Drawing your Favourite Book Cover

Feeling drained? Creativity can be an excellent self-care tool – here is a simple and uplifting exercise to boost your mood and connect with yourself.

A step-by-step guide for this creative exercise

1. Look through your books and find a book cover that appeals to you. It could be the colour, the image or the memory. I chose a travel book which is filled with colour and brought back lovely memories.

2. Find somewhere comfortable to sit where you can work easily. 

3. Choose your materials – they can be very simple. I chose markers and an old envelope.

4. If you want to keep this below a certain time, put a timer on your phone. I’d suggest a minimum of 20 minutes.

5. Close your eyes. Take five slow breaths – in and out. Whilst your eyes are closed, think about why you like this image.

6. Open your eyes and start to draw. Let yourself experiment and play. If you are drawing with markers, you can mix the colour of markers by ‘bleeding’ them into each other. Here I could get several shades of yellow by putting a dot or two of another colour on first and then smudging. You can also pull one colour into another by dragging a marker from the centre of a colour. 

7. When you are or feel done, feel free to put up on the counter or fridge for the day. 

Creative activities, like mindful doodling, are a great way to reduce stress and take a little time for self-care. If you are interested in trying more, take a look at my Tuesday Tune In’s, starting in April.