Interviewer: Mahmoud Mansi
“Many employees can’t manage and give expected effort in the business not because of the workplace but because they are suffering from a serious problem in their personal lives, which is logical and should be respected by the organization.”
Dina Alborgui
HR Revolution Middle East: As a professional art therapist practitioner and an artist, how do you believe colors impact us as human beings?
Dina Alborgui: In fact, I have my personal philosophy about that, so let me tell you a wondering story and meditate together for a while.
In our universe what do you see? What are the common things in the universe in point of view, which are not a need to understand or explanation? What is the unspoken language that we share? Well, I think the logical question now is what do you feel?
From my point of view, I can see clearly the common things are the colors and the shapes in all the universe. We are surrounded and affected by this nature of shapes and colors. Maybe the correct word is the nature’s components are colors and shapes that by its role affects us as human being.
And here let me declare this in more details, we are assured and know well from the variations of the plant leaf forms and colors, right? the logic question comes by its turn again “how do you feel about this colored leaf?”
What if the same leaf has the same form but it’s only drawn in the nature on the trees as outline, no colors, empty and transparent! The logic question now, “How do you feel about that leaf?”
Another example; do you see the air? No… but we feel it only because it is not a tangible thing and it’s transparent, so we say, it’s hot… it’s cold… it’s fresh… etc. Again; “How do you feel?”
What if the air is colored? It’s very windy and blue, once again it’s rose… etc. How do you feel now? Is it comfortable? If the air that we breathe is not transparent and I cannot see what is behind?
There are many examples that prove the colors’ impact on the human being. The conclusion of these examples that our emotions are affected by our five sensations which are affected naturally by the nature components which are colors and forms.
HR Revolution Middle East: Dina, you have been working with children, parents, employees and corporate leaders as an art therapist. Can you tell us what is art therapy from your own perspective? And how exactly do you help your clients?
Dina Alborgui: My own perspective and philosophy to deal with clients through art therapy or art psychotherapy – both are the same – in sessions: “one to one sessions, group, corporate sessions”.
I consider that the human being is divided into three faculties or parts; that are:
1- the head: that reflects thoughts – and acts as a container – imagination, five senses, brain and organs. 2- the body: which is the human container, organs, and physical feelings or emotions. 3- the spirit: feelings, emotions, unspeakable events, conscientiousness, energy, etc…
Such parts can be affected negatively or dramatically at any age stage and can get isolated somehow depending on the level of traumatic events. Any affected part may be affected by its turn to the other parts, taking in consideration the weight, the quality, and the repetition of the affection.
So, to rebalance or keep balance of the human spontaneous capabilities of trust and empowerment, we need to restore the harmony among these parts. Art therapy in its role can rewrite and aid in this harmonious balance. That’s how I help my clients in their different challenges in coping with their lives.
HR Revolution Middle East: On an individual level, why do people need art therapy? How can it impact their lives?
Dina Alborgui: When we say the word “need” it refers to something very important that we can’t live without. For example, I can’t live without eating my enough necessary quantity of calories – can’t live without drinking the enough quantity of water, this is a need, right? So if I couldn’t apply that need I will suffer, feel pain and get sick. When I fulfill my needs and get contained I will feel stable, happy, able to enjoy my life and satisfied, right? It’s the same for the psychological side and its needs. The human psyche has principles needs that should be fulfilled, contained and saturated during one’s age stages, which begins from the period of the pregnancy.
The problem starts when we suppress, deny or misunderstand our emotions and can’t deal correctly in a healthy way with our emotions, which reflects on our feelings or needs. In this state we suffer, we can’t feel the real love, we find difficulties to understand and deal in relationships, and we struggle in coping with the life challenges as well. So the point is to keep trying to understand yourself, understand and feel your emotions, balance your pathological state between the pain and the gain because life is not going through only one side.
Art therapy by its role can deeply lead you to make this balance. So my advice is to not wait till you feel that pain to start your therapy journey.
HR Revolution Middle East: You offer group sessions as well, working with organizations. Can you tell us more about that?
Dina Alborgui: Corporate art therapy workshop is one of the most important and interesting activities for the organization and their employees as well. As we know well that nowadays the life is rush and sometimes put all of us under pressure. The activities vary according to the therapeutic goal weather in a group or individual context. Art therapy sessions contain or include some art materials and tools, and followed an artistic creativity and art therapeutic instruction to facilitate the process. This allows people to express their emotions, experiences, relief their stress, and raise the group engagement.
HR Revolution Middle East: From your experience working with organizations, what are the major problems organizations face in their culture, and how does it impact their business?
Dina Alborgui: Of course any organization has employees from human beings not machines. So as mentioned in the previous answers that any of us needs from time to time to keep the psychological health and the mental health in a balance to cope with life challenges including work challenges, which means from a different angle just respect your emotions capabilities. Return to the work environment, we find that one of the life challenges is to keep your organization in balance economically and productively, and this leads us to think about several relationships; the management with the employees, and the relationship among one team and different teams together as an internal holistic relationship, and the external relationship which can be with the costumers, and competitors, in addition to personal life of each one of the team. This means there are a lot of responsibilities and duties that shall be done in a good quality most of the time on the business level and the personal level to protect your presence in “life” as an organization and as a human being. Then what if the conflicts appear a lot, and the harmony disappears, and the work environment became more ruthless? Obviously we will feel the pain and very stressful.
Art Therapy to organizations will reduce the unsolved problems and avoid in advance the unseen problems, which will lead by its turn to a harmonious organization with a high level of engagement. Art Therapy can also be used as a tool in selecting newcomers in the interviews for the hiring process, the organization should be sure that their new employees fit the right position.
HR Revolution Middle East: As the corporate world is turning into a digitalized one, emotional intelligence becomes one of the core competencies of business leaders. What is your opinion about that? And how does art therapy impact emotional intelligence?
Dina Alborgui: Emotional intelligence is one of the most important outcomes of art therapy sessions. Emotional intelligence means that you are mature enough to deal with everything in a balanced and healthy way without suppression and without unreasonable reacting, to deal with your own thoughts and emotions at the same time to deal with other and the surroundings changes. To be aware of what is happing, that is somehow difficult and it seems inapplicable all the time. So the secret is in keeping practice of art therapy sessions in organizations as group therapy and individually. For example, many employees can’t manage and give expected effort in the business not because of the workplace but because they are suffering from a serious problem in their personal lives, which is logical and should be respected by the organization. In that case if the concerned employee takes an individual art therapy session, his/her will be able to raise their emotional intelligence level to cope with the personal life and to act in the business, the employee knows the personal problem but can act in business without interaction in his/her personal life. Eventually, the concerned employee will feel his/her achievement, reparability, coherence and in repeating sessions he/she can feel more stability.
HR Revolution Middle East: You are also a certified color assessor. Can you tell us more about that? How do you use this for the benefit of organizations?
Dina Alborgui: The complete color assessment is like a deep scan on the human being for the psychological health state and skills. As an art therapist I use the color assessor tool to know more about the person’s skills and psychological health state and through the art therapy session I can give him/her the suitable advice regarding to his/her capabilities and abilities for the time being, which can change for more responsibilities or can be developed after that if he/she developed or changed. That was clear for me during the corporate art therapy group sessions that I conducted before.
As I mentioned before that art therapy group sessions have vary activities. In every activity all the group play the same role affecting their skills, which leads to personal development and ameliorate the organizational performance. Other activities have the elements of team building, decision making, organizational values, team engagement, and leadership and followers’ roles. In these activities we build values like this: “I accept to be the leader for this task now and respect my team also I accept to be the follower in another task and respect all.” So we all can play all roles at the correct time, correct position and with different parties. But it’s not a must to play all the roles in real life, it’s just to understand, accept and respect our own and others’ abilities and capabilities.
HR Revolution Middle East: Dina, as a magazine that is focused on Human Resources, what are the three most valuable practical advices you would like to tell to HR Leaders?
Dina Alborgui: I see HR leaders as the link between the top management and employees, which demands a lot of efforts to compromise the decisions and find the best solutions in the organization. This responsibility includes some duties: keep smooth communication across all levels of your organization – keep your eye open on the new experiences and give them a try to have a realistic evaluation – your real asset is the people you will never lose in investing them technically and spiritually.
THANK YOU