Creativity Is Medicine: How Expression Heals the Brain, the Nervous System, and the Soul
Creativity is not a hobby.
It is not a luxury.
And it is certainly not reserved for artists.
Creativity is a biological, neurological, emotional, and spiritual necessity.
Long before neuroscience could measure it, I lived it.
I have been an artist my entire life. During the most stressful, destabilizing, and uncertain periods of my life, creativity was not optional — it was how I survived. Art became my outlet for self-expression when words failed. It became my way back to center when my nervous system was overwhelmed. It was my source of calm, confidence, presence, joy, and self-inquiry.
Art was — and remains — therapy.
It is why I opened an art center nearly two decades ago. It is why I have continued to integrate my gallery and creative business into my life, even as my work expanded into functional, integrative, and quantum health. And it is why I created the Integrative Therapeutic Arts Program (ITAP) — to offer my local community a space where creativity becomes a healing container, a place where people can breathe, express, reconnect, and remember themselves.
Creativity brings people together.
It creates safety.
It creates coherence.
This is not incidental. It is medicine.
Science Now Confirms What the Body Always Knew
Recent neuroscience research confirms what artists, healers, and embodied humans have always known: creative expression keeps the brain young, resilient, and adaptable.
Large international studies using advanced brain imaging and machine-learning “brain clocks” show that people who regularly engage in creative activities — such as dance, music, visual arts, and strategic problem-solving — have brains that function four to seven years biologically younger than their chronological age (Ibáñez et al., 2025). Even more striking, as little as 30 hours of creative learning over one month can measurably reduce biological brain age by approximately three years (Ibáñez et al., 2025; Mercola, 2025).
Creativity strengthens communication between brain regions responsible for attention, emotional regulation, coordination, and cognitive flexibility — the very networks most vulnerable to stress, trauma, and aging (Ibáñez et al., 2025; Beaty et al., 2018).
Creativity is not “extra.”
It is protective.
Creativity Regulates the Nervous System
Creativity works through neuroplasticity — the brain’s ability to adapt, rewire, and restore balance in response to experience (Kolb & Gibb, 2011).
When we create, multiple systems activate at once:
Brain
Body
Emotion
Sensory awareness
Meaning and purpose
This simultaneous engagement enhances functional connectivity across cortical and subcortical networks, supporting autonomic regulation, emotional integration, and stress resilience (Fancourt & Finn, 2019; Koch et al., 2019). Creative engagement has been shown to reduce stress markers, improve mood, and modulate autonomic nervous system activity (Thoma et al., 2013; Kaimal et al., 2016).
This is why so many people feel calmer, clearer, and more alive after creating — even if they don’t “know why.”
The body knows.
Creativity Is Not Just Visual Art
One of the most important truths I share with clients is this:
You do not need to be an artist to be creative.
Creativity is a way of engaging with life — not a skill set.
Creativity includes:
Movement, dance, rhythm, and flow
Writing, journaling, storytelling, and voice
Music, sound, and vibration
Cooking intuitively
Designing spaces
Problem-solving and strategic thinking
Play, humor, curiosity, and imagination
Expressive communication and emotional truth
Activities that integrate movement, rhythm, and multisensory engagement — such as dance and music — show particularly strong effects on brain plasticity, emotional regulation, and cognitive reserve (Burzynska et al., 2017; Herholz & Zatorre, 2012).
What matters is novelty, presence, expression, and engagement — not talent or output.
The 9 Healing Roots: Where Creativity Lives
At Sage Health, creativity is not an isolated concept. It is one of nine foundational healing roots, all of which must be nourished for true healing to occur.
The 9 Healing Roots:
P – Physical Health
The structure, systems, and physiological integrity of the body.
E – Emotional Health
The ability to feel, process, regulate, and integrate emotion safely.
M – Mental Health
Thought patterns, belief systems, mindset, identity, and perception.
N – Nutrition, Digestion & Assimilation
How the body receives, breaks down, and uses nourishment.
R – Relationships, Community & Love
Connection, attachment, safety, belonging, and co-regulation.
S – Spiritual, Astral & Purpose Health
Connection to source, soul, meaning, and unseen realms.
C – Creativity & Self-Expression
Expressing your unique voice, joy, truth, and aliveness.
A – Energetic / Auric Health
Biofield integrity, chakra flow, energetic boundaries, and energetic body coherence.
S – Circadian Rhythm, Sunlight & Sleep
Alignment with natural light-dark cycles and biological timing.
Creativity is both one root — and the expression of all of them.
The Creative Force: Pathway to Embodiment, Divinity & Healing
Creativity is not just something we do.
It is who we are when we are connected to our essence.
Unlike artificial intelligence, which mimics and recombines, the human being is born to originate. We imagine what does not yet exist and bring it into form — through art, movement, language, design, storytelling, and soul-aligned living.
Creativity is divine communication.
When we create from an embodied place, we are in communion with Source itself — co-creating, channeling consciousness into matter. When creativity is suppressed, parts of our truth go silent. When it flows, wholeness is restored.
Creativity Is Anabolic; Illness Is Catabolic
From a physiological lens, creativity is anabolic — it builds energy, coherence, and vitality through dopaminergic reward pathways, neurotrophic signaling, and parasympathetic activation (Salimpoor et al., 2011; McEwen & Akil, 2020).
Chronic illness, trauma, and prolonged stress are catabolic, associated with neuroinflammation, HPA-axis dysregulation, mitochondrial dysfunction, and tissue breakdown (McEwen, 2017).
Healing requires a shift from catabolic survival to anabolic creation.
As the nine healing roots are nourished and aligned, the conditions for creation emerge naturally. Life force builds. Embodiment strengthens. The soul begins to express itself fully through the body.
Creativity as a Feedback Loop for Health
The more connected we are to our true self, the more creative we become.
The more creatively we live and express, the more vitality we cultivate.
Creativity helps regulate the nervous system, move trauma through somatic and emotional channels, and liberate energy stored in the body (van der Kolk, 2014; Koch et al., 2019).
It restores intuition, flow, and presence.
To create is to embody.
Why Creativity Is Foundational at Sage Health
Creativity is one of the pillars of Sage Health because healing is not just about fixing what is broken — it is about remembering who you are.
Creativity is how we:
Come back into the body
Reclaim joy and agency
Restore nervous system balance
Strengthen resilience
Reconnect with meaning and purpose
Creativity is not optional.
It is medicine.
References
Ibáñez, A., et al. (2025). Creativity, functional brain connectivity, and biological brain aging. Nature Communications, 16, Article 8336.
Beaty, R. E., et al. (2018). Robust prediction of individual creative ability from brain functional connectivity. PNAS, 115(5), 1087–1092.
Kolb, B., & Gibb, R. (2011). Brain plasticity and behaviour in the developing brain. Journal of the Canadian Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 20(4), 265–276.
Fancourt, D., & Finn, S. (2019). What is the evidence on the role of the arts in improving health and well-being? WHO Health Evidence Network.
Koch, S. C., et al. (2019). Effects of dance movement therapy and dance on health-related psychological outcomes. The Arts in Psychotherapy, 63, 102–110.
Thoma, M. V., et al. (2013). The effect of music on the human stress response. PLOS ONE, 8(8), e70156.
Kaimal, G., et al. (2016). Reduction of cortisol levels and participants’ responses following art making. Art Therapy, 33(2), 74–80.
Burzynska, A. Z., et al. (2017). Dance and aging: Effects on cognition, brain structure, and brain function. Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, 9, 386.
Herholz, S. C., & Zatorre, R. J. (2012). Musical training as a framework for brain plasticity. Neuron, 76(3), 486–502.
Salimpoor, V. N., et al. (2011). Anatomically distinct dopamine release during anticipation and experience of music. Nature Neuroscience, 14(2), 257–262.
McEwen, B. S. (2017). Neurobiological and systemic effects of chronic stress. Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience, 19(4), 333–344.
McEwen, B. S., & Akil, H. (2020). Revisiting the stress concept: Implications for affective disorders. Journal of Neuroscience, 40(1), 12–21.
van der Kolk, B. (2014). The Body Keeps the Score. Viking.