Tao Art : The Way Of Art

22/12/2025

Creative Health: The Question Being Asked Is No Longer the Right One

There’s been a global boom in practice, research and publishing about Creative Health this year.

This surge reveals the way forward - and also clearly shows that some questions are ready to be retired.

The outdated questions:

❓Are creative therapies effective?

❓Are art and music therapies viable allied health supports?

❓Do creative approaches really improve mental health and wellbeing?

These questions might have made sense decades ago when ‘evidence’ was emerging and professions were developing. They no longer fit the current global context.

💡Why these questions are outdated:

Global health bodies, psychiatry, and public health frameworks now recognise arts and creative engagement as vital contributors to mental health and wellbeing - like sleep, exercise and diet.

The issue is no longer uncertainty about effectiveness, but how systems respond to this knowledge.

🖼️ Reframing the questions:

If creative therapies are effective and evidence-supported, why are they still treated as peripheral rather than integrated as core public mental health infrastructure in Australia?

Why do our systems continue to hesitate in utilising creative practitioners as public mental health resources, despite overwhelming need and strong evidence?

In the midst of a mental health and su***de crisis, why are we still questioning the legitimacy of creative therapies instead of mobilising them as part of our public health response?

💗The human stakes:

The issue is no longer whether creative therapies are helpful. The issue is whether our systems are able to recognise, trust, and mobilise forms of care that don’t sit neatly inside older biomedical models — now more than ever when people are hurting, and help is urgently needed.

🌈 What I want to see:

Position descriptions for mental health roles in multidisciplinary teams that explicitly welcome PACFA-registered Creative and Experiential Therapists to apply.

GPs referring help seekers with mild-moderate mental health concerns to local, community based PACFA CCET registered creative and experiential therapists for timely, personal, creative care.

Schools engaging PACFA CCET registered creative and experiential therapists to help care for the mental health and wellbeing of both students and staff.

The Australian National Standards for Counselling and Psychotherapy now provide clarity and confidence about the role of tertiary-qualified counselling and psychotherapy practitioners, including Creative and Experiential Therapists.

⏰ Time for change! The question is no longer:

whether creative therapies work,

OR

Whether creative therapists belong in allied and mental health teams

OR

Whether creative and experiential therapies are safely regulated.

💫The real question now is:

How quickly will Australia’s systems adapt?

…

Want to read more?

https://ncch.org.uk/blog/creative-health-books-released-in-2025

27/10/2025

We’ve entered a new era of recognition for counsellors, psychotherapists, and creative and experiential therapists. Proud to see PACFA’s leadership and to reflect on CCET’s five-year journey that helped bring us here:

A New Era for Counsellors, Psychotherapists — and Creative and Experiential Therapists

It’s wonderful to see the National Standards for Counselling and Psychotherapy now formally published — a milestone that marks a new era for our profession.

For those of us PACFA registered therapists who work through creative, experiential, and relational ways of knowing and healing, this moment is especially significant. It affirms Creative and Experiential Therapists (CETs) as part of Australia’s nationally recognised counselling and psychotherapy workforce — something that many of us have been steadily working toward for the past five years.

Through PACFA’s College of Creative and Experiential Therapies (CCET), we have been laying the groundwork for this moment since 2020.

• ✨ Our journey so far:

• 2020: A group of 40 PACFA-registered Creative and Experiential Therapists came together, with PACFA’s support, to propose forming a new college that could represent our ways of working.

• 2021: PACFA’s Board unanimously accepted the proposal and established the College of Creative and Experiential Therapies (CCET). I was honoured to be elected as the inaugural Convenor.

• 2022: Our Leadership Group developed CCET’s values, purpose, membership criteria, and education standards — including a transparent, ethical assessment pathway aligned with national benchmarks.

• 2023: We prepared for opening for membership and contributed policy submissions to national reform campaigns.

• 2024: We opened for membership, launched our online community, developed standards linked to digital badges, and began our monthly CPD webinar series.

• 2025: We tripled our membership, contributed to the consultation process for these new National Standards, published a peer-reviewed response to the NDIS changes, and launched our community networking series, CCET Exchange.

As PACFA celebrates this new era, I also want to acknowledge the dedication, vision, and collaboration that have brought Creative and Experiential Therapies to this point of national recognition.

To my colleagues across the field — now is the time to make sure your voice is part of this future. If you’re a PACFA-registered Creative or Experiential Therapist, I warmly encourage you to apply to join CCET. Together, we’re shaping the evolving landscape of psychotherapy and counselling in Australia.



Find out more about CCET and how to join here:

https://pacfa.org.au/portal/Portal/About/Colleges/creative_and_experiential_therapies.aspx

17/08/2025

Light and shadow ☯️

11/08/2025

❤️

21/07/2025

Inspiration for today ✨

05/07/2025

Blown away by the maturity and wisdom of yr 9 age group of young people enjoying making and creating gratitude jars while supporting each other with healthy relating communication and general life skills education.
Facilitating groups with The Family Centre 🙌💜💫

02/07/2025

07/04/2025

04/04/2025

https://www.sociallyspeaking.com.au/peers-groups

02/04/2025

Calling all 12-25 year olds!
Are you passionate about mental health and want to contribute to change?💚
Come and join our Young Persons Advisory Committee (YPAC), we meet on the last Wednesday of the month... pizza included!! 🍕

What's in it for you?:
* Planning and helping run youth events and other programs including art workshops, hosting headspace
stalls at festivals and more. 🎵
* Evaluating and helping shape the delivery of headspace services. 💬
* Assisting in the design and development of our centre.
* Attending various meetings for local organisations/services/schools and presenting on behalf of headspace Tweed
Heads. 👥
* Developing our social media platforms and community engagement strategies.🌐

What are you waiting for!? Apply today... link in the comments!

27/03/2025

BOOK NOW! It's only two weeks until the 'Charms for the Charming' jewellery workshop at Tweed Regional Museum! Let your imagination run wild at this creative workshop for 14-24 year olds, run by offered as part of NSW Youth Week. Register at https://loom.ly/Flum00w 💚 Headspace