Well, we begin with explaining the event. For instance, setting the scene, then adding little context, then we introduce the emotions; almost as if we’re telling a story to ourselves. Even our everyday conversations work this way. Without realizing, we are constantly narrating our lives. This simple, human tendency lies at the heart of a powerful perspective known as Narrative Psychology.
Take something as ordinary as travelling by train.
Travelling by train has become a part of my routine now. And yet, no two journeys ever feel the same. There’s always something happening in the midst of the journey. I overhear the arguments (not that I wish to), watch strangers who become temporary companions, listen to students gossip about their professor (Oh dear, and what not). When I come back and tell someone about my day, I don’t say, “I travelled from point X to point Y.” I talk about the drama, the irritation, the frustration, the humour, and sometimes the small moments that stood out.
What’s interesting is that the train journey itself is the same but what changes is the story I choose to tell about it. Some days it becomes a tale of exhaustion. Other days, it’s almost funny. Although the facts remain unchanged, but the narrative shifts and with it, the meaning of it.
This is exactly what narrative psychology talks about. Our lives don’t come to us as neat stories. We turn them into stories. We select the moments, emphasise certain emotions, ignore others, and slowly build a version of events that makes sense to us.
Maybe this is why stories matter so much. They aren’t always accurate but they help us live with what happened. Somewhere between the facts and the feelings, we find meaning, and call it our story.
Meaning, after all, doesn’t come from events alone. It comes from the way we explain those events to ourselves. Two people can go through the same experience and walk away with entirely different lives, simply because the stories they tell about it are different. One story may say, “This broke me.” Another may say, “This changed me.” The event stays the same but the meaning shifts and that shift quietly reshapes the person.
Over time, these stories begin to settle. They don’t remain as isolated memories, they become the very patterns of our behaviors. We start describing ourselves through them—I am the responsible one, I am unlucky, I am strong, I am invisible (I am batman). And often without realising it, our identity starts forming around the narratives we repeat the most.
This is how narrative psychology understands identity. It is not as something fixed or something discovered, but it is something that is continuously written. We are both the main character and the storyteller of our lives. We constantly revise the earlier chapters in the light of new experiences.
Sometimes, the story we are living with becomes too narrow or too harsh or even too painful. It reduces a whole person to a single chapter. And healing, in many ways, begins when we are allowed to revisit that story. When we take a look at it with more compassion and more understanding.
Perhaps growth is not about changing the past but about changing the story we tell about it. It is about allowing ourselves to hold multiple truths at once. And in doing so, we don’t deny what happened. We simply make space to live beyond it.
So let me ask you,
What story are you telling about your life right now?
Comments
Post a Comment