NARRATIVE
THERAPY
Narrative Therapy helps us understand the stories that shape how we see ourselves, our relationships, and our lives. Rather than treating those stories as fixed truths, Narrative Therapy invites us to get curious about where they came from, what they have protected, and what else might be true.
The Stories We Carry
We all make meaning out of our lives. Human beings are storytellers, and across cultures and throughout history, we have used stories to understand who we are, where we come from, what has happened to us, and what it all means. That does not only happen in books, myths, families, or communities. It happens inside us, often so naturally that we do not even notice we are doing it.
We take what has happened to us, what people have said about us, what we have been through, what we have lost, what we have survived, and we try to make sense of it. Sometimes those stories help us understand ourselves. Sometimes they give us language for what hurt, what mattered, or what we needed. Sometimes, though, they keep us stuck.
Narrative Therapy is a way of exploring the stories we carry about ourselves, our relationships, and our lives. It helps us notice the meaning we have made, where that meaning came from, and whether it still fits. It is not about pretending things were better than they were. It is about asking whether the story we have been living inside is the only story available.
Helpful Links for Understanding Stories and Narrative
A helpful overview of Narrative Therapy as a collaborative approach that separates people from problems and helps people explore the stories shaping their lives. Article from Psychology Today.
We Are Always Telling Stories
Most of us do not experience life as a list of facts. We experience it as a story. Someone does not text back, and a story appears. A partner sounds distant, and a story appears. We make a mistake, feel rejected, or sense disappointment, and our mind starts trying to explain what it means.
Sometimes that story is accurate. Sometimes it is only partly accurate. Sometimes it is old pain wearing a new costume. Narrative Therapy helps us slow down enough to ask, “What is the story I am telling myself right now?” That question can create space, not because the story is wrong, but because it may not be the whole story.
Brené Brown: The Call to Courage
In her Netflix special, Brené Brown uses the phrase “the story I’m telling myself” as a way to slow down assumptions, reactions, and meaning-making. It is a useful entry point for understanding how quickly our minds create stories in moments of uncertainty.
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: The Danger of a Single Story
Novelist Chimamanda Adichie tells the story of how she found her authentic cultural voice - and warns that if we hear only a single story about another person or country, we risk a critical misunderstanding.
People Make Sense
One of the reasons I value Narrative Therapy is that it fits with one of the core ideas behind BearMind: people make sense. That does not mean every story we carry is accurate, helpful, or complete. It means those stories usually came from somewhere.
If someone learned early on that they had to be perfect to be accepted, it makes sense that criticism might feel dangerous. If someone learned that needing people led to disappointment, it makes sense that closeness might feel complicated. If someone learned that conflict meant disconnection, it makes sense that they might shut down, people-please, defend, or withdraw.
Narrative Therapy does not ask us to judge these stories. It asks us to understand them. When we stop asking, “What is wrong with me?” and begin asking, “What story have I been living inside?” we often discover that our responses are not random. They are connected to meaning, memory, protection, and survival.
The Problem Is Not the Person
One of the central ideas in Narrative Therapy is externalizing, which means separating the person from the problem. Instead of saying, “I am a failure,” we might explore the story of failure. Instead of saying, “I am anxious,” we might ask how anxiety has been influencing your life. Instead of saying, “I am the problem in this relationship,” we might look at the story, pattern, or cycle that keeps taking over between people.
This is not about avoiding responsibility. It is about creating enough distance from the problem that we can actually understand it. When we believe we are the problem, shame usually takes over. When we can see the problem as something we are in relationship with, we have more room to respond.
Re-Authoring the Story
Re-authoring does not mean making up a nicer version of reality. It means looking for the parts of the story that have been ignored, minimized, or forgotten. A person may carry a story that says, “I always fall apart,” but there may also be a story of endurance. A person may carry a story that says, “I am difficult to love,” but there may also be a story of longing, courage, protection, and attempts to connect.
A couple may carry a story that says, “We always fight,” but there may also be a story of two people trying, in painful and imperfect ways, to be heard and feel safe with each other. Narrative Therapy asks what else is true. What values have been present here? What has this person been trying to protect? What moments do not fit the problem story? What kind of story would allow more choice, honesty, and connection?
What Does Narrative Therapy Look Like in Therapy?
Narrative Therapy is a practical, collaborative process. Sometimes we will slow down a recent conversation and explore the story underneath it. Other times we might look at a painful memory, a self-critical thought, or a repeated relationship pattern and ask what meaning has been attached to it.
In therapy, we might ask what a moment seemed to mean, what it seemed to say about you, what it seemed to say about the other person, and what it suggested might happen next. From there, we can begin to separate the facts from the interpretation, the present from the past, and the problem from the person.
This can be especially helpful when emotions feel big, familiar, or hard to shift. The story gives us a map. Not a final answer, but a place to begin.
A Common Misunderstanding
One of the biggest misconceptions about Narrative Therapy is that it is just positive thinking. It is not. Narrative Therapy is not about pretending painful things were fine, forcing gratitude, ignoring harm, or putting a nicer spin on experiences that genuinely hurt.
Some stories are painful because painful things happened. Narrative Therapy respects that. It simply asks whether pain, shame, fear, or survival have been allowed to become the whole story. There may be more to notice. There may be strength that went unnamed. There may be values that survived. There may be choices that were not available then, but are becoming available now.
Is Narrative Therapy Right for Me?
Narrative Therapy may be helpful if you are hoping to:
Better understand the stories you carry about yourself.
Work through shame or self-criticism.
Make sense of relationship patterns.
Feel less stuck in an old version of yourself.
Explore identity, belonging, or life transitions.
Separate yourself from problems that have started to feel like who you are.
Understand how family, culture, religion, gender, or other systems have shaped your sense of self.
Make sense of painful experiences without being defined by them.
Narrative Therapy can be especially useful when you know the facts of what happened, but still feel trapped by what those facts seem to mean.
How I Use Narrative Therapy
Narrative Therapy is one of the approaches that helps shape the way I understand people, relationships, and emotional patterns. In individual therapy, that might mean exploring the story that shows up when you feel anxious, ashamed, stuck, angry, or not good enough. In couples therapy, I often use “story” in a similar way to how Emotionally Focused Therapy uses “cycle.”
When couples are stuck, they are usually not just reacting to what happened. They are reacting to what the moment means. One partner hears distance and tells a story of rejection. The other hears frustration and tells a story of failure. One pushes for closeness. The other protects themselves by pulling away. Before long, the story becomes the fight.
Depending on your needs, I also draw from Emotionally Focused Therapy, Internal Family Systems, attachment theory, neuroscience, and other evidence-based approaches. Each offers a different way of understanding what it means to be human, and together they allow therapy to be tailored to you rather than asking you to fit into a particular framework.
Sometimes the most meaningful change does not begin by asking how to become a different person. It begins by asking what story you have been living inside, whether it still fits, and what else might be possible.