Inner Alchemy
Mental Health & Wellbeing Creative Art Program
Inner Alchemy is a skill-building program designed to help the youth (K-12) with their mental health and wellbeing through art, dance, yoga, meditation, poetry and rhyming. Life can be overwhelming in a young person’s life, learning to gain independence and confidence while navigating through their feelings and discovering their identities isn’t easy! Inner Alchemy is designed to help the youth manage mild depression, anxiety, or stress. Our goal is to offer fun and creative activities to help the youth relieve stress or anxiety, prevent mental health problems, support recovery and resilience; enabling all youths to flourish and thrive. We offer workshops that guide the youth through interactive and creative exercises to help them gain confidence, enjoy better relationships, feel less stress and anxiety, and develop practical skills to deal with life’s everyday challenges. All of our classes are taught by instructors who have extensive teaching and coaching experience. Please contact us for more information.
Creative Art (K - 12)
Art can be used to build capacity for managing a child’s mental and emotional wellbeing. Studies have shown that art can help improve mental health conditions because it can improve focus, assist with processing emotions, improve communication, and increase self-esteem. Our creative art workshop uses integrative techniques to captivate the mind, body, and soul through drawing, mixed media art, acrylic and watercolour painting. Our goal is to create a judgment-free environment that focuses on the process of creating and what that means to the youth, not about the end result. Students are encouraged to create without any pressure or expectations!
*All art supplies and materials are included in the course fee
Dance (K - 12)
Our dance workshop is a solution to the Ministry of Education's Dance Curriculum requirement for all BC schools! Dance can improve a child’s mood and can ease depression and anxiety. It is an effective type of exercise that raises a child’s heart rate and works their muscles, which helps with symptoms of depression and anxiety by releasing certain chemicals in their brain. Dance also provides a way to escape stress and worries. In addition, dance can help train a child’s motor skills and memory. Learning new dance moves and different dance styles can sharpen a child’s brain’s ability to remember details which can help with their academics. Our dance workshop includes the fundamentals of dance and is designed so each child feels safe to express themselves physically through dance. We offer different dance styles such as Hip Hop, Breaking (Breakdancing), Street Jazz, Popping, Locking, KPop, House, Waacking, and Voguing.
Click on the link for our Hip Hop School Dance Program.
Poetry & Rhyming (K - 12)
Our poetry & rhyming program allows the youth the freedom to experiment, express, and get in touch with their inner selves. Our program is designed to guide the youth to discover themselves and their life journeys through journaling. Studies have shown that poetry & rhyming helps improve the youth’s cognitive function, which in turn improves their capacity to cope with stress. It has also been proven that poetry & rhyming helps decrease depression. Through poetry & rhyming, the youth noticed reductions in fear, sadness, anger, worry and fatigue. Our workshop aims to support the youth by helping them reflect and navigate their own feelings, providing a distraction from stress through poetry & rhyming and journaling.
Street Art (K - 12)
Street art (Graffiti) serves as a powerful conduit for emotional expression. This art form can transform typography into visual narratives of struggle, resilience, and hope. Graffiti gives the youth a unique sense of freedom and independence because it allows them to leave their mark on the world. With creative custom typography, the youth will feel seen, heard, and understood! Our workshop is designed for the youth to learn the fundamentals of street art and to experience a collective journey of healing, where every street art project becomes a beacon of support and empowerment.
Yoga (K - 12)
Yoga can improve balance, flexibility, range-of-motion, and strength. It can also enhance mental health, although these benefits are harder to measure. Although yoga movements are slow and controlled, they still elevate a person's heart rate, make the muscles work hard, and stimulate the release of helpful brain chemicals such as dopamine, serotonin, and norepinephrine. As a result, yoga can make a person happier which can help relieve depression. Yoga has also be proven to reduce stress, relieve anxiety and improve a person's sleep. Our workshop is designed so the youth can learn basic yoga poses and breathing techniques to help develop a deeper sense of body, mental and emotional awareness.
Meditation (K - 12)
Meditation offers the youth a sense of calm, peace, and balance that benefit their mental wellbeing and overall health. Our guided meditation workshop is designed so the youth can learn to stay centered and keep their inner peace by coping with their stress and focusing on something that calms them; clearing away the things that contribute to their stress. Imagery or visualizations will be used to help students relax. Students will be encouraged to use their senses: smell, see, hear and feel to help with the visualizations.
