CH: You came to SoulCollage® in 2010, at age 81.

MW: Yes. Seena spoke at the national conference of the American Art Therapy Association in Sacramento, CA that year. Her keynote address captivated me. I spoke with her, bought the book, and was hooked.

	Life Review (Council Suit)   by Marybeth Webster  I Am One Who recalls and reflects the memoirs of your almost nine decades of days. I show you order and meaning. I soften some of the harsher realities and sharpen other details that connect you to all of humankind. I glimpse your place in the Universe.

CH: I'm curious: you've said you can't remember a time when you didn't wonder what makes people tick, didn't look at the inner workings of the human experience. You pursued many professions before becoming an art therapist at age 66: scientific illustrator, teacher, school counselor, divorce counselor, peace activist. What did all those roles and experiences bring to your understanding of your cards or to the experience of creating your cards?

MW:  I made a SoulCollage® card with an image of a rear-view mirror -- such a perfect expression of what I'm up to in these last years of my life. I realize that not a single thing could be different and I now say that this is the best time in my lengthy life. One of the obvious connections is my father's shellshock from the First World War. I believe this destined me to become both a psychologist and a pacifist.

I can say, now that she's gone, that my mother was a full-on misogynist. She only wanted sons. So for a while, that made me a pretty fierce feminist. That is certainly in my work now, since many women attracted to SoulCollage® are eager to take up the mantle of compassionate non-violent woman warrior or sage -- roles that were denigrated for many, many generations. For the sake of my great-grandchildren, I hope we got here in time.

Grandmother for Peace (Committee Suit) by Marybeth Webster I Am One Who demonstrates thoughtful caring in the face of tyrants. I seek to use the arts and humor to touch their hearts.

I lived in Costa Rica and Honduras for over eight years, on the Mexican border for twelve, and I had worked with migrant Mexican immigrants as a teenager in farm labor camps in Colorado. I have a Latina heart; this is reflected in all my Spanish-speaking cards.

Each of my professions was good for its time. My motto was, "When in doubt, go back for another degree." I have pre- and post-doctoral masters. The Master of Art Therapy is the most gratifying. I see SoulCollage® as a very logical extension of everything I've been -- artist, wife, mother, divorcee, therapist, traveler, scholar, activist -- every bit is at work in the cards I build.

I'm re-reading James Hillman, who brilliantly articulates the beauty of the image for discovering your true self. Hillman's concept of soul-building implies that we're more than merely human. Soul makes creators of all of us human beings, if we don't get too hurt or too lost.

	My Art Therapist Self (Committee Suit) by Marybeth Webster I Am One Who, with the help of her Older Women's League (OWL), brews in her cauldron hope for the enlightenment of the Earth. She walks with others on their stony paths. She witnesses and supports their battles with their dragons and their graceful claiming of their own feminine power.

MW: Yes. We did a SoulCollage® Card Game at an Arizona retreat facilitated by Michele Manos. I discovered that a high proportion of my cards feature the image of the planet Earth, Gaia. That image, that beauty, that oneness, that aliveness, that tremendous system of working together to not just survive, but thrive -- that's my vision. That stands for me in the place of religion.

I called myself an angry atheist for 30 years, then gradually realized, "Oh, I'm not an atheist, I'm a seeker." Then I found the Society of Friends (Quaker), people who call themselves seekers, who don't have a creed, who have room for me. I call myself a post-Christian non-theist, feminist, Jungian, Native American Quaker. That's my label for the moment.

In the Service of Gaia (Council Suit) by Marybeth Webster I Am One Who inspires strong and loving action by human hands and minds and hearts to protect and honor our mother Gaia.

CH: In these many decades, how have you seen the self-exploration movement shift and change? Is it just a constant evolution?

MW: In the 80's I was an old hippie -- really open to throwing out all the old rules. I studied under many of the gurus of the encounter-group movement. Unfortunately, they were terribly "guru" and mostly white male. But they had something, and they helped to bring forward a richer, deeper soul search.

Arizona Medicine Wheel (Committee/Council Suits) by Marybeth Webster    I Am One Who  brings new life and meaning to barren ground. I bring hope to the desert wayfarer, representing a universal spiritual path to wisdom with my symbols of inspiration from all cultures.

Then I was very taken with the Native American Medicine Wheel teachings. I made a stone medicine wheel on my land in Arizona with the quarters representing different religions, using colored gravel plus green pebbles that I found on walks in the desert. That card gives me many-faceted answers to my queries.

The SoulCollage® Companions Suit taps into the animal spirits. I often start my workshops with an eagle, a rabbit, a bear, and a buffalo -- compass symbols of the Plains tribes -- at the four compass points on a miniature medicine wheel on an altar. We chant, "We stand ready to receive the gifts of Father Sky, of Mother Earth, and of the four directions."

I have done both Vipassana and Zen meditation, which add a gentle letting go of ego that complements all the personal growth modalities. The culmination of my evolution: my daily SoulCollage® journaling is now my primary spiritual practice. I have followed and lived that evolution.
   

Marybeth Webster, MA Educational Psychology: Counseling, PhD Community Psychology & Community Organizing, ATR (MA Art Therapy)  trained as a SoulCollage® Facilitator in 2011, after a long and varied career. She facilitates SoulCollage® in southern Oregon.