Jaya Narayan Expressive Arts Practice

Jaya Narayan Expressive Arts Practice Reflection of my psychotherapy practice. Its intermodal somatically inclined creative arts therapy. Most services are currently online. Visit my website.

https://www.jaya-narayan.com/ to book a 20-minute free consultation with me.

23/08/2025

I'm just here,existing at the surface of the water, not quite drowning but not quite able to breathe.
Jessica Sorensen

Isolation in adversity is a sense of drowning. It feels like a very narrow strip of window from which I can see the world, imperfect but connected, and I am not a part of it. The cycle of withdrawing and protecting further disconnects. The barriers get bigger, and even though I have a longing for someone to be with me, the familiar ways I learnt to cope are inherently and deeply a part of my muscles, making me withdraw, shrink and turn away.

In this exploration, I realised that the sounds of the external world, in this context, water, were louder than my own heartbeat. I noticed that when these moments arise, there is a strong urge to resolve, yet the work I am doing is making space to be in this terrain. A way to feel in my bones. The sense of being in water and breathlessness continues to exacerbate a felt sense of instability and effort. Tears choke up the vocal chords, and no words come out; no resources are available, and I cannot find an exit from the internal maze

21/08/2025

"One of the hardest things in life is having words in your heart that you can't utter."
—James Earl Jones
So much information is present in the more than linguistic realm. In the words not spoken, the pauses, turns, signs, gurgles, yawns and cracks. A significant communicator for me is the bodily movement in passivity. A way for the body to reveal what lies underlying. I call this exploration a movement choreography on the chair. It captures the moments and expresses a range of feelings and sensations. It conveys a way of being part of the world and how you perceive yourself. A consideration of how the chair represents the world and how we position ourselves about it. I find these inquiries fascinating. The intention in my work is never to point anything out or invite change, a way to hold curiosity and bring our attention to what might be new or yet to be known.

dreamsbundled up neatly stackedone on top of another Tied in bows of perfectionprompting effort striving hustling compr...
19/08/2025

dreams
bundled up
neatly stacked
one on top of another
Tied in bows of perfection
prompting effort
striving hustling compromising
never ending
spiraling
persevering
falling
self-soothing invisible wounds
for
capitalist validation

16/08/2025

“In response to threat and injury, animals, including humans, execute biologically based, non-conscious action patterns that prepare them to meet the threat and defend themselves. The very structure of trauma, including activation, dissociation and freezing are based on the evolution of survival behaviors. When threatened or injured, all animals draw from a "library" of possible responses. We orient, dodge, duck, stiffen, brace, retract, fight, flee, freeze, collapse, etc. All of these coordinated responses are somatically based- they are things that the body does to protect and defend itself. ~ Peter Levine

In this experiential, I pursue my motor impulses with the integration of the creative arts. I teach myself a range of options in this playful way, and my body reserves these movements as a warm-up for subsequent inquiries. With this orientation, my focus then shifts from the rightness to curiosity. I discover untried ways to follow my bodily cues to encounter the material. I begin by noticing the fragility, inconsistent surface and length of the paper. I am allowing a bi-directional communication by stretching, pushing, pulling, pausing, squeezing, twisting, tearing, and forming. I notice the intensity of these movements, the need to speed up and the material's resistance to my engagement. I appreciate the possibilities that integrating a range of expressive modalities offers to attune to the body.

14/08/2025

"If you reject the fundamental premises of the pathology paradigm, and accept the premises of the neurodiversity paradigm, then it turns out that you don't have a disorder after all. And it turns out that maybe you function exactly as you ought to function, and that you just live in a society that isn't yet sufficiently enlightened to effectively accommodate and integrate people who function like you. And that maybe the troubles in your life have not been the result of any inherent wrongness in you. And that your true potential is unknown and is yours to explore. And that maybe you are, in fact, a thing of beauty."
― Nick Walker

This exploration is inspired by someone who told me they dismiss their diagnosis. We celebrated their declaration. We honoured their strengths and their creative adaptation. Many of them were bigger than tick boxes. They spoke eloquently about the categories within the paradigm. Still, it does not tell them how their body/ mind/ imagination and heart got together to respond to cumulative adverse life circumstances.

For some, a prognosis is essential and validating. In contrast, for others like the human I am honouring those for whom it's too narrow, invalidating, and disallowing agency.

As I explored the limits set by another, I noticed the resentment I held in my shoulders. I became aware of my preoccupation with the constraint and inability to connect with anything more around me; no resources were accessible to me. I am still making sense of how to bring what I know in my body into my practice. It's more than the accuracy of words.

For me, 'revolution' simply means radical change.Aung San Suu KyiI am in the mood for changing up how therapeutic work i...
13/08/2025

For me, 'revolution' simply means radical change.
Aung San Suu Kyi

I am in the mood for changing up how therapeutic work is structured. I want to locate myself on the bridge between the one-on-one engagement and the world outside. I envision the need for a tender place that focuses on integration, beyond the CBT strategies and checklists, where actual practice can occur and resources can be cultivated. I am bringing my strengths of Psychodrama, body and experiential ways of knowing to this new format. A pilot for 2025 will be offered on an ongoing basis in 2026. Because the real change occurs relationally. If you are interested in this type of engagement, please contact me to learn more.

untethered tearing, sharp edges floating helplessnessbleak dancing sounds of despair silence of collective retelling ...
12/08/2025

untethered tearing,
sharp edges
floating helplessness
bleak dancing
sounds of despair
silence of collective
retelling of history
rubbles of control
deprivation
oppression
fear as justification
either / Or
shaping power
demanding gratitude
will the suffering end?

09/08/2025

"Every day begins with an act of courage and hope: getting out of bed." – Mason Cooley.

As much as somatic therapy fame has empowered people to find a deeper link to their experience, it is bottom-up and linked to the nervous system. It has inadvertently formed standards of what a well-healed body looks like. The popular visuals on social media suggest that it is a ventral vagal-led, socially engaged, well-resourced, boundary manager and self-care selector.

My practice is teaching me that these moments are about receiving relational attunement, asking for help, finding regulating support, cultivating curiosity, and practising gentleness. The body leads the way to inhabit and expand in the dwelling, acceptance, as it is, even if it's a sense of feeling cornered, as is the case here in the exploration.

How might I make more inner space to occupy the corner? How can I remain present in the restrictions? How might I continue to orient and stay in the environment? Taking baby steps and honouring what is. How might you respond to being in the corner?

A poem formed by shapes, contours and textures that speaks to living-lived bodyReminiscing the unlived storiestapering ...
07/08/2025

A poem formed by shapes, contours and textures that speaks to living-lived body

Reminiscing the unlived stories
tapering pointy disconnection
irregular beginning, middle with no end
rough memories
indescribable blankness
wrinkly spirals of coping
incongruent acceptance
shadows of prickliness
Implicated by contrasting tone
Cracked
conditional imbalance
exclusion curved as uncertainty
sharpness of experiencing
forming the moody base
living - lived body

05/08/2025

"The vestibular system is the sensory foundation of safety. It informs the brain: you are here. You are upright. You are held by gravity." ~ Ruth Lanius

The vestibular system is vital and often overlooked. The connection between the inner ear, movement propensities, and spatial orientation is a type of ongoing seeking. Weightedness, constraints, and structure shape our impulse to find ourselves in a state of balance and imbalance. Fluid Movement, such as rocking, swinging, swaying, and stillness, allows us to experience our sense of dimensions (coordinates) and facilitates sensory integration. When there is a sense of gripping within presenting as chronic pain and tension, it might be helpful to ask what I need to resource my proprioception. Do you remember playing games that invited us to move and suddenly pause? We called it London statues, playful ways to experience our bodies in space and time.

In this exploration, I am using sound, Movement, matching and repetition to situate myself. The easier the process, the more accessible it is to bring curiosity to these body-led experiments.

02/08/2025

“If someone else’s reaction seems out of proportion to the situation, it usually means that something else was triggered.” – Dr. Lauren Fogel.

Big feelings attach themselves to small flashes. Sometimes, the intensity of the response to an ordinary moment feels disproportionate. When you reverse roles with someone who has experienced the slippery terrain of neglect, abandonment, violence, betrayal and/or dependency, it all makes sense. The feelings of what was unsaid, unfelt, and forcefully set aside, mightily shifted into resolution, are still here.

When they couple with a scent of unmet needs, they bring forth a cycle of re-experiencing and activation. I feel deeply for my clients who are doing their best to navigate their lives despite their challenging backgrounds. In this experiential exercise, I am foregrounding that I am not ready to acknowledge the feelings of fear, shame, guilt, remorse, anger, self-doubt, and confusion. I recognise that they are always here, protecting me from the inevitable until I am ready and in the presence of an attuned witness.

31/07/2025

“People often say, “I don’t know how you’re doing it.” I tell them that I’m not. I’m not deciding to wake up in the morning. I just do. Then I put one foot in front of the other because there’s nothing else to do. Whether I like it or not, my life is continuing, and I have decided to be part of it.” ~ David Kessler

Being curious about entanglement, I wonder how our wounds hold energy, which can blur, confuse, and enmesh, inter-acting with one another. A way in which what is unattended to calls our attention. The aspects that we are unable to accept or hold are often accompanied by feelings of shame and guilt. Yet they are present, like a metronome, playing a tune to which we move, relate and choose. I looked up the meaning of entanglement in physics. These words make so much sense: a phenomenon where two or more particles become linked together in such a way that they share the same fate, regardless of the distance separating them.

What do we need to do to create some distance between the aspects that wind over and have a repetitious quality, making the stance smaller in each step? In this experiential, I noticed the comfort of repeating and seeing that it helped me slow down. Perhaps that is the wisdom of this response, a way to be soothed.

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Eve Studio
Melbourne, VIC
3072

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