Narrative therapy is a respectful, non-blaming, collaborative approach to psychotherapy. It believes that each of us is the expert on our own life and that we possess many resources that can help us reduce the influence of problems that plague us. It encourages therapists to help clients access and affirm their own strengths.
Narrative therapy focuses on the stories we tell about ourselves. These are not strictly individual stories. They are shaped by the taken-for-granted assumptions of the cultures in which we live.
Our stories reflect the habitual ways we interpret our experience and make sense of our lives. They act like different focal adjustments on a pair of binoculars. Each adjustment brings certain things into sharp focus while blurring others, powerfully shaping perspectives on our past, present and future. These stories, if unexamined, have a way of becoming entrenched over time.
A client might come for narrative therapy when a story he has about himself—a way he has of understanding his life—has become so entrenched that it isn’t allowing any other points of view. This story may well have him over-focusing on problems, leaving him unable to see other things about his life that might help him move forward in ways he would prefer. In this case, a narrative therapist would help him re-focus his binoculars in order to gain new perspectives on his life and construct more hopeful and inspiring stories to live by.
Narrative therapy is sensitive to issues of social justice. It considers the diverse social contexts within which people live and how assumptions around things like gender, sexual orientation, class, and race affect well-being. It helps clients reconsider culturally ingrained ideas about what it means to be a good person—ideas about appearance and achievement, for example – and how these ideas have convinced them they don’t measure up. It empowers clients to create their own ways of knowing themselves and to discover their own appreciation for their lives.
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