Art therapy and the Puritan work ethic

I have been reading Maps to Ecstasy by Gabrielle Roth; it was part of the required reading for the shamanic training program that I'm currently enrolled in. The first paragraph of the book jumped off the page and directly into my mind:

In many shamanic societies, if you came to a shaman or medicine person complaining of being disheartened, dispirited, or depressed, they would ask you one of four questions: When did you stop dancing? When did you stop singing? When did you stop being enchanted by stories? When did you stop finding comfort in the sweet territory of silence?

For years I have lamented this fact of modern American society: We do not dance or sing; we pay other people to do it for us, deeming ourselves "not good enough," and holding them to an impossible standard. Yes, a lot of amazing, beautiful work comes out of this, and it may well be "better" than what the average person who must work for a living can produce--but I feel that this separation often sucks the soul out of the art, the artist, and the audience. When I graduated from college, I briefly contemplated a career as a professional belly dancer, and quickly realized that performing in restaurants, using only the music that the clientele wanted to hear, and letting skeevy men put dollar bills in my clothing would destroy my love for the dance itself. And countless others sit in the audience, watching the performance, wishing they could be up there but feeling like they can't because they are too young or too old or the wrong gender or don't have a model's body. It's not a winning situation for anyone.

We do not tell stories, we do not find enchantment in them. We watch Hollywood movies and TV shows, and expertly analyze and judge the plotlines. These days we don't even watch shows with a plot, preferring this strange new phenomenon called reality TV. And in the constant noise of the TV and Internet--we can be entertained 24 hours a day if we want--there is no time for silence, and we're judged as strange for even wanting to unplug for a while.

This all adds up to a loss of soul, both on an individual and a collective scale--which we call "mental illness." Once we can get a diagnosis of depression, we can then see a therapist for help (after our doctor checks us out so that it can be covered on our health insurance)--and then, they may give us happy pills, or they may have us do art therapy, music therapy, dance therapy. Just as physical illness often forces us to slow down and take a rest from our busy careers, mental illness can give us the permission to sing and dance and make art and reconnect with our creative spirits. It's only OK to be creative if some authority who knows better is MAKING us do it.

I firmly believe that if we lived in a world where we honored our souls enough to make time for creativity, we would not have such a great need for psychotherapists and pharmaceuticals. I want to live in that world and I don't think I'm the only one.