Storytelling

When I teach social work courses, I often invite social workers to speak to students.  I ask the professionals to tell their stories - talk about the client or the project that made an impression.   I ask them to cover the details - who they were and what happened, the feelings that came up, the questions and self-doubt that they struggled to overcome.

The Hero's Journey
Students want to hear the stories of the work and be inspired.  They want to learn from the experience of seasoned clinicians. Students want to see themselves in the story - cast as the capable and flawed protagonist, who faced with a challenge, struggles with external barriers and internal feelings of self-doubt, and overcomes by using time-tested and time-honored skills competently in the context of a therapeutic relationship. 

All the components of the social work process, including the theoretical framework and underlying rationale for interventions, are part of the story.

• How did you meet and how did the relationship get started? - Engagement
• What did you ask and what did they say? - Assessment
• What did you think was going on with the client and their environment?  - Diagnostic Formulation
• What did you decide to do and why?  Did the client agree? How did you explain this to the client? - Treatment Planning and Theoretical Rationale
• What did you try?  - Interventions
• How did that go? What progress did the client make?  How could you tell? Did the client accomplish their treatment goals?  Did they feel better? - Evaluation
• How did you know you were done?  How did you say goodbye? - Termination

Invariably, however, most guest speakers felt compelled to discuss their work broadly and abstractly, listing duties and components instead.  It seems that we believe the language of academia should be formal, abstract, detached.

In Methods of Discovery:  Heuristics for the Social Sciences, Abbott notes that storytelling is used as a powerful explanatory method in research because...

• ...Narration seems persuasive precisely because telling stories is how we explain most things in daily life.
• ...Narration is the syntax of everyday understanding.

If it is good for research in the social sciences, then it is good for the training of social workers.

In Writing as a Sacred Path, the author notes that in ancient Celtic cultures storytelling was considered a service to the community.  Among the Dine people (Navaho), to be told a story is a great honor.

Stories are gifts.  Write them down.  Tell the stories.  Share your insights.  Use your voice.  I bet that writing and organizing our professional stories, with details and coherence, leads to professional efficacy and resilience.  I may have stumbled on a hypothesis for testing.

Whatever way your stories come to you is the right way.  --RL LaFevers