Creative Self-Care for Mental Health and Wellbeing

The ability to recognise, represent and place perceptions, memories, concepts and associations into predictably repeatable groupings or relationships. It is linked to everyday functioning and built upon assumptions.

The ability to recognise, represent and place perceptions, memories, concepts and associations into groupings, which share key characteristics, while recognising that they also differ in others. It is related to the making of meaning and the initial assimilation of the new.

The ability to observe both direct and indirect perceptions and associations, objectively, accurately, and at will. It is also the ability to produce an innovative approach or insight into familiar problems or accepted wisdom. It involves clarity of perception: seeing beyond assumptions, to reach the essence, the reality, or the unseen potential. It is linked to self-understanding and understanding of context.

The ability to generate two-dimensional pictorial imaginations that are available to be translated externally, for example into images or linguistic descriptions. It is linked to implicit associations in non-verbal personal symbolic language.

The ability to maintain in thought, an overview of physical or conceptual mechanisms, systems, forms, structures, or metamorphoses over time. It is also the ability to co-ordinate a variety of perspectives, including the ability to represent the point of view or experience of another person. It is linked to the experience of relationships, including empathy and self-esteem.

The ability to formulate appropriate spoken structure and coherence, both as a monologue and in reciprocal conversation using appropriate vocabulary and expression. It is linked to fluid modulation between personal symbolic language and shared symbolic language, within a coherent whole.

The ability to formulate written structure as a coherent whole using appropriate vocabulary. It is linked to shared symbolic language and to the trajectory and grammar of attention. 

The ability to use common sense algorithmic responses or trial and error, when working with unknowns. Heuristic thinking is often an inspired attempt or a last resort in difficult circumstances. It may involve thinking through the practical application of the hands or body as whole-body thinking, or as part of instantaneous decision-making in an emergency. It is linked to crisis management, and creativity in novel situations, but requires subsequent processing to fully assimilate the experience, including any paradox that may arise in relation to normal protocols. It is linked to self-efficacy and survival.

The ability to refrain from judgement or prejudice when considering, for example, perceptions, associations, information or experiences, and to maintain that position for a sustained period to achieve a full, objective overview. It requires modulation of attention and is linked to post-event processing.

The ability to make reasoned and coherent judgements on the basis of an informed understanding. It is linked to explicit reinforcement or recalibration of associations, concepts or actions.

The ability to co-ordinate perceptions, associations, ideas, concepts, strategies and approaches, and manage the synergy between them, while moving between explicit and implicit thinking. It is linked to personal organisation and needs, and the associated internal and external ethical considerations relating to personal conviction or potential action.

The ability to objectively compare and contrast a new perception with a previously held view, experience or understanding and support or adapt one or the other. This includes perception of the thinker’s own thought processes. Where this presents a paradox, the thinker uses their perceptive ability to recognise it. It is linked to the recognition of a new reality.