What is Doodle Therapy?

What is Doodle Therapy?

by | Mar 3, 2023 | Doodle Art Therapy Blog, Doodle Therapy

What is Doodle Therapy?

Written by Cindy Bayles

Get my free chapter of Doodle Therapy!
A brain with half of it colorful and the other half grey.
For most of my life, I never felt good enough. I was always looking for way to “fix” me. I lost weight, went back to school, took self-improvement classes, and read self-help books. But none of those “fixed” me.

I jumped from one tool to the next but nothing was ever quite right. Then I found doodling. Doodling was the missing piece. Doodles created results where before I was running in circles, afraid of making mistakes, looking stupid, and being seen. By making simple doodles, I gained courage and confidence.

I went from victim to doodle warrior. The twelve doodles in my  book, “Doodle Therapy” saved my life, my marriage, and my future. You can be a doodle warrior too. All you need is your mind, heart, pen, and paper.

Doodling can change your life too! You can create an inspired life of joy, love, purpose, and creativity. I know because I did.

In every post you will come closer to seeing your value. You will gain tools to live a creative, purpose filled, and joyful life. These are the tools I used to change my life. A life that is unrecognizable from my former life.

Doodle Therapy is interactive, transformative, and unlike anything you have experienced before! Doodle along with me and uncover the gold in your thoughts, feelings, and actions. Doodling is fun, easy, & effective personal growth. Doodle therapy works faster and more effectively than anything I have ever seen.

Are you ready to try something fun, easy, and effective?

Let’s get started!

 

What you will need:

The basics:  paper and any writing utensil. 

Yep! That’s it. 

If you want to add color, bring your crayons, watercolors, any kind of paints, markers, dry erase markers, or colored pencils. It doesn’t matter.

I use watercolors. You can see the list of my favorite supplies here.

Throughout this blog, you will see a pen like this Doodle YOU pen . This is your que to start doodling. Don’t stress, just follow the instructions and let your mind be free.

8 Keys Doodle Therapy Will Change Your Life!

 

Doodle YOU Flower

Cognitive Behavior Tools or CBT

CBT is a common therapy tool. This tool helps us to reframe our thoughts. Cognitive means what our brain focuses on. Behavior refers to the actions or inactions we take. Our thoughts create feelings, which create actions, which create results. We have more power over our results than we believe we do. Doodling helps teach our brains to knew ways to think, feel, and act.

Doodle love and acceptanceCompassionate Change vs Beating Ourselves Up

We can beat ourselves up or we can use compassion to create change. It’s time to treat ourselves differently. Doodling gives us the opportunity to see ourselves as beautifully human. How would it feel to stop yourself up and start loving ourselves instead? No “fixing” required.

Radical Questioning

Stop deleting your negative thoughts and start questioning them instead. Asking ourselves “Why me?” has no good answers. But asking powerful questions, such as “Would everyone think this is true?” We gain a different perspective. With a new perspective, we see how our thoughts create our reality.

Doodle Compassionate WitnessCompassionate Witness

Using the power of creativity, we give ourselves the gift of being compassionate witnesses to our pain. We may yearn for someone to see, hear, and understand our pain. We are uniquely qualified to understand our own pain and to help ourselves heal.

Doodle Scientist Divine Scientist

Doodling allows us to experiment with new thoughts, feelings, and actions without believing we are inherently broken when they go wrong. Divine scientists look at everything as just data. Our emotions are no longer tied to the outcome. We are just scientists trying to see what will happen with the next experiment.

Doodle BrainDaily Mental And Emotional Health

We have neglected our emotional and mental hygiene for far too long. Doodling gives us ownership of cleaning out our brain and choosing our thoughts and emotions on purpose. Daily mental and emotional cleaning is the key to lifelong mental and emotional health.

Gain a New Perspective

When we doodle our experiences, we can gain a new perspective on ourselves, others, and the circumstances. Through doodles, we see things in entirely new ways. Giving us the ability to reframe experiences into empowering and healing doodles.

Download my free Doodle Therapy chapter!

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Personality isn’t permanent | Ben Hardy Book review

Personality isn’t permanent | Ben Hardy Book review

by | Jun 16, 2020 | Book Review, Doodle Art Therapy Blog

What Is Personality?

When I got the email with the opportunity to review Benjamin Hardy’s book “Personality isn’t permanent” I jumped at the chance. I love Ben’s down-to-earth style of writing and how he uses great stories to illustrate his points. I love his work is based in science.

As I read this book, I learned that I get to choose who we want to be, regardless of who we’ve been. It teaches why I get stuck in unhealthy patterns and how to overcome what I believe is true about me.

Personality Isn’t Permanent

Personality isn't permanent
Benjamin Hardy explains contrary to popular belief personality is forever changing. We are not the same person we were yesterday or will be tomorrow. However, many of us believe “That is just who I am” and “I was born this way” or “It is in my genes” as if we have no control over who we are.

Personality Tests And Other Myths

I love taking a good personality test. Don’t you? I thought it helped me figure out who I am. The problem with personality test is I decide the test is who I am now and will be in the future. In his book, Ben explains these tests keep us from moving forward and changing our habits because we believe it’s just who we are.  So, we choose careers based on random personality tests. How scientific is that? I learned about all of the myths we believe about personality. One of the myths is our personality is unchanging. However, Ben says, we are not the same person we were yesterday and we will be different people tomorrow.

Worth Its Weight

Personality isn't permanentDoodle Therapy and Personality Isn’t Permanent are much the same. Both are about hope and change and becoming who we are meant to be. I have waited for things to change instead of being the change. But when we change ourselves everything changes around us. I loved reading this book and will read it again and again. It is filled with practical advice and awesome action steps to help us get where we want to go.

What I learned from Personality Isn’t Permanent

The Gold Nuggets I found in “Personality Isn’t Permanent include how we can:

  • Reframe our trauma to make it work for us instead of against us.
  • Choose our own future despite our past.
  • Become more confident and define our life’s purpose.
  • Enhance our subconscious so we can overcome addictions and limiting beliefs.
  • Learn better ways of journaling to improve our chances of reaching our goals.
  • Create an environment that encourages us to become the future us we envision.
  • Set goals that will propel us into the future that we desire.
  • Change our thoughts so we can change our future.

 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Author Ben HardyDr. Benjamin Hardy is an organizational psychologist and bestselling author of Willpower Doesn’t Work. His blogs have been read by over 100 million people and are featured on Forbes, Fortune, CNBC, Cheddar, Big Think, and many others. He is a regular contributor to Inc. and Psychology Today and from 2015-2018, he was the #1 writer, in the world, on Medium.com. He and his wife Lauren adopted three children through the foster system in February 2018 and, one month later, Lauren became pregnant with twins, who were born in December of 2018. They live in Orlando.

ABOUT Personality Isn’t Permanent

In Personality Isn’t Permanent, Dr. Benjamin Hardy draws on psychological research to demolish the popular misconception that personality—a person’s consistent attitudes and behaviors—is innate and unchanging. Hardy liberates us from the limiting belief that our “true selves” are to be discovered, and shows how we can intentionally create our best selves and achieve big goals instead. 

He offers practical, science-based advice to for self-reinvention, including:

  • Why we should never be the “former” anything—defining ourself by our past successes can be just as damaging to our potential to grow as being haunted by past failures
  • How to design a desired vision of our future self and make decisions based on what the future you would want.
  • Why personality tests such as Myers-Briggs and Enneagram are not only psychologically destructive but are no more scientific than horoscopes.
  • How to tap into what psychologists call “pull motivation” by narrowing your focus on a single, definable, and compelling outcome.

Pick up a copy today and let go of who you thought you were so you can become who you were always meant to be.

Thoughts are powerful | Change your thoughts, Change your life

Thoughts are powerful | Change your thoughts, Change your life

by | May 18, 2020 | Doodle Art Therapy Blog, Goals, Self care

Thoughts Are Powerful

Your thoughts are so powerful they have created your life. And your thoughts will create your future!

The good news is you can change your thoughts. You hold your future in your mind!

Recently, I realized I was waking up every morning thinking “I am struggling”. Upon further observation, I realized I was using the words “I am struggling”: throughout my day. I said it ALL. Of. THE. TIME.  As if it were an excuse. “I am struggling to get out of bed”,” I am struggling to eat right.”  “I am struggling to get everything done.” “I am struggling to….”  And on and on it went.

So why does this even matter? It’s just a thought after all!

Change Your Thoughts, Change Your Life

It turns out, our thoughts control what we do. I knew this theoretically but I didn’t believe it in my soul. It feels woo-woo to me. There is nothing concrete about changing your thoughts.

I have often heard the quote:

Watch your thoughts, they become your words; watch your words, they become your actions; watch your actions, they become your habits; watch your habits, they become your character; watch your character, it becomes your destiny. by Lao Tzu

But I have always thought about this in correlation with being a good person. Don’t think bad thoughts so you don’t do bad things mentality. Every time it is referred to in church it is about committing sin and pornography.

In Proverbs 23:7 is says:

For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he: Eat and drink, saith he to thee; but his heart is not with thee.

Thoughts are powerful

So if you think good thoughts, do you do good things?

When I think “I am struggling”,  I imagine I am in the middle of a big ocean treading-water with the waves splashing in my face. Survival is my only thought. I am not trying to get to shore because I will die if I try. So, I just continue treading water in the middle of the ocean. There are waves crashing into me constantly, big ones, medium ones, and small ones. Every time I catch my breath another one hits.

No rest for the drowning

When the water calms, I lay on my back and float. I can rest. But, there is no way I could save or help someone else. Because we would both drowned. I am just barely able to keep myself alive at the moment. I see no hope that I can move out of this mess and get myself to shore. So I mindlessly tread water, in the middle of the ocean, with waves hitting me in the face, fighting for my life. Every day. Because I think “I am struggling”. A thought I repeat to myself over and over again, multiple times a day.

Because of this, my day looks like this:

  1. Wake up: think “I am struggling.”
  2. Drag myself out of bed.
  3. Pray.
    • Plead with God about my struggles.
    • Pray and ask who I can help.
    • Think “there is no way I can help anyone”.
  4. Struggle through work.
  5. Eat whatever I find.
  6. Do what is urgent.
  7. Collapse into bed.
  8. Repeat.

Have you thought this?

  • That was dumb.
  • Why are you so stupid?
  • I am soooo awkward.
  • There is no way I could ever do that.
  • Nobody likes me.
  • I have no friends.
  • So and so does it way better than me.
  • I don’t feel loved. Go here to read how to feel more love. Hint: it has to do with your thoughts.

And on and on we go.

What if there were a different way? What if you could start moving toward the distant shore? What would that look like?

Changing your thoughts is simple and hard

thoughts are powerful

Could it be that simple? I change my thoughts and everything changes?

Yes! It is that simple. But unfortunately, it is hard to do. Some of the thoughts we think have been around for a long time. Most of our thoughts we believe to be true. It would feel strange to stop believing what you believe is true, wouldn’t it?

How to change your thoughts

Step 1:

The first step is to get all of your thoughts out on paper. Just start writing. I find it easiest to choose a subject or an emotion but the goal is to just get it all out of your head.  Brain dump all of your thoughts out on paper.

Step 2:

Take a look at all of those thoughts that are swirling around in your head. Crashing like waves into you, circling like sharks around you, looming on the horizon as a storm about to burst over you.

Step 3:

Now, destroy that paper! Rip it up, burn it, whatever it takes to get rid of it. While at the same time saying that these things are not true.

Thoughts are powerful

Step 4:

It’s time to open up your journal and write down some things that you are grateful for. Fill yourself up with positive affirmations. And say at least one of those things to yourself for the rest of the day.

Step 4:

Rinse and repeat.

This is what it looked like when I changed my thoughts:

Before:

  • Thought: I am struggling
  • Feeling: Desperation
  • Action: I stay where I am and keep working to survive.
  • Result: I keep struggling and I make no progress toward not struggling.

Thoughts are powerful

After:

  • Thought: You’ve got this!
  • Feeling: Confident
  • Action: I take action.
  • Result: I begin to make progress every single day.

What?????  Yep. It’s simply that hard.

 

 

Feel The Love | Free Love List

Feel The Love | Free Love List

by | May 10, 2020 | Doodle Art Therapy Blog, Relationships, Self care

THE FIGHT

pink Fighting-Gloves

My 10-year-old cousin grabbed the paper from my desk and started waving it around. He yelled “Look, Cindy got an F on her paper!” I was already jumping to retrieve the paper. But it was harder than I anticipated. He just  held the paper out of my reach. So, I did the most logical think and tackled him. I was not going to be subjected to the humiliation.

I was not going to have everyone see my failure. My failure to color a picture for my science class. My big fat red F at the top of my paper. So, quiet little Cindy fought for her dignity. Although, the fighting wasn’t really dignifying… The teacher waded into the fray and separated us. I was given my assignment back and we were sent to our corners. You would think that was the end of the story.

CONSEQUENCES

However, fighting in the classroom brought consequences. Roger received a kick in the pants that sent him flying out of the classroom door, 15 feet away. And I had to stay after school. Which would have been fine for most normal kids, but not for me. I was the quiet kid who never got into trouble. The girl whose mother had been an invalid for the past 2 years, the kid who’s hair was a mess. The kid who never got her homework done. I was that kid.

yellow school bus

Being kept after school meant that I missed the bus. Which was a big deal. I lived 5 miles away from home. I had no one to call  and no way to call. So after “doing my time” with the teacher, I wandered around outside the school in the deserted playground without any idea of what to do or where to go. I felt alone and abandoned. And then out of nowhere my grandmother came looking for me. She realized I was missing and came to find me. When she finally found me, I broke down in tears and sobbed all the way home.

FEEL THE LOVE

I have been thinking about how this incident affected me for the past several days. The only part of that memory I have remembered was the fight. I had forgotten all about the rest. I forgot that my grandmother had come looking for me and that I was not all alone that day.  That, someone, did love and care about me and that someone did notice that I was missing. It’s funny how our memories rewrite history, isn’t it? I mean even with my own children, they all have 6 different stories about the same event. And all of the stories are different from the correct interpretation which is mine. (Wink)

 

 

FEEL THE LOVE LIST

So I started thinking of all of the other people that have been in my corner. The people who showed up when I needed them. I made a List. It is a list of anyone that has ever loved me or anyone that I have ever loved. My Papa and grandma were at the top of the list. I knew they loved me and would do anything for me. They were my biggest cheerleaders throughout their lives. It was obnoxious at times. I lived with them right after I was born for a while because my mother had to have surgery. I lived with them after my mother and father’s divorce and I moved in again when I was 17 with no place to go. There were many others on that list.

ANGELS AMONG US

The more I wrote the more I realized how much I am loved. Many of those people on the list are no longer with us anymore. But their love still lives on. I can access that love every day. Just by remembering those people that loved me and that were always there to cheer me on.

Because I want to feel more love, I have been praying for those people to be my ministering angels. They are the people that love me and were always in my corner. To celebrate Mother’s day this year. I encourage you to make your own love list and post it where you can see it and add to it every day. It is amazing what happens when there is a tangible list of people that love you and have always been a part of your life. There are Angels Among Us!  Look for them. record them. The more you look, the more you will see. When we change what we focus on, we change what we see. That’s what Doodle Therapy is. Doodle Therapy changed how interpret my world. 

I have created a free Feel The Love List printable for you here. Use it and start feeling the love.

feel more love heart

What is failure? | Sinking ships don’t float

What is failure? | Sinking ships don’t float

by | May 3, 2020 | Doodle Art Therapy Blog, Goals

What is failure?

My 17-year-old son, Will built a boat. Really. He built a boat out of scrap wood in our backyard. One day during this COVID-19 quarantine, he mentioned that he might want to build a boat.  I shrugged and suggested that he ask Youtube for help to build his boat. (Because Youtube has all of the answers.) But he said that it would be cheating to get instructions… I didn’t expect it to go much past the initial thought of “I want to build a boat” stage. But it did. Way past the initial idea!

A few days later, a couple of his friends came over and began building their boat. They worked on it for the entire day and into the night. We went to bed expecting them to call it quits soon. But the next morning when I left for my walk I realized that all of the boys were at my house at 6 am! This was very strange. Why would 3 teenage boys be at my house working on a boat at 6 am?

So I went to investigate. It turns out, not one of them had gone home the night before! Really. It is some kind of miracle. They had worked all night long on that stupid boat. They planned to launch it that day. But there was more work to do than they anticipated. So the launch was postponed for a few days.

After much work and an unknown amount of dollars, launch day arrived a few days later.

The Launch

 

What is failure?

The epic boat launch of May 2020!

 

The boat was painted black, had benches for sitting installed as well as custom cup holders for the occupants. It was rather tall and I worried that the height may be a design flaw. But then I have never built a boat. They christened her “Black Hawk” and set out for their maiden voyage.

We all gathered at the reservoir to witness the launch of the “Black Hawk”. We were all curious as to how long it would take this 500-pound boat to sink to the bottom of the lake. The boys had assured me that they would bring life vests but they conveniently “forgot” them.

After some maneuvering, the boat was launched. However, there seemed to be some design flaws. The kids in the boat couldn’t move right or left without the boat almost toppling over. After many near turnovers, they got their bearings and they were pushed further out into the lake. But then something strange started to happen. The longer that the boat was in the water, the less wobbly it got as it sunk deeper and deeper into the water. But as it got lower in the water, it became less unsteady and easier to maneuver.

Sinking ships don’t float

The boy at the back had thought to bring a bucket and started frantically bailing water. I wasn’t sure if they would make it back to shore. It was touch and go there for a while. With two boys trying to paddle, one boy bailing, and a girl standing in the middle of it all. And some curious kayakers floating around the boat wondering what this contraption was. Finally, Will got out of the boat and pushed it to shore.

 

What is success?

Can you hear them in the video? They are seeing where things didn’t work and then discussing what they should do next time. They are not embarrassed that they tried! They are just looking at what they can change next time.

So my question is what is failure? Was this a failure? And if so was it a waste of time, wood, and unfinished homework? I think this was a rousing success. Sometimes, we set goals, and then when we don’t quite get there we call the whole project a failure. But what if the victory is in the trying? What if your goal is to sail across the ocean and you only make it halfway? What if your goal is to make a million $ but you only make $1000? What if your goal is to lose 50 pounds and you only lose 5? Are all of these things failures? Many will say yes.

But I disagree. I believe that to fail is to give up. To have had a great idea and then not making that idea come alive is failing. Maybe it isn’t perfect the 1st or the 10,000th time but we keep trying until it becomes something.

One of the kids there said, “It’s better than the Titanic!” Way to be optimistic!

What I learned from a sinking ship

So what is failure? Failure is quitting after something didn’t go right. Failure is not learning from the experience. There were so many lessons learned. Here are just a few.

  1. Just start and see what happens.
  2. Set goals that are out of your reach.
  3. Gather your friends and have some fun creating something amazing.
  4. If it doesn’t work, collect data, and try again.

What are you not doing because you are afraid to fail? Would you quit making plans and just start?

Are you setting goals that are easy for you and you don’t have to stretch and grow to get close to?

What are you not trying because of what others might think of you? What would happen if you asked them to join you?

Are you looking at what is working and what’s not working and making adjustments for next time?

I challenge you today to try something new today whether it be writing a blog post or building a boat or whatever you feel inspired to create! You will be better for it!

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