our own experiences during the painting process. You’ll have an opportunity to pause, reflect, and share your insights and ah-ha’s. Weaving together your unique heart opening experience, you can choose to share what you're taking away and how you’ll integrate this into your day to day life.

Have questions?

I’ve got you covered! Check out these frequently asked questions.

  • Painting online is wildy fun, because you can show up in your PJ’s, a cup of tea, and your paints! When you register for the workshop you’ll be sent a confirmation and information to login to Zoom to meet. Read below about how to set up your space. You’ll be surprised how easy and enjoyable it is to paint from home.

  • LISTEN and follow what comes up.

    You will have blank paper, brushes, and paint. Your “work” is to LISTEN.

    Can you come to the painting process like a child open and curious? What might happen then? What color do you want to use? Where does the brush want to go on the page? What has energy? What feels satisfying? What repels? What makes you tired? What excites you and gives you juice?

    What would you paint if no one would see it? What might you paint more or make bigger? What tiny things are calling to be expressed? Can you hold the space for all of it? Can you allow the collective unconscious to bubble up in your work?

    What happens when you bump up against judgements or desires to run away from things that feel uncomfortable, and you stay? What happens when you lean into that discomfort? What if you did more of what made you feel uncomfortable? Instead of covering something up or abandoning the image, what if you embraced that shadowy part?

    What if you listened deeply to your body- to your soul, and just stayed present with it all? Where might that lead you in the painting process? What might you discover?

  • There is only ONE rule, and that is not to comment on other’s artwork. This provides a safe container for everything and anything to show up without censorship or judgment.

  • Ask for support! LOL

    You’ll let the facilitator know you need some help by waving/ raising your hand.

  • Well, then just paint! Your work is to listen deeply enough to your own creative source and follow its guidance. Share, don't share, turn the volume down, and listen to others' explorations – all are welcome.

  • Please let the facilitator know you are feeling done so a completion conversation can happen. This is a dialogue to see if there are any places in the painting that need more attention. Sometimes when the painter feels done, some additional inquiry will open a whole new door to discovery.

  • What materials do you have on hand? You can start there. If you want to buy some paint liquid tempura works well or fluid acrylic paint. You can buy Dick Blick tempera or Golden and Liquitix brand paints. The dollar store sells Prang paints, they aren’t as high quality, but will do. Get some various-size brushes, paint trays (ice cube trays, meat trays, plastic plates, wax paper all work), water containers, paper towels, painter's tape, and paper. You can order paper here.

  • Your space doesn’t have to be big, the back of a door or part of a wall can be a painting spot. Cardboard, shipping paper, or plastic table cloths are helpful to use as a backdrop. Use painter's tape or masking tape and tape the backdrop to the wall or a door, then tape paper to the backdrop (unless you have a spot that can get messy). Paint drips, so you may want to protect the floor with a drop cloth or cardboard.

    Have a place to put your computer or tablet on — such as a small table, a bar chair or a step ladder. We will spend time talking and meditating together, so having a chair to sit in will be necessary, before we begin painting. When we begin painting you’ll point your computer to your painting so we can see both your paper and you while you're painting. You can paint sitting down or standing up, and maybe a bit of both.

Why Soul Play?
This is what the Creative Collective is saying.

  • Soul Play is the most powerful deepening into myself that I have experienced in a very long time. I was able to let thoughts go and feel what was happening in my body and soul, discovering a deep anger and sadness inside of myself. Through the free-flowing painting process, strong emotions emerged and then transformed. It was both a physical and visual process playing out on the paper in front of me. I felt a connection with the colors and viscosity of my paint. How the variation of speed, pressure, and size of the brush strokes represented what I was feeling. Laura used her excellent intuition and helped guide me when I needed it. This is a simple and powerful practice that I'm using in my day-to-day meditations.

    — Barbara

  • I was amazed at how the art class unfolded. I felt safe and seen in every aspect of the time we had! I felt you took us on a journey of our soul’s path that needed healing. Healing of the soul that separated from our true essence. I remembered on a soul level what was needed to get thru the break and fill in the truth on a conscious level! I still feel so complete with the work and I look at the painting with love and understanding. I have it hanging in my living area to see things I didn’t see before and others tell me what they see. Thank you so much for your art class that transcends all time with love! Blessings to you and all who are touched by your gifts!

    — Margie M.

  • I recently participated in the Soul Play painting experience with Laura and found it so moving and revealing, especially for someone that doesn't have much experience with painting. Diving down my own personal rabbit hole with painting helped me explore and inquire into feelings and ideas that don't always have words to describe them, or logical, linear chronologies. Sometimes they just are, and soul play painting helped me get my soul around some of those feelings, and get them out and on paper, in the amorphous, nebulous blobs of beauty that they are. The painting process helped me to think about some of those feelings differently, to let go of trying to think about them at all, and to just let them be. To feel them. It will be the first soul play painting experience of many, I hope.

    — Danny M.

  • Painting was a first for me. It was very powerful as sometimes, deep emotions cannot be sufficiently expressed with words. The power of image/color is undeniable. Laura is an extremely kind and gifted facilitator and knew just when to intervene, what questions to ask, and what suggestions to make. The group was also very powerful. I feel very grateful for the opportunity to have experienced this level of therapy and will definitely add painting as part of the journey to understand and express myself more deeply.

    — M.L.

  • Soul Play painting was a very interesting experience for me. Although I have painted since I was young, the focus of the little time I could devote to it was on improving my technique or trying to make something pretty. This was the first time for me that the focus was on the process, on what I felt like painting, and it was a very deep experience for me. Sometimes I used the paper to leave behind, and others I used the paper to create and bring alive. Letting go and creation, all at once.

    — B.M.

Is Soul Play Therapy?

Art making is indeed therapeutic, however, Soul Play is not intended to be a therapy substitute. It's an open-ended creative source deep dive that may stir up your stuff.

Let’s mix paint and have some fun!

Interested in learning about upcoming workshops?