“… great literature, drama, music and the visual arts can relieve, restore and reinvigorate the human mind”
ReLit is “the Foundation for the complementary treatment of stress, anxiety and other conditions through immersion in the arts.”
They believe that “great literature, drama, music and the visual arts can relieve, restore and reinvigorate the human mind”, and have a particular focus on bibliotherapy: the art of slow reading, especially of poetry.
The video below gives a sample of a “ReLit Summer Session”, concerning which they say:
“Our work on literature, especially poetry, as an aid to wellbeing intersects with other forms of creative therapy: reading leads frequently to creative writing and sometimes to performance, to music and to art.
Our Summer School on ‘The Green Life of Change’ took us into the territory of the restorative power of the natural environment or, as the naturalist and writer Richard Mabey calls it, ‘the nature cure’.
As we expand our reach, ReLit will be engaging in collaborations with other organisations devoted to a diversity of arts and creative therapies designed to restore – to re-light – the human spirit. Take a look at this video to see an example.”
Other posts about a wellbeing society:
Iceland puts well-being ahead of GDP in budget
What accounts for ‘England’s green and pleasant land’? A panel data analysis of mental health and land cover types in rural England
Residential green space in childhood is associated with lower risk of psychiatric disorders from adolescence into adulthood