Art Therapy: Emotion Storms
How to use weather to talk about feelings, behaviors, and circumstances.
What is an emotion storm?
For this activity, an emotion storm is a visual representation of how different emotions feel. Think about how your brain and body feel when you are elated. If your feelings were like weather, what would an elated forecast look like? How does that compare to a resentful forecast?
Looking at a storm through a window allows us to see what’s happening while staying safe inside. In a similar way, this therapeutic art activity gives kids an opportunity to conceptualize, visualize, and explore different emotions from a safe distance. Read on to learn how to do it!
Therapeutic Art Activity: Emotion Storms
Grab a sheet of watercolor paper.
Use masking tape to make 4 “window panes” on the paper. One piece of tape will go horizontally through the middle of the paper, and one will go vertically through the middle of the paper. You should have 4 rectangular panes.
Assign each of the 4 panes a different emotion forecast. You can do this a few different ways:
Keep it simple by assigning a single emotion to each pane. (example: In pane 1, paint a storm that represents jealousy.)
Explore complexities by assigning compound emotions to each pane. (example: In pane 2, paint a storm that represents feeling left out and angry.)
Contextualize the emotions by assigning a scenario prompt to each pane. (example: In pane 3, paint a storm that represents how you would feel if you got in trouble for something you didn’t do. In pane 4, paint how you would feel right before a piano recital.)
Use watercolor paints to create the weather that matches the emotion forecast. When done, there should be 4 different window panes depicting 4 kinds of emotion storms (see example below).
This is a great time review abstract art—the storm doesn’t have to look like what it represents, it needs to evoke the feeling of what it represents.
Look at your window and talk about the weather you created!
Is this emotion storm comfortable, uncomfortable, both, or neutral?
What kind of things might someone think, feel, or do if they were stuck in this emotion storm?
How could you comfort yourself or someone else who is in an uncomfortable emotion storm?
Do storms last forever? Like our emotions, weather changes—storms pass, the sun sets and rises again, and there is hope in a new day.
This therapeutic art activity is designed to help kids develop and explore emotional literacy and build resilience.
Resilience is a dynamic skill set that empowers kids to adapt, learn, and thrive through any storm. Resilience is fostered through a growth mindset and the understanding that hardships can be met with empathy and hope. By nurturing a growth mindset, parents, educators, therapists, and caregivers can support self-efficacy, problem-solving skills, and optimism in kids so that they can grow and persevere through even the severest storms.
Materials:
Learn more about Art Therapy and explore our recommended Art Therapy Materials.
