Meet our featured beauty with brains Rupa Parthasarathy, founder of Mindkshetra (https://www.facebook.com/mindkshetra/). A beautiful person both inside and outside, she has been touching hearts and lives, and painting the world a shade kinder. Here is an interview with her:
- Tell us more about yourself – your hobbies, passions, dreams etc.
Mine is a story that partly reveals itself with my distinctive tongue twister of a last name (always a great conversation starter!). At a glance, it’s easy to unravel my backstory of hailing from an Indian background. And within Australia, the story of my family’s journey to this land at some point. While that holds true, mine has also been a story of facing adversities, finding my feet, exploring my identity, and establishing connections. That’s what interests me about life-stories, there’s so much more than just what meets the eye. I have always held a deep love for stories. Hence, I am invested in life stories; I love telling them, sharing them and nurturing them. I am someone who believes in painting this world a shade kinder. I thrive on making meaningful conversations and connections.
I have a soft spot for my parent language (I prefer using the term parent language to mother tongue, as it’s the language of both my parents) – Tamil (my being lights up, in its presence). I also speak Hindi and other Indian regional languages (which, if I hear beyond my home’s boundaries, always make my head turn quicker than a bird and tugs at my heart with familiarity). I am also an optimist, an intrepid learner, a movie/music buff and a person who enjoys watching endless reruns of DIY home renovation shows.
- Tell us what inspired you to start Mindkshetra?
I grew up fascinated with all things creative – sketching, music, dancing and storytelling were some of the pursuits I dabbled in and still do. Drawing from this experience, I understand how self-expression can be used to sort through mental chaos, gain clarity, and nurture physical, psychological, and emotional well-being. Art therapy provides me with an approach to facilitate positive change in a person’s (people’s) lives using creative means.
I founded Mindkshetra to create a place where people can experience some mind space. A place where we can nurture mental health from a wellness perspective, rather than only through an illness perspective. Growing up, I experienced that having conversations, even basic things like feeling overwhelmed or anxious, was always relegated either to occur either behind closed doors or mostly dismissed as something that will pass. So I wanted to create a space where discussions about mental health are facilitated openly. Much like how a consistent effort builds physical fitness, I believe it takes conscious effort to nurture mental and emotional wellness. Given, I have witnessed and experienced the healing powers of artmaking, and I teach creativity as a strategy to build and sustain mental health.
- What is art therapy, and how does it differ from conventional psychotherapy?
Art therapy is a therapeutic technique that integrates psychotherapy and creative process to enhance physical, mental and emotional well-being. It is based on the idea that tapping into our creativity by engaging in self-expression can help us gain mental clarity, explore our emotions, develop self-awareness and promote our well-being. As the emphasis is on the creative process of self-expression, no unique artistic ability or talent is required. Artmaking in art therapy courses is playful experimentation with self-expression without having any concerns about achieving perfection.
As human beings, we are complex and unique. There are various factors like our upbringing, culture, heritage, genetics, family, to name a few, that play a role in how we process and react to situations. There are times when we cannot express our thoughts, feelings, emotions only by verbalising them. Art-making provides us with an avenue to externalise these internal workings. Self-expression allows us to view them outside of us, gives some much-needed space to reflect and process them.
- What services do you offer at Mindkshetra?
Mindkshetra offers individual consultations, creative art-based wellness workshops for kids and young people, creative workshops for parties, celebrations, art therapy courses for adults and creative wellness and personal development coaching for communities and organisations.
At Mindkshetra, our mission is to support life stories using creativity. The practise caters to a wide range of people. These people have experienced life adversities, mental health conditions, or anyone interested in taking care of their mental hygiene or connecting with their intuition.
Our Practice is based on the philosophy that we can author our life stories through self-awareness. We believe in seeing clients as a whole person – not defining them by their diagnosis, based on the philosophy that we can author our life stories.
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