From: Eric Miller, World Storytelling Institute Date: Sat 17 Oct 2020 ________Notes on Using ____Storytelling
for Healing What is a Healing Story?
What are some ways that Healing Stories work? In what ways could stories and storytelling
assist, stimulate, and support healing (growing, and transforming)
processes? Healing may be called for after traumatic events in life --
losses, or having been injured. Healing in the physical sense refers to recovery after flesh is
cut, crushed, or otherwise damaged.
The wound needs to be cleaned.
The external toxic situation needs to be resolved so there is no
further damage. Nutrition and other
conditions conducive to healthy life need to be there. Then what is usually called for are: rest,
time, and love (support). How could this be applied to the emotional and psychological
levels? Part of a psychological healing process might involve
remembering (in one's memory and imagination) a situation in which one
experienced a trauma. One might
role-play -- speaking to and as characters in the situation. One may benefit from expressing towards the
characters (including oneself) emotions such as disappointment, anger,
forgiveness, acceptance, understanding, and love. This is sometimes known as taking care of
"unfinished business" -- this term is a metaphor for an interaction
that one feels was not fair or satisfying.
This kind of role-playing may lead to experience and release of
emotion, often called catharsis and abreaction. Then perhaps one could let go of "old
baggage". One cannot heal someone else.
Only the client could heal the client.
Things a facilitator could do is stimulate, nourish, guide, and seek
to raise awareness in the client. The very process of using one's imagination (alone and/or with
others); of exploring thoughts, feelings, images, and characters; and of
developing an inner dialogue with various feelings and thoughts within
oneself (which could be personified as "voices"), could increase
healing and wellness in oneself. The theme of healing includes growing, maturing, finding
unexpected resources within oneself, developing one's imagination and
creativity, resiliency, healthy coping mechanisms, "finding one's
voice", "finding one's self", maturity, emotional
intelligence, and social (inter-personal) intelligence. This theme may involve recovering from traumas and building up
one's ability to be resilient, as well as non-traumatic situations such as 1) Growing, like a seed may grow to become a tree, and 2) Creativity (including finding and creating solutions to
challenges). A story can be a model of the past and a model for the
future. But a Healing Story can be
more than just a model to follow. The
right story could "do its work" on one. Poetically-speaking: a story may tap one on the shoulder,
wanting to be told. A Healing Story could engage with a client's conscious and
unconscious, and comfort, encourage, nourish, support, and stimulate the
client. Such a story could help the
client to transform and grow. Symbols
of transformation can trigger actual transformative processes in a
person. The right story could help one
to integrate various aspects of one's self and one's experience. It could help one to "get oneself
together", "straighten oneself out", "put the pieces
together", and "connect the dots". Feelings of wellness increase -- When one feels connected to one's unconscious,
and to the collective unconscious. When on feels one knows who one is, where one
is coming from, and where one is going (on various levels). When one knows "what one is
about". When one knows one's abilities and aptitudes
(potentials). A person may suffer a "broken heart", feeling crushed,
lost, and devastated. At such a point,
a client may lose hope, and become de-motivated. There may be "a dream that never will
come true". However, what the client was dreaming of may still be able to
come true in a different way. This is
where one could practice "Life-story Repair" -- re-chart one's
course, taking the new circumstances into account. One could still "live happily ever
after" -- or do a reasonable facsimile of such (which is all anyone
could do in the real world anyway). Sometimes "one can't see the forest for the trees",
because one's vision is being blocked by a large tree right in front of
one. One may lose perspective. Get overwhelmed. At such times, one needs to see things with
a broader perspective. One needs to
reframe one's perception of the situation. Framing and reframing concerns how one looks at one's
situation. A glass can be perceived as
being half-empty (insufficient, falling short) or half-full (some has been
done, and more could be done).
Reframing one's circumstances, how one sees one's circumstances, can
get one "back on track". One
can regain hope and motivation.
Helplessness, seeing no way out of an unpleasant situation, leads to
depression. Carl Jung's term for integration is individuation. This is a process by which one becomes a
mature individual -- 1) the various aspects of oneself are connected, and 2) one is connected with the cosmos. 1) Become aware of, bring into play, and acknowledge the
existence of, the various aspects of oneself.
One could personify
-- and converse with -- various personality traits within oneself. People we have known become aspects of our
imagination, and finally aspects of ourselves. We internalise that which we remember and
hold near and dear. 2) Come to a clear understanding of one's place in society, culture,
history, and the cosmos. Is one a
member of a social movement? Is one a
member of a religion which has a concept of how life began on earth and how
it might end? Fairytales may concern maturing, learning a lesson, and/or
overcoming -- or coming to be at peace with -- a challenging situation. In fairytales, characters may undergo
difficult experiences. The
perseverance, resourcefulness, determination, resiliency of these characters
could relate to healing. Coming to a
realisation about oneself or others could be healing. It might be useful to keep this saying in mind: "I hope to change that which I can change, to accept that
which I cannot change, and to have the wisdom to know the difference". *** Notes on a Method of Storytelling Therapy (8 Steps) Using Storytelling for Psychological Counselling, Psychotherapy,
Facilitating Healing, Life Coaching, and Facilitating Personality Development
(of self and others). The 8 Steps 1) Tell your Life Story. 2) Listeners share similar experiences. 3) Identify turning points, outstanding motifs, and themes of
the Life Story. 4) Gather Associative
Stories. 5) Modify / Add to / Subtract from any of the above-mentioned
stories. 6) Speak to and as characters in the stories. 7) Seek to bring to mind metaphors for aspects of the stories. 8) Compose a Healing
Story (Inspiring / Encouraging / Guiding / Integrating /
Transforming). *** To read about using metaphors for healing, please see the "Metaphor Therapy"
wiki page, and Susan Perrow's essay, "The
Mystery and Magic of Metaphor". *** An example of a Healing Story is the "Moon Rabbit Story". Also, this article may be of interest: "There's
a New Therapist in Town: Storytelling Therapy", Indian Express, City Express section, page 5, 11th Sept 2019.
On World Mental Health Day 2020 (10th Oct), I spoke for 10
minutes about "Using Storytelling to Improve Mental Health". The link to the recording is here. To WSI homepage <end>
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