As we move through life, we may pick up messages about our differences. We can become aware of dreams and wishes we feel excluded from having and we may come to conclusions that we are not good enough to have or enjoy some of the offerings of life. We arrive at a decision that there must be some sort of problem with us. Many times, we then pay attention to situations, comments and interactions that validate this assumption that we are the problem.

All of us are narrating problematic stories, and the problem with problem stories is that they affect our lives in a myriad of ways. They can prevent us from participating in activities, that can hold us back from certain relationships and they can cause us to feel smaller than we should. They can disempower us in significant ways.

Narrative practitioners work with organisations, individuals, families and communities to bring about change by analysing 'problematic’ stories. These are the stories that reveal problems that disempower us. Narrative work is very clearly about naming the problem and recognising that the problem is the problem, not the person. There are a multitude of events, relationships, systems and societal discourses at play that can make life problematic for people. In fact, we are never the problem. The problem is always the problem.

At Made Better Human, we show people how they can counteract a problem-saturated story by looking out for the unique outcomes in their story, which are the concrete instances that have been overlooked but that put the whole situation in a different light. These unique outcomes are times when we resisted the problem. Often, we may not have even noticed that we have demonstrated an act of resistance but a narrative coach or therapist who is listening for these sparkling moments will call them out when they hear it. Often times we are so enmeshed with our problem stories we don’t realise how we are also separate from the problems.

If you believe it’s time to resign from being the owner, creator, narrator and director of problem stories in your life you might be very interested in attending our Made Better Stories program. Why not reach out to Made Better Human to gather up more information You might find our module on Problem Stories particularly useful. We’re looking forward to discovering your sparkling moments of resistance to problems.