How to Draw Your Feelings: Sadness

Using art to process and express emotions.

For much of my life, I’ve made art primarily for self-expression and storytelling. However, over the last couple years, I’ve started tapping into its power to help me process and release emotions.

I’m drawn to different types of art depending on the emotion I’m experiencing at the time (for example, here’s a post I did on drawing grief). Today, I’ll show one method I use to process sadness.

Step 1: Grab your favorite drawing tools

I like to work in black and white when I’m feeling sad, so I grab my trusty Pentel Pocket Brush Pen and a Micron 10. But if you feel like working with color, go for it! There really is no one right way to do this exercise.

Step 2: Draw Yourself As How You’re Feeling

Next I try to draw myself as how I’m feeling, usually using the first image that pops into my head. Here, I’m drawing myself as a lump on the bed, covered in a blanket. Other times, I draw myself as a child, curled around myself. Do whatever you want—it doesn’t have to look like you. If you feel like a mop, draw yourself as a mop.

Step 3: Make repetitive marks

Make repetitive strokes or patterns around or in your art to express how you’re feeling. When I’m sad, I tend to be drawn to making downward marks using my brush pen as you see below. I suppose it resembles rain a bit. Pay attention to the type of stroke your hand wants to make—there’s no right or wrong way to do it, so go with what you feel like doing.

The repetition of drawing the mark again and again gives me time to process my feelings and in the end calms me down. It’s another way to visualize your feelings but in a more abstract way than Step 2.

By the time I finish, I feel a little lighter. The act of drawing lets me acknowledge my feelings without needing to explain or justify them, and putting marks on the page is a physical way to let some of that weight go.

I hope that sharing this method invites you to try it, too—especially on days when words fall short. Remember, art doesn’t need to be perfect or even beautiful to help us. It just needs to be a place where we can show up as we are, marks and all.

What about you: what methods do you find helpful to process sadness (either with art or without)? I’d love to hear in the comments below!

Leif Love

A dignified Leif posing in front of Minnehaha Falls in Minneapolis.

Take care and keep creating!

-Katharine