No matter where you live in the world right now, things feel a bit fraught. Wars and political conflicts, economic woes, alignment of stars and planets…whatever the root cause, our brains give us a hard time when there are external stressors.
So let’s take a look at three things we can do to make ourselves feel a little better:
- Donate money to the cause of your choice. Find one that aligns with your values and give a little. It truly doesn’t have to be a lot – pennies add up to dollars when lots of people donate.
- Help a fellow human via direct action. Reach out to a neighbor, volunteer at a community kitchen, knit a hat, whatever’s in your wheelhouse. Your act will make (at least) two people feel better.
- Take a break from overthinking. Turn off your brain and let yourself relax without guilt. I can help with this. Let’s draw some repeatable tangle patterns using my ISCO. method.
Why Patterns Create Calm
Patterns use simple instructions: “Fill this circle with small dots, and repeat to form a line.” You know exactly what to do. Your hand can start moving and your mind can relax because your made the decision. Creating patterns becomes a form of moving meditation to quiet your mind while keeping your hands busy.
Step-by-Step ISCO. Patterns & Tangles
ISCO. is a mnemonic for the five strokes that make up almost all art.
- I is line;
- S is squiggle or wave;
- C is an arc or half-circle;
- O is a circle; and
- • is a dot
With these five marks you can make almost anything from a simple checkerboard to a realistic rose.
For making repeatable patterns and “tangles” we combine the ISCO. marks into elements that we can use to fill a space. Use your imagination to put together any two marks. Then try building a different element using three marks. Try the first two marks again in a new way. There are endless combinations.
Next we’ll draw a frame on the page (a square, rectangle, or any closed shape) and fill it in by repeating the elements you created.
When filling a frame with combinations of ISCO. marks, you can choose a structure to make everything neat and repeatable. You might arrange your elements in rows, or maybe you spiral them, or arrange them like tiles.
This can become meditative as you repeat, repeat, repeat the elements. See if you can let your mind wander while your hand does the work. Can you take a nice long, deep breath with each stroke or element? So relaxing…
If your combination of elements is complex, you might make a “mistake” as you repeat and element to build the pattern. But don’t let perfection ruin the experience. If you muff the pattern, you have two ways to go: continue the original pattern with your mistake as a little blip in it; or update the pattern to match your mistake. Either way is fine. Don’t let it stress you – life is definitely not perfect and neither is art.
If you fill the frame with your pattern quickly and want to keep going, you can add more marks in layers, or add details, colors, or shading.
When you are finished
- Take a deep breath and look at your pattern drawing
- Recognise the beauty in what you created
- Remember that even in difficult times, there is beauty to be found
If you want to explore the experience more deeply, you can ask yourself these questions:
- Did your stress or feelings shift as you created the patterns?
- Has drawing patterns allowed you to make connections to other things in your life? Do you feel differently about them?
- Is there anything that you’d like to change in the pattern? You can start fresh and draw again, or add to what’s already on your page.