Grieve

with

Love & Kindness

Sandra, UK

I was very anxious about attending the workshop as I am used to not talking about myself to anyone, not even friends or family. The workshop helped to see how grief (and not dealing with it/or knowing that I was experiencing it) has affected my approach to life for so long. My thoughts, actions were all coloured by grief. Confronting this has started a process of changing my thoughts and behaviours in a more positive way.

Ruth,

Helen is an inspired and inspiring course leader. I would recommend her courses highly. Thank you very much indeed.

Beccy, Leicester

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Attending the workshop was an amazing experience. Helen was a really good tutor who was completely professional and worked in a very calm and patient manner. Having been through her own experience and learnt to deal with her grief using creative methods, she was able to relate to us and guide us through a variety of techniques to get in touch with our feelings. Each of them had their own value and I will definitely be using them again.​

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It felt very special to be in such a safe environment with women who all had their own stories but could all relate to each others grief around childlessness, we felt a common bond and there were tears but there was also a lot of laughter.

MB

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Attended this wonderful day course with Helen. Met some wonderful women - we shared, we cried, we painted - took one more step in our healing paths together. Incredible experience with allowing, gentle assistance and guidance from Helen. Well worth attending.

Melissa

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Helen provides a very safe environment in which to experiment and offers new and different ways of thinking. The group provides support and inspiration – as you would expect. I was stuck and it has definitely released something in me that is allowing me to move on.

Benedicte

I am delighted I attended Helen’s workshop, it was incredibly helpful. I was able to connect to feelings buried deep inside me and express them, in a way I had not expected. We were a small group which I found great, it was easy to discuss and share. It was both relaxing (I felt relaxed and at peace the whole day) and invigorating (giving me the energy and courage to continue my own healing journey).

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Gen

I recently attended one of Helen's day courses as I'd always enjoyed messing around with drawing and painting as a child and wanted to explore creativity again in a safe space. I was a bit worried about it as I hadn't any recent art experience and wondered what the other people would be like. I worried we might all sit round sobbing into our paints!

Actually, the whole day was great. Helen structures it well and it felt like the right balance of exploring our feelings and creativity, having time for inner exploration and realising we all had common experiences as childless women. It also felt really safe and secure which means it was ok to be wild or messy or refined- what ever we needed.

I left feeling energised and happy. I'd connected to a great group of women, I'd reconnected to a part of myself I hadn't used in years and felt inspired to do more. What better way to spend a rainy Sunday?!

Anonymous,

I felt Helen created a really safe space to feel.

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Connie

Just wanted to tell you all about the wonderful workshop I attended on Sunday, run by our very own +Helen Segal. I nearly didn't go because I was feeling some anxiety about it the day before but am so pleased I went. I found it really helpful. It was a lovely, safe place for me to explore my creativity and let go of my perfectionist streak! And met some lovely women whilst I was there. Thanks Helen.
 

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8 Week Course

I am a passionate Artist, Teacher, Girlfriend, Friend, Highly Sensitive Person and a Woman without her own children – oh and not forgetting a wild hippy at heart. I have been teaching Art for thirteen years and have been fascinated with the process of what stops others and myself from creating freely. I am absolutely enthusiastic about self-expression through the creative process and believe that everyone is creative, yes even the person that believes they aren't and thinks that they don't have a creative bone in their body. They DO!!!! Whether it’s through cooking, dancing, dressing, walking, business or even organising your day. We are all creative beings!!! A lot of us have been scared due to past negative experiences and our beautiful creative free child is just hiding away, waiting for us to make things a little safer for them to come out and play.

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For years I didn't believe that I was a creative woman. I surrounded myself with artistic people, dancers, writers and musicians. I was their mascot and spent hours building them up and encouraging them to do their work. ​Twenty years ago after a big change in my life, I found myself back in London, where I was born. I hated what I was doing; a croupier since I was 18. I had travelled and worked abroad and found that I had become negative and depressed.

I knew that something had to change and so I left my job! I remember sitting on my sofa thinking, 'now what Helen?' I didn't know what I liked, I didn't know what I was good at and all the people around me thought I was totally bonkers. This was the start of a journey of personal discovery, as I had learnt that I was suffering from depression and low self-esteem.

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When I look back at that time, I didn't have a plan until later. I really was living a day at a time. I entered into personal therapy. I began to play again and started to trust that each action I was taking was bringing me closer to what I was meant to be doing in my life. I enrolled onto a course, which took me towards teaching and working with children with learning disabilities. Within that year I learnt I as dyslexic and I really wanted to explore my own creativity. I joined a part-time course in drawing and the rest is history. I began to believe that 'everyone needs to feel and connect to their own creative force.’

​After my degree course, achieving a 1st Class Degree in Design and my Teacher Training in Leicester, journeyed to Aylesbury. There I spent a very happy five years teaching Art and Textiles and creating my home. It was a place I thought I would settle for the rest of my life, but it seemed not to be. I met my partner in the summer of 2007 and after two years together and a bit of commuting, I was asked to make a big decision to move down to London, and to try to start a family. In 2010 I moved, it was one of the largest decisions I had made in my life, it felt right, though my fear lived next to me for quite some time.

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In 2014 I decided that I wanted to combine my creative, teaching and personal development work together. I enrolled on an Integrative Art Therapy Foundation Course and today I am personally working towards completing my Diploma in Child Counselling using the Arts. I continue to be aware of my blocks and overcome them. I learnt about the Intuitive Painting Process and connecting to our Point Zero through Michele Cassou’s books and website. I have also taken Chris Zydel’s online Painting with Fire courses and feel privileged to have been mentored by her. This way of creating is truly remarkable. It is one of the most powerful therapeutic tools we can use to hold, love and heal ourselves.

I truly believe that Art Heals!

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In 2015, I chose to let go of a life long dream of becoming a mother after two rounds of IVF and lots and lots of heartache. I knew that I had been avoiding that grief for a while, and I knew it was time to let go of the dream. I was so grateful I had the tools to express my pain, depression, sadness and the masses of anger within me.

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I turned to my creative practises with GUSTO! I painted and wrote regularly. I used ritual and shared my expression on the Gateway forum and with safe individuals who were able to listen, encourage and love me through my Grief Work. I let go of others that couldn’t do this. I started to feel that something was shifting within me. I was so grateful I had an outlet for my grief and I had not hidden it way within me, knowing that this just makes me emotionally and physically ill. It was not a comfortable process, however, slowly but surely the pain started to subside. I started to notice that situations that used to trigger an emotional response within me had disappeared. They are not all gone, but it feels a little more manageable. Today, I am starting to feel so much stronger within myself and I am thinking positively about the future in such a more loving and compassionate way. This is a true miracle, from the place I had once been.

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Why I do this

I want to pass on the tools that I used to support myself through this process. Encouraging you to walk and ride through tough times using the creative arts and your intuition. Moving out of isolation with love and kindness helps! Connecting helps!

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I truly believe that creativity heals. It helped me move forward in my life. I want everyone who is finding life difficult or overwhelming, who are finding it hard to breath at times, who feels lost and alone, to have a way to express themselves in a loving and safe way. Art truly Heals! It helps regulate ourselves, grounding in life and who we are.