How to tell stories that heal
– a master class in storytelling
A one-day course with tutor: Pat Williams
Course outline:
Stories can be incredibly powerful therapeutic tools. They help bypass rigid views about life, enhancing the listener's flexibility of thought. And by suspending ordinary constraints, they help people reclaim optimism whilst fueling their imaginations with the energy necessary to attain goals. In the physically ill, they can also stimulate the immune system and speed recovery.
On this popular and empowering day master storyteller, Pat Williams, explores stories that have a powerful beneficial effect on the mind/body system and teaches you how to source and tell such therapeutic tales yourself.
All successful psychotherapy and counselling involves storytelling and the appropriate use of metaphor, tapping into the natural way our brains work. We cannot know what goes on in another person’s mind but, if you perceive the ‘pattern’ of a story and understand that it could be useful to them at a specific point in their life, that is reason enough to tell it. Their unconscious, creative imagination will seek and find the ‘meaning’ relevant to their situation. No explanation, no direct statement of a story’s meaning can substitute for the way it acts on the hearer’s mind.
| What you will gain from the day: | |
• |
A powerful way to stimulate optimism, hope and independence in distressed people |
• |
A new love and deeper understanding of the value, resonances and resources within stories |
• |
Enhancement of your problem solving capacity |
• |
Insight into the mind/body communication system |
• |
Greater confidence in dealing with a wide range of people – and an understanding of, and practise in, the therapeutic precision of metaphor. |
| Who should attend? | |
• |
Anyone involved in psychotherapy, counselling or social work who needs to harness the therapeutic power of metaphor by being an effective storyteller. |
• |
It is also valuable for the medical and nursing professions to know how to tell stories that lift depression and promote healing. |
• |
Anyone interested in the age-old power of metaphor and storytelling for professional or personal reasons. |
• |
If you would like to make sense of all the fragments of information you have about self-harming and pull them all together into a cohesive and effective treatment strategy, this training day is for you. |
Course programme:
Registration: 8.30am to 9.30am (Tea or coffee before 9.25am)
9.30am – How and why stories help people
Stories as instruments that reach the imaginative mind. Metaphor and pattern recognition. How a story can work on many different levels, and for different purposes, if the pattern of need is the same. Examples of how stories can reach the mind and the body, and stimulate the immune system. The value of understanding why we evolved to dream and the relation of dreaming to storytelling. Discovering the power of stories in your own life: Exercise.
11.00am — Break
11.30am – How to find the right story for each situation
Influencing the mind/body system. Finding, creating and matching metaphors. Using and extending metaphors to alter your listeners’ perception of reality. Visual and auditory metaphors. Finding a metaphor for yourself: Exercise.
1.00pm — Lunch break
2.00pm – How to use stories as therapy
Stories bypass the natural resistance to change. Narrative as therapy. Discovering how much more you know when you think metaphorically. How to find out how much you know about your client without even knowing you know: exercise. Learn the art of finding the right metaphor for your client: Exercise.
3.00pm — Break
3.30pm – How to tell stories well: the three simple rules
How to tap into our vast heritage of wonderful tales. How to build expectancy and maintain rapport. The value of autobiography. How to tell stories and where to find them – practical tips. Consolidation exercise: the power of the story graphically demonstrated.
| BRISTOL: | Date: Thursday 14th June 2012 Venue: Clifton Hill House, University of Bristol Times: Each day starts at 9.30am and ends at 4.30pm Course Code: WS06 |
| LONDON: | Date: Thursday 27th September 2012 Venue: Regents College Times: Each day starts at 9.30am and ends at 4.30pm Course Code: WS07 |
| YORK: | Date: Tuesday 9th October 2012 Venue: King's Manor, University of York Times: Each day starts at 9.30am and ends at 4.30pm Course Code: WS08 |
| PRICE: | £160 plus vat (£192) per person. Fee includes tuition, course notes, attendance certificate, lunch
and refreshments
______________________________________________
Thinking of booking 5 or more courses? |
To book by phone, call: 01323 811690
Alternatively, you can download an application form and post or fax it to:
Human Givens College,
Chalvington,
East Sussex,
BN27 3TD
fax: 00 44 (0)1323 811486
Also see, How to Book.