Stories are a part of our human condition from prehistory, predating written language.

Stories are in themselves entrancing. All we need to do is watch a child becoming engrossed in listening to a story, or recognise our own experience as we become involved in reading a book, watching a movie, or listening to a friend speak about their experience - telling their story.

Stories also are self-contained, They don't require a specific response. They don't demand any particular action on our part. They invite a focused and absorbed experience where we can become less attached to our usual perspective which will have its limitations, and visit another world of experience, another view of something which may be familiar, but which in the experience of the story, appears an a novel way, from the novel perspective which the story invites us into.

When we listen to a story, we know it's "just a story" so we can be open to it, and to any message that it may contain. There is no compulsion, no obligation, no advice - "it's just a story".

One of my teachers said that for him, books were dangerous, because there was no way of knowing how the reading would change the reader. I remember being surprised by his comment, but have come to appreciate what he was pointing to, as an opportunity to invite change in our clients' experience so they can let go of some of their rigidities which keep any problem in place, and invite a softening, an opening, a widening of a narrow perspective so that new options, new possibilities can have the opportunity to appear, be seen, and influence our experience.

I like to think of stories as a further extension of indirect language. We can offer a client an idea by translating it into an invitation - "Perhaps you could ...", or "I don't know when you'll be ready to ..." and we can also offer a story where this idea is expressed within the fabric of the story. 

My Irish ancestors say "Sometimes the longest way round is the shortest way home", reminding us that issuing a command "Just stop it!" won't necessarily lead to the desired outcome, and may even push a client further into their defensive corner where they can bunker down or come out fighting as a reaction to being subjected to such a force.

When we appreciate the potential benefit of stories for our clients, we still have to explore how we can find stories, and how we can have the stories be most useful for each individual client.

After my time learning with Milton Erickson it became obvious to me that to follow his principles of offering alternatives rather than forcing some standard answer, I would need to be able to tall stories, and ... I knew I couldn't do that. I KNEW that I was not a story teller. I read books and went to workshops in an attempt to learn, but nothing clicked for me. I felt paralysed in my permanent defect.

Michael Yapko commented that too often, stories were left like abandoned babies at the door of the unconscious mind, hoping to be taken in. His comment connected with me, and added to my dilemma. Not only could i not find a story, but if I did, would it be a useful story.

Then I had an epiphany! The question "What's missing?" or "What are you overlooking?" or "What do you want from our work together?" which created a delightfully relevant direction for any hypnotic session, could also give just as delightfully relevant direction for a story.

If we can discover what might be missing for a client, it becomes obviously useful to help us to find it. And ... if we can build on this discovery, we can create with a story about a client, or some experience from life, where whatever might be missing for this individual client ... was found!

This discovery was a huge relief for me, and I invite you to play with this in case it is helpful for you to find a story, and to formulate a story to be more relevant to each individual client, adding to our effectiveness and satisfaction.

We will explore details in the next post, but I wanted to lay out the background first.

Could you leave a comment about your response to what I have written? How this might be helpful? What might still remain as an obstacle for you?

Until the next post ...

Rob