Do You Know What Narrative Therapy Consists Of?

Narrative therapy uses the narrative mode for therapeutic purposes. The narrative mode is one that uses a point of view and a narrative voice for the presentation of a literary or theatrical story, among others. This narrative mode will be established as a respectful and non-blaming approach, so that it respects a maxim: people are experts in their own lives (Morgan, 2004).

As we say, narrative therapy seeks a respectful, non-blaming approach to therapy and community work. In addition, it sees the problem as a separate entity from people and assumes that people have many skills, competencies, convictions, values, commitments and capacities that will assist them in reducing the negative influence of the problem in their lives.

For narrative therapy, the word story or narrative means: events linked in a sequence, over time, and according to a theme. As humans, we interpret, we give meaning to everyday life experiences. We look for a way to explain the events and give them meaning.

This meaning is what shapes the story (narrative). We all have many stories about our lives and relationships that occur simultaneously. We have, for example, stories about ourselves, our abilities, difficulties, competencies, actions, desires, work, successes and failures. The way we have written and tried to give coherence to these stories includes a lot in the way we continue and continue to write them.

We are talking about a succession of events linked by a temporal thread. It is in this thread precisely where we have selected them because they fit better with the idea of the dominant story. Those left out of the dominant story remain hidden or less meaningful (or with modified meaning) in light of the dominant theme.

For example, if I have a dominant story in which I am a good driver, every time I respect the signs, I give it meaning and that meaning reinforces the conclusions of the story. The day I get fined, as it does not go according to the dominant story, it is hidden or minimized because it does not fit the global meaning.

What are the main goals of narrative therapy?

Well, the main objective of narrative therapy is to offer the person the space to define their own life according to an adaptive narrative mode (that is good for them). The secondary objectives would be the following:

Incorporate new elements into people’s narrative.
Achieve that the person can build a better future project.
Being able to share these new meanings with our environment, thus facilitating a new relational dimension.

Boy reading a book with highlighted story

People are storytellers

It may seem curious to you, but all human beings are storytellers. Stories that we tell others but stories that we also tell ourselves. In addition, in these stories there is usually a good part of truth, as well as another of inventiveness.

We are born with a narrative drive. Thus, we socialize and create the development of the self and establish an autobiographical memory that gives us meaning. The personal narrative is what we explain (and we explain) about our own life. We ourselves create our world and, therefore, we are responsible for the reading we do of it.

This offers us the opportunity to make the first difference between the problem and the person. From this difference a great opportunity arises, that of the person to value their own resources and analyze the problem from another perspective. The history of the person will be presented through events chained with the corresponding interpretation that we make of them. From there, a narrative voice and a plot line will be established on which to intervene.

Likewise, in the narrative itself it is decided what we consider and what we discard in our history. Thus, our personal history will be influenced by sociocultural factors, as well as other more individual ones, such as our genetics.

Language is more important than you think

Language is the medium we use to create (or re-create) and present ourselves. It is also useful to manage our inner world of thoughts and feelings, hence the importance of analyzing this language. If we create our reality from the explanations that we give ourselves about it, this narrative will define what are called “effects of the dominant story”.

These effects are those that are derived, for example, from the tone or voice that our most global or general history has. Thus, if ours is a story of abandonment and loss (written and told by us), the effect of this dominant story will be melancholy.

The therapeutic process of narrative therapy

The position of the therapist in this model will change from an expert to a companion of the person who asks for help, the latter being a co-author of the therapeutic process and not a client or patient (White, 2004).

The idea of the therapeutic process using narrative techniques is basically to be able to find an alternative history, a deconstruction of the dominant narrative history, in favor of a renewed and different history.

Reflection is in favor of this new narrative looking for what we call isolated achievements, which are those that give us the opportunity to introduce new information and / or approach. Therefore, they give us the opportunity to build a new history and / or identity.

Book with blank sheets and a leaf of a tree between them

This technique is both very simple and extremely complicated. It is simple in the sense that it represents a linguistic separation from the problem of the patient’s personal identity. What is complicated and difficult is the delicate way it is achieved. It is precisely through the careful use of language in therapeutic conversation that the person’s healing begins and is ultimately achieved.

What’s new about the narrative approach is that it provides a useful sequence of questions that consistently produces a liberating effect for people. Following this therapeutic sequence is like building an arch brick by brick. If you try to get to the last step without patiently laying the first bricks, your bow will not hold.

Technical description of narrative therapy

We assume that our life is as it is, but we can always rethink it in another way. Deep down, each person can rewrite their story as they wish (García-Martínez, 2012). There are three dimensions around the narrative matrix that allow a coherent, complex and multiple narrative (Gonçalves, 2002):

Narrative structure : construction of a meaning from one’s own experiences through a process of connection through the different narrative episodes of our lives. The structure is made up of:
- A beginning, which is the point from where we start our story. We can take the example of a client who comes to the consultation for the first time and indicates that he does not know where to start. One of the therapist’s responses could be “from the beginning” or “from where it is easiest for you to begin to explain your story” (this will be the beginning).
- A development of history. It includes those concrete events, the internal responses, the objectives of the protagonists, the actions that take place, the cause and the effect and, finally, the context.
- An ending, which is considered when obtaining certain results and / or the closing of the narrative.
Narrative process : it has to do with the way we explain our lives, that is, what tone we put into it (for example, of dramatic commitment).
Narrative content: it refers to the diversity and multiplicity of the narrative production, the themes or plots that we tell, sometimes falling into the “broken record” or the rumination of old unsolved themes.

Narrative technique exercises

First steps to change our internal dialogue:

The internal dialogue is interrupted as it has begun, by an act of will. You are as you say you are, but you could change if you start talking to yourself differently (Castaneda, 1994), to tell yourself that you are different. Below I present a series of exercises to work with internal dialogue, that voice that continuously speaks to us and translates reality:

Know your internal dialogue : Pay attention to the form and content of your internal dialogue. Think about whether this is a destructive or constructive, uneasy or serene dialogue. In short, negative or positive. To change it, you must first know its content, the most frequent thoughts that we dedicate.

Ask the right questions : analyze the situation that arises by changing the questions that one asks himself / herself. For example, instead of asking “why has this happened to me?”, We can ask ourselves “what can I learn from this situation?”
Change the focus : the way we talk to each other can be changed. It can help to start talking to us like a loving mother talks to a child. Incorporate loving and kind words into your self-talk.

Narrative personal tools

There are multiple resources to explore aspects of our narrative, such as metaphors, stories or therapeutic letters, among others. We see some of these resources.

Resources to know yourself

Life stories: are stories intended to give meaning or justify a certain vision of events.

Small journey on oneself : it is about imagining and writing a letter to a person with whom we have not had contact for a long time.
Ten years later : a description is made of how you visualize yourself ten years older, physically, internally, at work, relationships with people and hobbies.
Preferences : think and write what our preferences are, to reaffirm ourselves and grant us the pleasure of expressing freedom with our own choices.
Spaces : divide a grid into the different spaces to dedicate to the important people in your life, the most significant places, the happiest events, the most pleasant sensations, the most beautiful dreams and the loves that have made you mature and grow.
I remember… : the person is invited to finish this sentence without thinking too much about the answer. You can use as many incomplete sentences as you want to explore and work with.

Loving the mystery : it is about searching within ourselves for those questions that have no answer.

Hand of a person writing about narrative therapy

Metaphors and stories

A metaphor is a linguistic form that makes an implicit comparison between two different entities, a dramatic device that captures attention and provides an altered framework through which the client can consider a new experience (Lankton and Lankton, 1983).

There are three types of metaphors to use in the therapeutic process:

Those that refer to personal experiences of the therapist.
Those that refer to obvious truths.
Stories adapted to the circumstances of the person.

Therapeutic metaphors can be used to formulate an opinion, suggest solutions, access and use of resources, personal knowledge, sow specific ideas, etc.

On the other hand, stories are expressions of essential philosophical truths, explanations of nature, or stories of dreams. The stories are therapeutic because the person has the possibility of finding his own solution through the own rewriting of the story and the conflicts that appear in it.

The tale is not about the outside world, although it may be realistic enough and have everyday features woven into it. The unreal nature of these stories is an important resource, since it makes it obvious that the interest of the stories is not the useful information about the external world, but the internal processes that occur in the individual (Gordon, 1978).

Ultimately, by telling strangers our personal stories we get rid of them and make them past. This allows us to begin to design a future to our liking, documenting those stories so that they are not lost in oblivion and can serve as inspiration to others. The ultimate goal is for people to understand the power of the way they tell and tell what happens and how the way they do it influences how they behave now.

Bibliography:

White, M. (2002) ” The narrative approach in the experience of therapists .” Gedisa.

Nomen Martín, L. (2016) “50 psychotherapeutic techniques” . Pyramid.