#QuoteAsArtTherapy

Photo by Sveta Korniienko on Unsplash

Reflection on Catherine Hyland Moon’s Quote

"It reminds me that it is unlikely I will ever save anyone from ruin by barging in with my techniques and theories and reputation. But if I am willing to be with them and to be guided by the cracks of our lives – the marks of our making and our inability to always hold ourselves together – then there is a chance that together we may find new life."

This statement speaks powerfully to the heart of art therapy. It challenges the common fantasy—felt by many beginning practitioners—that our role is to fix, to rescue, or to apply our knowledge in a way that cures suffering. Catherine Moon reminds us that healing does not arrive through force, expertise, or authority. In fact, when we rush in armed with theory, we risk overlooking the person before us: their fragility, their timing, and the wisdom already held in their lived experience.

The phrase “guided by the cracks of our lives” reframes brokenness not as failure, but as a pathway. The cracks are evidence of a life lived—losses, transitions, ruptures, mistakes, and also resilience. In art therapy, we often see these cracks in the materials: torn paper, uneven lines, textures where paint resists or bleeds. They become metaphors for our inability to stay perfectly intact, and for the way healing happens not by erasing damage, but by being with it.

This perspective invites the art therapist into a posture of companionship rather than mastery. We sit with, not above. We witness, rather than direct. We allow art-making to reveal what words cannot hold. Our presence becomes the instrument—not our control.