Process arts · Recovery arc · Pittsburgh

The recovery arc

A companion to the Process Arts curriculum, organized not by medium but by where a person is in the work. The same expressive practices — image, movement, sound, writing, drama, adornment — arranged as four stages of a single arc. Stabilize the body before anything is asked of it. Externalize the problem so it sits in the room rather than inside the person. Reclaim what the persona could not hold. Integrate it into the room with another and into the ordinary week. The structure follows Jamie Marich's Process Not Perfection and the staged logic of Judith Herman's recovery model; the work is run on the principle that the doing is the medicine, and that messy, unfinished, and private are all welcome.

I. The four stages

What each stage does

The order is a sequence, not a hierarchy, and most people move back and forth across it. Stabilize is placed first because regulation precedes insight when a person has arrived dysregulated, and most people arrive that way the first time.

Stabilize

Herman Stage 1 safety, Marich Phase 1 stabilization, Porges polyvagal, Levine somatic experiencing

Arrive and regulate. Safety in the body before any depth work.

Externalize

White and Epston narrative therapy, Jung projection, Schwartz IFS unblending

Get the problem, the story, the disowned part out of the self and onto the page.

Reclaim

Jung shadow and persona, the golden shadow, Schwartz IFS exiles, Hillman

Meet and welcome back what the persona could not hold — shadow, masks, projection.

Integrate

Herman Stage 3 reconnection, Tedeschi and Calhoun PTG, Banks relational-cultural CARE

Carry it into the room with another person and into the ongoing life.

II. The sixteen

The full arc

Four stages arranged as quadrants of a wheel; four rings deep, the entry practice at the center, the deepest work at the perimeter. Reading clockwise around any ring is a four-stage pass at the same depth. Reading outward through any quadrant is one stage's descent from entry to depth.

Recovery Arc curriculum: 4 modules across 4 rings An interactive wheel. Each of the sixteen sectors is a clickable practice. Four modules form four quadrants of a recovery arc; four rings grow outward from the entry practice at the center to the deepest work at the perimeter. 1234 Recovery Arc Curriculum 16 practices · 4 modules StabilizeExternalizeReclaimIntegrate
Four modules arranged as the quadrants of a recovery arc, four rings deep. Each cell opens to a practice; the arc advances outward, from the entry practice at the center to the deepest work at the perimeter.

Stabilize

  1. R1 The Arriving Body soon
  2. R2 Contained Shape soon
  3. R3 Rhythm That Settles soon
  4. R4 The Safe-Enough Room soon

Externalize

  1. R1 The Problem on the Page soon
  2. R2 Naming the Mask soon
  3. R3 The Story Told About You soon
  4. R4 Parts in the Room soon

Reclaim

  1. R1 Masks and What’s Underneath live
  2. R2 The Disowned Bright soon
  3. R3 Letter to the Exile soon
  4. R4 The Coronation soon

Integrate

  1. R1 Into the Room With Another soon
  2. R2 What the Growth Cost and Gave soon
  3. R3 The CARE Wheel soon
  4. R4 Carrying It Forward soon

III. Seven stations inside each practice

One practice, seven entries

Every practice runs through seven modalities. The participant enters at whichever one calls and may always pass. The work does not have to be good, finished, or shown.

  1. 1Visual Arts. Drawing, painting, collage; the image worked on paper.
  2. 2Movement and Dance. The body as the medium; posture, gesture, locomotion as expressive vocabulary.
  3. 3Music and Sound. Voice, drum, instrument; the practice carried by vibration and rhythm.
  4. 4Writing. Letter, list, poem, declaration; the practice held by the pen.
  5. 5Drama and Performance. Monologue, scene, gesture, role; the practice staged.
  6. 6Fashion and Adornment. Mask, crown, garment, talisman; the practice worn.
  7. 7Open Intuitive. No prescribed medium; the practice as it arrives.

IV. Find your route

Calibrate the prompts

The prompt at each station is written four ways, calibrated to two axes: how at home a person is in art-making, and how much direction they want today. The choice saves locally and carries across both Process Arts curricula.

Calibrate

Which of these is most true today?

The prompts at each station are written four ways. The variant that suits a person who already paints differs from the variant that suits a person who is uncertain whether they should be here at all. Pick one; the choice saves locally and the station prompts re-filter.

V. The current state

What is published, what is coming

One practice is written: Masks and What's Underneath, the entry practice of the Reclaim stage. The remaining fifteen hold their position on the wheel and accept email signups for when each goes live. Cells with a thicker stroke on the wheel are published.

A note on scope. The curriculum is counseling-with-creativity inside the ACA C.7.a frame, not creative-arts-therapy in the credentialed sense. The author is an LAPC in Pittsburgh; the practices are written for facilitated group use and for individual self-guided use. Practices that touch shadow, parts, or symbolic-enactment material carry their own scope-of-practice and contraindication notes inline.