Podcast Episode 28: Storytelling In Counseling
Introduction:
Thanks for clicking on Conversations with Crosswinds Counseling. I’m Curtis Smith, and I invite you to subscribe to our podcast, and to like and share it as well. I hope you enjoy today’s episode.
Podcast #28:
Curtis: Hi everyone and welcome to Conversations with Crosswinds Counseling. I’m your host Curtis Smith and as always joined by a Crosswinds Counselor. Today it is Michael Mcgonnell. Mike thank you for being here.
Michael: Yeah, thanks for having me, Curtis.
Curtis: Yeah, absolutely. We’re talking about the importance of story today. What does that mean?
Michael: Well, what it means is how do you put something together? Like, when something happens to you. What’s the pieces of how you construct telling other people about what happened to you, and understanding that can be a good sign of like how well you’ve recovered from whatever happened to you.
If it’s something small, it’s like, ‘Oh, that’s easy.’ You can tell a story, ‘Oh, yeah, I stubbed my toe this morning.’ But a lot of times when something really bad happens, it’s like making sense of that and being able to tell a coherent story about it is a good way of measuring, ‘Okay, did I actually, recover from that event or am I hiding from it or trying to avoid it at all costs. Stuff like that.
Curtis: This is a fascinating topic to me for a couple of reasons. One is I think humans are just naturally storytellers. You know before the printing press and the written word that’s how people communicated. It’s how things got passed down generation to generation, we kind of had a story. We told stories, and even though we’ve come so far in terms of technology, I don’t know if humans are all that different than we were thousands of years ago. We’re still at our heart people that tell and share stories.
Michael: Yep. And that’s actually – there’s a concern depending on who you listen to in the realm of psychology – of people that are worried that we’re losing our ability to tell coherent and connecting stories with people. And then it’s like, Okay, well does that mean we won’t be able to actually process our lives and be able to like heal from things? Or share our experiences, so yeah, it can get, depending on how you know deep you want to get into it, but it’s like yeah, it’s something that’s very important to our existence.
Curtis: Yeah, the other angle that this strikes me from is that I find and the older I’ve gotten, the more I have found I have this running narrative in my head. I kind of have a story of my own life that I feel like I’m always telling myself, or I’m always kind of aware of. Is that something you see a lot in the clients that you work with?
Michael: In healthy ones.
Curtis: Okay, well good. That’s good that. I’m glad I have that.
Michael: And that’s well actually, I would even say the kind of stories you’re telling yourself, because the story you tell is reinforcing. So, the more you tell it, the more you’re going to believe that story. So, if you are depressed and you believe yourself to be depressed or even would say, ‘Oh, I’m not good. I’m not worthy.’ And what’s interesting is again who started telling you that story? So, you can really start digging into this, and being like, ‘All right, where did I get my story?’ But the more you repeat that, the more you’re going to believe it. Which is important. Like, again, if you have good stories, sharing that with people and again being able to tell a coherent story about any experience in your life then you can be like, ‘This is who I am.’ And as you tell that, and reflect on it, and say, ‘This is who I am.’ You’re enforcing that every time you tell it.
Curtis: So, tell me about how you incorporate this into your sessions with clients? How does it look in therapy? Do you start with that? ‘What’s your story that you’re telling yourself? What’s the narrative in your head?’ Or do you start externally? ‘What’s your story that you share with people?’ And then work backwards to get at what’s driving that, or when you incorporate this, into therapy what does that look like? How do how do you use it to help clients?
Michael: Well first, ironically, again you just ask and then listen, and you try – people will tell you your story or their story, if you listen and then so basically, I just start piecing that together. So, like again, if we’re talking, it was like oh you say something I’d be like, ‘Man it really seems like you’re saying this about yourself. Like you don’t think you’re valuable, and then we’ll dig into that and say, ‘Okay, where did that piece come from,’ and, ‘What’s that,’ and then even going into specific memories because usually, like, again, if you have a belief, or a feeling that you tell yourself through your stories – that you’re not worthwhile, or people don’t like you, there’s usually a root cause for that. There’s a root story.
I also usually say – talk about the movie Inside Out. If you’ve ever watched that very good movie about this concept because all of the child’s core memories are linked to an experience she had as a child like friendship island is one of the islands, and it’s based on how she plays with her friend when she’s little and so then that carries into the rest of the story of like a core memory that she carries with her. So, the same is true for all of us. So I’ll be like, ‘Okay, what’s the memory or what’s the first memory you can remember that, or the most important one,’ and they’ll usually say, ‘Oh my dad,’ or, ‘My mom,’ or, ‘My teacher said to me one day that I was stupid,’ or that, ‘They didn’t like me very much,’ or nobody was – I wasn’t [told I was] going to amount anything, and then that’s carried with them, from all you know, for the rest of their lives in some capacity either they’re being reinforced with that through again, different encounters they’re seeing, or they are striving to prove that person wrong constantly.And so it’s again how are you dealing with that, how are you carrying that.
Curtis: In this way and in so many other ways, I feel like I’ve heard those first few years of life are so key [for] you. So many foundations get set for somebody who has unhealthy foundations, and some of those first building blocks of their story are negative. How difficult is it to rewrite your story? How difficult is it to get away from some of those pieces that were put in place that have shaped your story into a negative one.
Michael: For me, I think it’s nothing short of a miracle. I would say like if you look at the brain research that I’m going through has kind of been mildly discouraging, because it’s like the guy Jim Wilder that I was listening to was basically talking about how if certain traumas were experienced as what age he was like and this person will develop into this, and this person will develop into this. And it feels very deterministic, but it’s interesting, like as I reflect on it, it’s like, and yet I see my clients somehow being able to rewrite their stories, and somehow, and one of the things that I incorporate again is like we go back into that memory, and I like to – I’m very faith-based, and I try to modify this for clients that aren’t super faith-based so I can include everyone, but a lot of times I’ll be like all right let’s invite Christ into the situation because a lot of times in those moments where we’re we experience a lot of pain, Christ isn’t there, we don’t see Him, we don’t know what He’s doing, and so we’ll do some work and try to get to a place where it’s like okay, ‘Let’s invite Christ into this,’ and then, ‘What has He got to say? What’s He doing?’ And it’s interesting because like again it doesn’t work like instantly for everybody, but there are some people where it’s like they’re at that right spot where they’re able to receive it quickly, and the change can be super dramatic. Like I’ve seen it almost instantaneous, instantaneously, where it’s just like a snap of a finger and their stories changed, and they accept it, and they’re moved on.
Curtis: Well, in a way that makes practical sense because the Bible is full of verses that that share with us that in Christ we’re a new creation, and if you look at uh your life or yourself through the lens of Jesus, I can see where you can make a quick transformation because it is a new beginning. Right. He makes all things new. We see that over and over again in the Bible so it stands the reason that we could see it in our lives. It is a little discouraging to think maybe that’s the only thing, um this idea of predestination that you’re talking about, like if this drama happens at this age you become this. Boy without Christ it feels like those are going to be really hard things to overcome.
Michael: Yeah, and you know I’ve – I know people that, I’ve heard of people doing it and things like that, but again for me like my faith was super impactful in my recovery so I’ll oftentimes talk to my clients and be like, ‘Hey, if do you find another thing that’s working for you or if you find another path forward, like I’m willing to walk down that with you.’ And there are, it is possible, I would say because I believe in miracles. But yeah, for me personally, like I can’t, like Christ is the person that saved me so I don’t know of any other way.
Curtis: Yeah, and that’s the beauty of Crosswinds Counseling. We are a faith-based organization. We certainly bring Jesus into to the room with us, but we don’t force that on anyone. If you don’t share faith or if you have no faith, or if you don’t want faith to be a part of your counseling experience, it doesn’t have to be. That’s one of the things I most appreciate about Crosswinds counselors. So, Michael thank you for joining us today and for sharing your thoughts. It’s a really interesting concept um to think about our stories. How we share our stories. How they connect us with others, and how we can work on and improve our stories so thanks for being here today Mike.
Michael: Yeah, no problem. Thanks for having me.
Curtis: Yeah, and thank you for joining us. We will see you next time on Conversations with Crosswinds Counseling.
Outro:
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