Why I Can't Seem to Embrace Adult Coloring

I loved coloring when I was a kid. I also loved drawing. I drew houses and horses and princesses and families of mice that lived shoes. Now I call my drawing sketching and I don't do it very often. When I do, it is generally in a group and I am drawing the naked woman who is posing for all of us. When I sketch in this way, I often enter that amazing, timeless creative flow that is so elusive in my normal life. I have no doubt there is value in this whether or not I produce anything worth looking at.

I also do Zentangle, which is not really drawing. It is repetitive doodling. It is pleasant and the end result is often pretty nifty. It is supposed to be meditative. I am not sure if that is so for me. I feel like there is value in it if I am producing something that will be used in some way, like this Zentangle fish I made for my Under the Sea Powder Room (there is actually a whole school of them, each one unique, and some made by friends and they add joy to a necessary bodily function). But if I am doing Zentangle with no real goal...then it kind of feels like a waste of time to me.

Which brings me to adult coloring. I kind of want to do it because it is clearly relaxing and there is something satisfying about filling a space with color and seeing a pleasing result. But it also seems kind of stupid. The only real adult coloring I've done is the mandala above and I did it as part of a group activity that I was not leading. It was a pleasant way to pass a couple hours. I also tried one of the adult coloring apps on my Ipad (yes, they exist) in which you simply selects a color and touches the space you want to fill. This feels even stupider - you don't even have to color in the lines, and yet, it too, is oddly satisfying.

So, even though I find it to be a pleasant distraction, I can't quite bring myself to buy one of the adult coloring books that are popping up pretty much everywhere. Probably this has more to do with me than the activity itself. When I crochet, I refuse to follow a pattern. Instead, I act as though yarn is clay and try to shape it freeform into the hat or bag or sock (that was a disaster) that I see in my head. I don't even like to follow recipes. So of course I don't want to color in someone else's design. Also, just for the record, I did do some research and coloring as therapy is debatable.  It seems that pretty much the only ones who are calling adult coloring therapeutic are the people creating the adult coloring books. Most real therapists say that while relaxing, coloring has no therapeutic value.

Still I kind of want to do it anyway...