Grief in Images: Why Drawing Reaches What Words Can’t

by רקפת הדר | Nov 1, 2026 | Healing and Inner Work

Grief in Images: Why Drawing Reaches What Words Can’t

Grief rarely arrives as a sentence. It arrives as a weight, a color, an image you cannot shake, and a page lets you meet it in that form. In a visual journal you choose a color, an image or a shape, put it down without explaining it, and let the words come later, or not at all.

I am Rakefet Hadar, an art therapist, an author, and the founder of the school that trains SoulPages facilitators to guide creative work in a visual journal. I started my own visual journal in 2014, when my mother was dying of cancer. I was a therapist who gave to others all day, and I needed a place that was just mine. The method I teach now grew out of that period.

Search for art journal prompts for grief and you will mostly find lists. A list cannot tell you which prompt to skip on a bad day, or what to do when a page turns out to be too much. This article is about the page itself: why an image reaches what a sentence can’t, and how to make one, including for the kinds of grief that rarely get their own instructions.

Why does drawing reach grief when words don’t?

A sentence needs a story, with a beginning, a middle and an ending, and grief often has none of the three. A page asks for something smaller. It asks you to choose a color, to tear out one image, to draw one line. You can do that without knowing what you feel.

I once worked with women evacuated after October 7th, in a hotel lobby. One of them, who had lost her daughter, made a page. When I asked her to name it, she cried and then went silent. Words had become another wound for her. In a visual journal the order runs the other way: color and image speak first, and text arrives last, if at all. I wrote about that work in When Words Hurt.

One honest caveat. There is very little rigorous research on art journaling for grief in particular, and most of what circulates online comes from practice and from commercial blogs. What I describe here comes from my own practice as a therapist and from my own journal.

Which kinds of grief can a visual journal help with?

The same page works differently depending on what you are grieving. Four kinds come up again and again:

Kind of grief	What makes it hard	What a page can do
A death	The loss is clear, and the words are not	Give the person a color, an image and a place on the page
Ambiguous loss: dementia, estrangement, divorce, a person who is missing	There is no ending, so the usual rituals of mourning have nothing to hold on to	Stay unfinished, with no pressure to resolve anything
An anniversary or a date	It arrives whether you are ready or not	A small dated page you return to each year
A shared loss, in a family or a community	Everyone is grieving at once, and nobody has spare words	A page made beside others, without having to tell the story aloud

Ambiguous loss is a term from the psychologist Pauline Boss, who describes two forms: a person who is physically absent but still present in your mind, and a person who is physically present but psychologically absent. She argues that closure is a misleading goal for this kind of loss. A page suits it well, because a page is allowed to stay unfinished. Leave a corner empty. Draw a door ajar.

How do you make a grief page, step by step?

SoulPages is a method for working in a visual journal. It brings together art therapy principles, Jungian psychology and trauma-sensitive practice inside a simple structure of seven elements. Here they are, adjusted for grief.

You need a notebook with thick pages, a few magazines or printed images, scissors, glue, and whatever paints are already in the house. Twenty minutes is enough. Before you start, make sure your journal has a resource page, one built around a color you love, a place that held you, or someone who loves you. If there isn’t one yet, make that page first and come back to the grief another day.

Intention. Choose one small direction for the page: a memory, a person, a feeling, or simply “today.” One word is enough. It only has to point somewhere.
The magic of chance. Leaf through the images and tear out whatever you are drawn to, before you understand why. An image that seems unrelated to your loss belongs here too.
Background. Lay down the first layer of color. It might be a color that belongs to the person, or one that feels like the weather inside you right now. Let it dry.
Images. Glue down what you chose, or draw it. A photograph is a fine image: you can paint around it, or cover half of it. Collage is as good as drawing.
Color. Add color where the page asks for it. Color is the energy of the page, so notice which color you reach for and which one you skip.
Line. Line is your personal signature. Draw a frame, a thread between two images, a path, a door.
Text. If words come, write one sentence: something you did not get to say, or just the date. If they don’t, leave it.

You do not need all seven on every page, and the order is flexible. If drawing itself is the obstacle, I wrote about that in I Can’t Draw. Can I Still Keep an Art Journal?

A journal spread with a stitched pocket made from a map, a bare tree, small drawn houses, a sailing ship and a crescent moon over a starry sky — A journal spread with a stitched pocket made from a map, a bare tree and a crescent moon.

What do you do with the page afterwards?

You meet it before you explain it. In SoulPages this happens in three steps, in this order:

Feel. What does this page do to me when I look at it, before any explanation?
Describe. What is actually there: which colors, what is large and what is small, what sits in the corner.
One question. An open question that does not suggest its own answer, for example: “What is the page asking me to leave room for?”

Then close the journal, write the date, place both hands on the cover and take one breath. I wrote more about looking at finished pages in What Do You Do With a Page After You Make It?

How do you get through an anniversary or a bad day?

Make the page smaller. Give yourself ten minutes and a pocket-size page: one color, one image, the date. You do not have to say everything. The date and one image are enough to mark the day.

If you make one page each year on the same date, you can lay them side by side after a few years and look: what stayed, which colors came and went, what moved. The pages are dated, so the change that felt invisible from inside any single year becomes visible across them.

A spread from Gates of Hope Art Journal: a girl with a pink crown beside a round collage of a globe, a wooden house, a castle and a figure with a jackal head, with handwriting winding between them — A spread from Gates of Hope Art Journal: a girl with a pink crown beside a round collage.

When is a grief page too much, and what do you do then?

Grief is not a problem to be solved, and crying over a page is not a sign that something went wrong. But making a page can also flood you. Put the brush down, close the journal and turn to your resource page if:

Your body goes on alert. A racing heart, short high breaths, shaking hands.
You feel far away. A sense that you are not quite in the room.
The same image returns again and again, with no relief.
You feel worse after making a page, every time.

Then feel your feet on the floor, drink some cold water, and come back to the room through your senses. I wrote about this step by step in Is It Safe to Journal About Trauma? In SoulPages we start from resources, the strong and good parts of you, and we approach harder material only if you bring it in yourself.

If the grief stays unmanageable for weeks, if your sleep or daily life is affected, or if you have thoughts of hurting yourself, please do not go through this alone. A therapist can work with your pages in the room. In the US you can call or text 988, in the UK you can call Samaritans on 116 123, and elsewhere you can find a local line at findahelpline.com.

Frequently asked questions

Can art journaling help with grief?
It can. A page asks for a choice of color or image rather than a finished story. There is little rigorous research on art journaling for grief specifically, so what I can offer comes from practice: a page gives grief a form, and the words can come later or not at all.

Do you need to be able to draw to make a grief page?
No. A color wash, a torn image, a glued photograph and a single line make a complete page. The page is for you to look at. Nobody has to see it.

What should you draw when you are grieving?
Start with a color and one image, not with the loss itself. Choose the color that fits today, or an image you are drawn to without knowing why. If the person appears on the page, let them arrive in their own time.

How do you make art about a loss with no closure?
Let the page stay unfinished. Pauline Boss, who named ambiguous loss, argues that closure is a misleading goal. Leave a corner empty, draw a door ajar, and date the page so you can return to it.

How long should a grief page take?
Twenty minutes is enough for a full page. On an anniversary or a hard day, ten minutes and a pocket-size page is plenty.

What if the page makes you cry?
Crying is not a sign that something went wrong. If your body goes on alert, or you feel that you are not quite in the room, put the brush down, feel your feet on the floor and close the journal. If this keeps happening, please consider working with a therapist.

There is usually one image in the pile that you keep skipping and keep coming back to. Start there. You do not have to know yet what it means. Give yourself ten minutes today, take a page, some watercolor and a few images, and make something that reflects what you feel right now, even if you cannot name it yet. Date it, close the journal, and let it be enough for today. There is also a free lesson waiting when you join the list: soul-pages.com

If questions come up along the way, I am here.

With love,
Rakefet

What Is Active Imagination, and How Do You Practice It on Paper?

by רקפת הדר | Oct 31, 2026 | The SoulPages Method

What Is Active Imagination, and How Do You Practice It on Paper?

A wide visual journal spread: a pink dotted figure beside a tree, painted houses, two girls standing on a patterned hill, a large yellow sun and a crescent moon in a starry blue sky

Active imagination is a method Carl Jung developed for meeting the unconscious while you are awake. You take one image, from a dream or a mood, let it move on its own, and treat whatever appears as a figure you can speak with. On paper it is simple: give the image a body in color and collage, then listen to it.

I am Rakefet Hadar, an art therapist, an author, and the founder of the school that trains SoulPages facilitators to guide creative work in a visual journal. Most of what you find about active imagination is either a Jung scholar explaining the theory, or a blog post telling you to close your eyes and have a conversation with your inner child. Neither one tells you what to actually do for the next half hour. What I want to give you here is the paper version, the one I use in my own journal, because an image that has a body on the page is much easier to stay with than one you are holding in your head.

What is active imagination?

Active imagination is a way of working with the unconscious while you are fully awake. You start from something that already arrived on its own, a dream fragment, a recurring image, a strong mood, and instead of analyzing it, you let it unfold and you watch what it does. In Mysterium Coniunctionis, Jung’s instruction was to take the unconscious in whichever form it has already offered you, give it your full attention, and observe its changes objectively.

Two things make this active imagination rather than daydreaming. You stay conscious the whole time, as the observer, and you take part: you ask, you listen, you let the figure answer back. It is a conversation, not a film you are watching.

Where does active imagination come from?

From Jung himself, between roughly 1913 and 1916, in the years after his break with Freud that he called his confrontation with the unconscious. He did not only think his way through that period. He wrote the figures down and he painted them, and those pages became The Red Book.

A visual journal spread with two faces printed in black and in red, each beside a green speech bubble filled with Hebrew handwriting, over pink, orange and green paint with small drawn houses and a tree — A spread from my own visual journal: two faces, each with a speech bubble full of handwriting.

The best-known example of active imagination in the history of psychology was done on paper, in color, by hand. A visual journal is as close to the original as this practice gets.

A few years later, Jung kept the habit in a smaller form. In Memories, Dreams, Reflections he describes drawing a small circle in a notebook every morning in 1918 and 1919, a mandala that, as he put it, seemed to correspond to his inner situation at the time. I wrote more about that, and about what color does inside this kind of work, in Color Archetypes.

How is active imagination different from guided imagery or daydreaming?

The difference is mostly about who is steering.

	Guided imagery	Daydreaming	Active imagination
Who chooses the images	A recording or a facilitator	Nobody, it drifts	The unconscious offers, you stay present
Where you are	Following someone else’s script	Half absent	Awake, watching, taking part
What you do with what appears	Follow it to a planned ending	Forget it	Answer it, and write it down
What is left afterwards	A pleasant state	Nothing	A page, and something you were told

Guided imagery is useful, and I use visualizations in my own teaching. But there you arrive where the voice takes you. In active imagination nobody knows where it is going, including you.

How do you practice active imagination on paper, step by step?

You need a notebook with thick pages, a pile of old magazines, scissors, glue and whatever paints are already in the house. Half an hour is enough.

Before you start, make sure your journal has a resource page in it, a page made from a color you love, a place that held you or someone who loves you. If there isn’t one yet, make that page first, and meet the figure on another day.

Intention. Choose one image to work with: a figure from a dream, a scene that keeps returning, or the mood you woke up in. One word or one picture is enough. This is a direction, not a plan.
The magic of chance. Leaf through the magazines and tear out every image your hand stops on, before you understand why. Do not argue with the choice. This is where the unconscious gets its first word in.
Background. Lay down a first layer of color, the ground the figure will stand on. Choose a color that feels safe to you, because the background is your ground while you meet the figure.
Images. Give the figure a body: a cut silhouette, a glued face, a drawn shape, or several torn images joined together. Let it be as large as it wants to be.
Color. Add color around it. Color is the figure’s energy, and it often says more about the figure than the image does.
Line. Draw the line between you and the figure: a frame, a path, a thread. You decide how close it stands.
Text. At the end, let the figure say one sentence. Write it beside the figure in its own voice, without editing it, and add the date.

You do not need all seven on every page, and the order is flexible. The structure gives you something to hold, and you are free to move inside it.

A journal page with a dark tree whose trunk holds a small lit house, drawn spirals, pink and green inks, and Hebrew handwriting across the top — From my own journal: a tree with a house inside its trunk.

What do you do with the figure once it is on the page?

You meet it before you explain it. In SoulPages this happens in three steps, in this order:

Feel. What does this page do to you when you look at it, before any explanation?
Describe. What is actually there? What is large and what is small, which colors, where the figure is looking, what is hiding in the corner.
One question. An open question that does not suggest its own answer, for example: “What does this figure know how to do that I don’t?”

Then write the dialogue. Ask the figure one real question, the kind you would be a little afraid to ask a person, and write the answer in its words rather than yours. You will recognize a true answer because it surprises you.

In Inner Work, the Jungian analyst Robert Johnson sets out four steps for active imagination: the invitation, the dialogue, the values, and the ritual. The fourth is the one people tend to skip, and in my experience it matters most: do something small and physical with what you received. Closing the journal, writing the date, placing both hands on the cover and taking one breath is a ritual. So is keeping the page where you can see it for a week. I wrote more about looking at finished pages in what to do with a page after you make it.

A journal spread on an orange and pink background: a cut-out photograph of a man seated at a table, painted blue dots running from his hands, drawn houses and Hebrew handwriting — Another spread of mine: a seated figure, and blue dots running out of his hands.

Is active imagination safe?

Mostly, and with limits worth naming. There is very little formal research on its safety, and the usual cautions come from clinical experience: because the process is unstructured, it can bring up intense material quickly, and anyone living with trauma, dissociation or psychosis is advised to do this work alongside a professional rather than alone.

In SoulPages we handle that by starting from resources, the strong and good parts of you, and approaching harder material only if you bring it in yourself. If the figure on the page starts to frighten you, if your heart races or your breath goes short and high, or if you feel that you are not quite in the room, put the brush down, feel your feet on the floor, close the journal and turn to a page you made from your resources, or any image that steadies you. I wrote about this in more detail in Is it safe to journal about trauma?

One more limit, a quieter one: stay the observer. If the figure starts giving you instructions about your life and you find yourself obeying them, you have stopped having a conversation. You are allowed to disagree with it.

Frequently asked questions

What is active imagination?

Active imagination is a method Carl Jung developed for engaging with the unconscious while awake. You take one image from a dream, a mood or a feeling, let it unfold on its own, and treat the figures that appear as something you can speak with and answer.

How do you practice active imagination?

Set aside a quiet thirty minutes, choose one image that already came to you, and let it develop rather than directing it. Give it a form by drawing, collage or writing, ask it a real question, write its answer in its own words, and record the date.

What is the difference between active imagination and guided imagery?

In guided imagery a recording or a facilitator chooses the images and the destination. In active imagination the images arrive on their own and nobody knows where it is going, while you stay awake and take part as yourself.

Do you have to be able to draw to do active imagination on paper?

No. Collage, torn paper, a silhouette and a field of color do the work. A figure built from magazine images with one sentence written beside it is a complete page.

Is active imagination dangerous?

It can bring up intense material, because it is unstructured. People living with trauma, dissociation or psychosis should do it with a professional. Start from your resources, set a time limit before you begin, and stop, close the journal and turn to your resource page if you cannot stay grounded.

How long does active imagination take?

Thirty minutes of making is enough for one page. The part that takes longer is afterwards: coming back to the page over the following days and seeing what it was telling you.

There is usually one image in the pile that you keep skipping, and then coming back to… that one is the door. You do not have to know yet what it means. Give yourself half an hour this week, take a page, some watercolor, a few images, and make something that reflects exactly what you feel right now. Then ask it one question, and write down what it says.

And if you want to learn the whole method, and eventually guide other women through it, that is what the SoulPages school is for.

If questions come up along the way, I am here.

With love,
Rakefet

I Can’t Draw. Can I Still Keep an Art Journal?

by רקפת הדר | Oct 29, 2026 | Techniques and Materials

I Can’t Draw. Can I Still Keep an Art Journal?

A visual journal spread with black silhouettes of a crowd under an umbrella, two children holding hands, and two large white figures, one covered in Hebrew handwriting, beside a pink sunburst and small drawn houses

Yes, you can. An art journal never asks whether your drawing looks like the thing you drew. It asks whether the page reflects what you feel right now, and a color you love, an image torn from a magazine, a simple line and a few words can do that. Drawing is one way onto the page, and you may never need it.

I am Rakefet Hadar, an art therapist, an author, and the founder of the school that trains SoulPages facilitators to guide creative work in a visual journal. Almost every woman I have met along the way began by telling me, “I can’t draw.” Most of the answers you will find online are kind. They tell you that anyone can do this, and then they hand you stencils and stickers. I would like to give you the reason behind the reassurance, and a whole first page that has no drawing in it.

Can you keep an art journal if you can’t draw?

Yes. An art journal, or visual journal, is a book you fill with color, images, line and words, to make room for what is happening inside you. You open it when you need it and close it when you are done. Nobody grades it, and it does not have to look like anything.

SoulPages is a method of working in a visual journal, built on seven elements: intention, the magic of chance, background, images, color, line and text. None of the seven requires you to know how to draw. Images, for example, can be drawn or cut out and glued, and in my method a glued image counts exactly as much as a drawn one.

Why doesn’t drawing skill matter in a visual journal?

There are three reasons.

The journal asks a different question. A drawing class checks whether the apple on the paper looks like the apple on the table. In your journal, you check one thing: whether the page feels true to you today. A big red smear of paint can do that better than an accurate apple.
Most of what you do is choose. Which color, which image, where it goes on the page. In the step I call the magic of chance, you pick what you are drawn to without knowing why yet, and there is no wrong way to make that kind of choice.
Your line is a signature. In SoulPages, your line is as personal as your handwriting. Nobody wonders whether she has a talent for signing her name.

What is the difference between a drawing class and a visual journal?

Both are worth your time. Here is what each one gives you.

	A drawing class	A visual journal
What you learn	Technique: proportion, light and shadow, depth	Giving color and shape to what you feel
Where you start	Looking closely at an object or a model	An intention, and a background of color
What counts as success	A drawing that looks like what you meant to draw	A page that reflects what you feel right now
Who sees it	The teacher and the class	You, and anyone you choose to show it to
What you bring	A wish to practice and improve	A page, some paint, a few images and a few minutes

If you want to learn to draw, take a drawing class, and enjoy it. If you want a place of your own on the page, you can begin today, with the hands you have.

A visual journal spread with a house shape cut from an old map, an old black-and-white photograph of a child under a painted pointed hat, and a pink figure outlined in white against a night sky with stars — A spread from my own visual journal: a house cut from an old map, an old photograph of a child, and a pink figure outlined in white under the stars.

What does a first page with no drawing look like?

You walk through the seven elements, one after the other. Gather a journal or a sheet of thick paper, watercolor, a wide brush, an old magazine, glue and a black pen. Here is the whole page, step by step:

Intention. Choose one word for what you would like to find on the page today: quiet, joy, strength.
The magic of chance. Leaf through the magazine and pull out whatever you are drawn to, before you understand why.
Background. Wet the wide brush and cover the whole page with one color. This is the first layer on the page, and you cannot get it wrong.
Images. Cut or tear out what you chose, and glue it onto the background.
Color. Add color around the images, wherever the page still looks empty.
Line. Take the pen and outline one image, or fill a corner with dots and short dashes. Your hand already knows how.
Text. Write a few words, or a single one, and add the date.

When you finish, look at the page for a minute before you close the journal. It holds an intention, color, images, line and words, and you didn’t draw a thing. If you want a next page, the Bridges to Myself protocol takes you through one step by step.

Do you need stencils, stamps or special supplies?

No. Stencils and stamps are fine if you enjoy them, but they are sold to beginners as a way around drawing. You don’t need a way around it. A magazine gives you more images than you will ever use, a pen gives you line, and a single color gives you a background.

Start with what you already have at home. You can add supplies later, once you know what you keep reaching for.

What do you do when a voice inside says “this is ugly”?

It will come, almost every time. There is no point in arguing with it. Keep going, and the voice gets quieter. Here are four ways to do that:

Leave the page in the journal. A page you dislike today can become the background of tomorrow’s page.
Add a layer. Paint over paint, paper over paper. A visual journal is made in layers, and anything you dislike can be covered.
Go back to choosing. Open the magazine again and pick one more image. You cannot choose an image badly, so the inner critic has nothing to say.
Close the journal and come back tomorrow. A page that looks ugly at night sometimes looks very different in the morning.

Once a page is finished, there is a gentle way to look at it without judging it. I describe it in what to do with a page after you make it.

What if you actually want to draw?

Then draw. Simple shapes are enough: a house, a sun, a tree, the outline of a figure. My own pages are full of small houses, dots and short dashes, and you have known how to draw all of them since you were a child.

If you keep making pages, your hand grows more confident. You don’t have to wait for that before you begin.

A visual journal spread built on a road map, with an old black-and-white photograph, a small drawn house, a snail filled with patterns, a red heart and handwriting over bright pink and orange paint — A spread from my own visual journal: a road map as the background, an old photograph, a small house and a snail filled with patterns.

Frequently asked questions

Can I art journal if I can’t draw?

Yes. An art journal does not check whether a drawing looks realistic. It is a place to give color and shape to what you feel, and color, cut-out images, a simple line and a few words are enough for that.

What do I put in an art journal instead of drawings?

Choose an intention, cover the page with color, glue down images from magazines, add simple pen lines and write a few words. In the SoulPages method these are the seven elements: intention, the magic of chance, background, images, color, line and text.

I am not creative at all. Is this still for me?

Yes. A journal page is built from small choices: a color you love, an image that stops your hand, a single word. You do not need to feel creative to make those choices. Put the color and the images on the page and see what comes up.

Should I learn to draw before I start an art journal?

No. A drawing class teaches technique. A visual journal gives you somewhere to put what you feel. You can start the journal today and learn to draw whenever you like, if you ever want to.

What do I do with a page I think is ugly?

Leave it in the journal and add a layer: paint over paint, paper over paper. A visual journal is made in layers, and anything you dislike can be covered. You can also close the journal and come back tomorrow.

What supplies do I need to art journal without drawing?

A journal or thick paper, watercolor, a wide brush, an old magazine, glue and a black pen. You do not need stencils, stamps or expensive materials, and what you already have at home is enough to begin.

When did you last spread paint across a page with nobody checking how it came out? In kindergarten perhaps, or second grade, or so long ago that you cannot remember… The journal did not ask then whether you could draw, and it will not ask now. Give yourself ten minutes a day, take a page, some watercolor, a few images, and make something that reflects exactly what you feel right now. If you are still wondering what kind of journal this is, I wrote about the difference between an art journal and a visual journal, and the courses at soul-pages.com are there whenever you want a structured way to continue.

With love,
Rakefet

Can You Do Art Therapy on Yourself at Home? An Honest Answer

by רקפת הדר | Oct 27, 2026 | Healing and Inner Work

Can You Do Art Therapy on Yourself at Home? An Honest Answer

A hand with a fine brush painting a paper figure covered in Hebrew handwriting, glued onto an orange, pink and blue watercolor background

No, not on your own. Art therapy needs an art therapist: it is clinical work that happens inside a relationship, with someone responsible for your safety and your pacing. What you can do at home, on your own, is make art that is genuinely therapeutic. For everyday stress, for grief that is still moving, and for knowing yourself better, that is often enough.

I am Rakefet Hadar, an art therapist, an author, and the founder of the school that trains SoulPages facilitators to guide creative work in a visual journal. I have stood on both sides of this question. In the clinic I am the therapist. And in 2014, the year my mother was dying of cancer and I was depleted from giving to my clients all day, I opened a visual journal because I needed one place where I could be the one receiving. Nobody was treating me there, and the SoulPages method was born there. So when you ask whether you can do this by yourself, my answer has two halves, and you deserve both of them.

Can you do art therapy on yourself?

No, and the reason is in the word therapy. Paint, paper and glue are the same in a clinic and on your own table. What makes it therapy is the trained person in the room, who assesses what you are carrying, notices what you cannot see in yourself, and stays responsible from one session to the next.

What you can do alone has other names: art journaling, visual journaling, therapeutic art making. Those names are accurate, and the practice behind them is real.

	On your own at home	With a group or a trained facilitator	With an art therapist
What it is called	Art journaling, therapeutic art making	Therapeutic art	Art therapy
Who holds the process	You	The facilitator’s structure and training	A credentialed therapist, clinically
What it suits	Everyday stress, reflection, grief that is moving	Wanting structure, teaching and company	Trauma, a diagnosis, distress that affects sleep or daily life
Safety net	Your own pacing and a closing ritual	A held space and a method	Assessment, containment and continuity of care

What can making art on your own actually do?

Quite a lot, as long as you ask it for the right things:

It settles you. Small studies have found that a single session of 20 to 45 minutes of art making can lower anxiety or stress hormones in healthy adults, at least in the moment. I wrote about what that research does and does not show in how art journaling helps with anxiety.
It gives a feeling a form outside you. A color, a torn image or a small figure on a page can hold an experience at a distance you can bear, so you look at it instead of being inside it.
It builds a record. One page is a moment. Fifty pages are a map of a year, and patterns you could never see in a single evening become visible.
It gives you a place that is yours. Nobody assigns the page, nobody grades it, and nobody needs to see it.

You do not need to know how to draw for any of this. You need to let color and imagery meet the page and see what rises.

A visual journal spread with a girl in a white dress among painted trees, a face at the edge of the page, and a row of small houses along the bottom — A spread from my own visual journal: a girl in a white dress among trees, with a row of small houses drawn along the bottom.

What can’t it do?

This is the half most articles skip. A journal, however faithful, cannot:

Notice you. A page does not see that you have gone pale and quiet. A therapist does, and slows things down.
Assess or treat a condition. Depression, an anxiety disorder, post-traumatic stress and other diagnoses need clinical care. A journal can walk beside that care. It cannot be that care.
Pace you when something opens too fast. Alone, you are both the one who is flooded and the one who has to stop the session.
Hold the thread between sessions. A therapist remembers where you were last week and where you were heading. A journal keeps the pages, and you have to do the remembering.

A home practice is a different thing with a different job, and it does that job well.

How do you make art at home in a way that is therapeutic and safe?

SoulPages is a method of working in a visual journal, built on seven elements (intention, the magic of chance, background, images, color, line and text), in which every session begins by connecting to the strong, good parts of you and to your resources. Harder material is approached only from that ground, and only if you brought it yourself.

For a first session at home, set a timer for twenty minutes and choose your stopping point before you begin, the way a swimmer checks where the ladder is before entering the pool. Then walk through the seven elements:

Intention. Choose one word for what you want from this page today: rest, steadiness, company. It is a direction, and the page is free to go elsewhere.
The magic of chance. Leaf through a magazine and pull out whatever you are drawn to, before you understand why.
Background. Cover the page with a color you love. This first layer is the ground you will stand on.
Images. Glue down what you pulled, and make sure one image is a resource: a place that held you, or someone who loves you.
Color. Add color around the images, wherever the page asks for more.
Line. Take a pen and outline, connect or frame what is there.
Text. Write a few words, or a single one, and the date.

When the timer ends, meet the page before you explain it. Ask what it does to you when you look at it, describe what is actually there, and ask one open question that you leave open. Then close the journal, rest both hands on the cover for one breath, and give yourself ten ordinary minutes before you return to your day.

My Bridges to Myself protocol walks you through a resource-first page in more detail.

When is working on your own not enough?

Watch the direction, more than the intensity. A home practice is doing its job when heavy material moves: you create, something shifts, and you leave the page a little lighter or clearer. Bring in a credentialed therapist when:

The same overwhelm returns every time you open the journal: a pounding heart, fog, numbness, a scene replaying without relief.
Sleep, work or daily functioning are suffering.
The trauma is recent and still raw.
You are living with a diagnosis, or suspect you might be.
There are thoughts of harming yourself. In that case, reach out right away: call your local emergency number or a crisis line (in the US, call or text 988), or tell someone close to you.

Reaching for help is a continuation of the same care that brought you to the page. My article on whether it is safe to journal about trauma covers pacing and stopping in depth.

Is there something between working alone and seeing a therapist?

Yes. A course, a group or a retreat led by a trained facilitator gives you structure, teaching and other women around you, without a clinical contract. In SoulPages, community is a resource in its own right: your page is witnessed, and what one woman dares to put on paper opens a door for the others.

A facilitator is not your therapist, and a good one says so plainly. I have mapped all three options in art journaling vs. art therapy vs. therapeutic art.

Can you keep a home practice while you are in therapy?

Yes, and the two strengthen each other. A journal gives you the six days between sessions. It catches what surfaces late at night, holds it until you can bring it somewhere, and gives you something concrete to bring. Tell your therapist that you keep a journal and ask how they would like you to use it.

A visual journal spread with two collaged figures, one under a pointed spiral hat and one with open arms beneath a sun — A spread from my own visual journal: two collaged figures, one under a pointed hat and one with open arms beneath a sun.

Frequently asked questions

Can I do art therapy on myself?

No. Art therapy is clinical work led by a trained art therapist within a therapeutic relationship. What you can do on your own is therapeutic art making, such as keeping a visual journal, which calms, clarifies and builds self-knowledge without being treatment.

Is making art at home as good as art therapy?

They do different jobs. A home practice gives you a daily place to settle and reflect. Art therapy adds a trained person who assesses, paces and holds what is too heavy to carry alone. For ordinary stress a home practice is often enough. For trauma or a diagnosis it is not.

What do I need to start at home?

A journal with thick pages, watercolor or any paint you own, a few old magazines, scissors, glue and a pen. Twenty minutes and a timer matter more than the quality of the materials.

Do I need to know how to draw?

No. Color, torn paper, collage and simple marks carry the work. You only need to let color and imagery meet the page and see what rises.

How do I know I need an art therapist rather than a journal?

Watch the direction. If creating leaves you a little lighter or clearer, the journal is doing its job. If it repeatedly leaves you flooded, numb or worse than before, if sleep and daily life are suffering, or if the trauma is recent, choose a credentialed therapist.

Can an online course replace art therapy?

No. A course gives you a method, structure and often a community, and for many women that is exactly what they were missing. It does not include assessment, a treatment plan or a therapist who knows your history.

There may be a journal in your house already, bought for a day when you would have the time, the talent or the reason… You can begin tonight without any of the three. Start with a color you love and one image that stops your hand, and let the page be a place where you receive something. Give yourself twenty minutes, take a page, some watercolor, a few images, and make something that reflects exactly what you feel right now. And if the page keeps bringing more than you can hold alone, let that be the moment you invite someone in. The courses at soul-pages.com are there whenever you want a structured way to continue.

With love,
Rakefet

How to Do Shadow Work Through Images, Not Prompt Lists

by רקפת הדר | Oct 25, 2026 | Techniques and Materials

How to Do Shadow Work Through Images, Not Prompt Lists

Shadow work through art means giving the parts of yourself you have pushed away a form on paper, a figure, a color, a torn image, so you can meet them outside yourself instead of arguing with them in your head. In a visual journal you begin from your resources, let images arrive before explanations, and witness the figure before you interpret it.

I am Rakefet Hadar, an art therapist, an author, and the founder of the school that trains SoulPages facilitators to guide creative work in a visual journal. Search for shadow work and you get lists: thirty prompts, fifty prompts, questions asking you to write about your jealousy, your anger, the traits you judge in other people. A written question goes straight to the part of you that already has its defense ready. An image slips in through a side door, and it usually arrives before the defense has time to wake up.

What is the shadow, in plain words?

In Carl Jung’s psychology, the shadow is everything in you that you pushed out of sight because it did not fit who you were supposed to be: anger that was not allowed, a need that felt shameful, ambition you learned to hide. It does not disappear. It shows up sideways, in a sharp irritation at someone else, in a dream, in an image that grabs you for no reason you can name.

The shadow is not only dark. Jungian writers also speak of a “golden shadow”, the gifts and the brightness you disowned just as firmly as the anger. The qualities you admire a little too much in another woman often live there.

When I teach the inner artist archetype to SoulPages facilitators, we name that archetype’s shadow plainly: the starving artist, the madness, the harsh self-criticism and judgment. Every archetype carries a shadow side. Knowing its name is what lets you enjoy the gifts of the archetype without suffering from its dark side.

Why work with images instead of prompts?

Three reasons, and they build on each other:

An image gets chosen before the mind votes. The shadow was hidden by the thinking mind in the first place, so asking that same mind to write about it is asking the guard to open the gate. When your hand stops on a picture in a magazine pile before you know why, something other than the guard made that choice.
A figure on paper gives you distance. Once the disowned part has a body on the page, a black silhouette, a collaged face, a smear of red, it is outside you. You can look at it instead of being it, and that distance is what makes the meeting bearable.
Jung did it this way himself. He did not stop at words. He painted the figures he met in his inner work, in the pages that became The Red Book.

A visual journal spread with a black figure on one side, a white figure on the other, and a small girl sitting between them — A spread from my own visual journal: a black figure and a white figure, with a small girl sitting between them.

Is shadow work safe to do on your own?

It can be, if you go slowly and start from strength. Shadow material can stir anger, grief and shame that have been held down for years, and diving into it alone, all at once, can flood you instead of freeing you.

In SoulPages we never go to the hardest material directly unless you brought it yourself and you are ready to work with it. Every session begins with resources, the strong and good parts of you: people you love, places that held you, moments you were braver than you knew. The shadow is approached only from that ground.

Pause and close the journal if your body switches to alarm, if you go foggy or far away, or if the same scene keeps replaying without relief. If that overwhelm returns every time you open the journal, this material needs a therapist alongside you, and your pages can travel with you into that room. My article on whether it is safe to journal about trauma covers pacing and closing rituals in detail.

How do you meet your shadow on a page, step by step?

You need a journal with thick pages, a pile of old magazines, scissors, glue and a few colors you already own. Thirty minutes is enough. If this is your first time, make a resource page first, a separate page of what steadies you, and keep it open beside you.

Then walk through the seven elements of a SoulPages page:

Intention. Dedicate the page to one figure: a quality that irritates you in other people, or one you admire and never allow yourself. One word is enough. It is a direction, not a plan.
The magic of chance. Leaf quickly through the magazines and pull out every image that stops your hand, before you understand why. Don’t argue with the choice. The images that catch you with a small discomfort belong here too.
Background. Lay down the first layer of color, the ground this figure will stand on. Choose a color that feels safe to you, because the background is where you stay while you meet it.
Images. Give the figure a body. A cut-out silhouette, a collaged face, a drawn shape, a combination of the images you pulled. Let it take up as much of the page as it wants.
Color. Add the energy around the figure. Where is it hot, where is it faded, where does it bleed into the background?
Line. Draw the line between you and it: a border, a path, a thread connecting the figure to the edge of the page. You decide how close it stands.
Text. Last, let the figure say one sentence. Write it next to the figure, in its own voice, without editing.

You do not need every element on every page, and the order is flexible. The structure is there to hold you, so you can move freely inside it.

What do you do with the figure once it is on the page?

Meet it before you explain it. In SoulPages a finished page is met in three steps, in this order:

Feeling. What does this page do to me when I look at it? Before any explanation.
Description. What is actually there: which images, which colors, what is large and what is small, what is hiding in a corner.
One question. An open question that does not suggest an answer, such as “When I added this figure, what was on the page that was not there before?”

Resist naming it too fast. The moment you say “this is my anger”, you trade everything the image holds for a label you already had. Then close the page deliberately: write the date, close the journal, rest both hands on the cover for a breath. Come back to your shadow pages every few months, in batches, and look for the figures that keep returning. My guide to what to do with a page after you make it walks through this witnessing in more detail.

A visual journal spread with a girl in a white dress and a dark crowned silhouette standing on the same page — A spread from my own visual journal: a girl in a white dress and a dark crowned silhouette on the same page.

Frequently asked questions

What is shadow work through art?

Shadow work through art is giving the disowned parts of yourself a visible form, a figure, a color or a collaged image, so you can meet them on paper instead of only thinking about them. The image creates distance, and it often reaches material that written questions miss.

Can shadow work be dangerous?

It can overwhelm you if you dive into the hardest material alone and all at once. Start from your resources, keep sessions short, close the page deliberately, and bring in a therapist if the same overwhelm returns every time you open the journal.

Do I need to know how to draw to do shadow work in a journal?

No. Collage, torn paper, color and simple silhouettes carry the work. A figure made from magazine images and one sentence of text is a complete shadow page.

What is the golden shadow?

The golden shadow is the positive side of what you disowned: gifts, confidence or brightness you learned to hide. The qualities you admire a little too much in someone else often point to it.

Should I interpret my shadow drawings?

Describe first and interpret slowly. Notice what the page does to you, describe what is actually on it, then ask one open question. Naming a figure too quickly closes the image down to a label you already had.

How is this different from shadow work journal prompts?

Prompts ask the thinking mind to write about what it has been hiding. Working with images lets your hand choose before the mind decides, gives the shadow a form outside you, and starts from your resources rather than from the wound.

There is often one image in a magazine pile that you keep turning past, and then turning back to… that is usually where the page wants to begin. You do not have to know yet what it means, you only have to let it onto the paper and stay beside it for a while. Give yourself thirty minutes this week, take a page, some watercolor, a few images, and make something that reflects exactly what you feel right now. If you want a gentle, structured way in, my guide to keeping an art therapy journal walks you through the first pages, and the courses at soul-pages.com go further whenever you are ready.

With love,
Rakefet

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