Do the INR (Individual Narrative Responsibility) Work

How often do you reflect on how much the stories you tell yourself impact your life?

Personally, I think about it everyday. Because since I was a child, I have always been keenly aware of narrative dynamics. Consciously or unconsciously we all perceive ourselves as characters in a narrative. And how we locate ourselves in the narratives, determines how we experience the world around us.

This is also something that I was taught in my seminary. But, in my experience, a lot of ministers don't talk about it this way. Here's the facts though. Essentially ministers of every kind are in the storytelling business. Or perhaps more accurately, we are in the "storyselling" business. It doesn't matter what the religion is, all of them are built on and sustained by stories. It is that simple. And the fundamental stories that all religions run on are:

1. Who am I?
2. Where did I come from?
3. Why am I here?
4. What happens after I'm gone?

Even those who seem to be opposed to religions and even avowed secularists or atheists seek to answer these questions, because basically most humans' brains would break if they tried to make it through the day in the mystery that any one of these questions could plunge us into if we didn't have some kind of answer to fill in the gaps.

Birth of a New Religion - Pastatarianism

Imagine that you were just plopped into some random house in the middle of nowhere. You have amnesia. You still have the ability to talk. So, you ask the other folks the first two questions on our list--"Who am I?" and "Where did I come from?" But it turns out that everyone else has amnesia too. None of you know who anyone is. All you know is that you all are HERE. So, then you all ask each other "Why am I here?" This is a question of meaning and is the main driver for most human behavior. The cool thing about this question though is that it works retroactively. If you can figure out why you're here i.e. what your purpose is, it can actually fill in the blanks of "Who am I?" and "Where did I come from?" sufficiently that you can actually build a life around it and keep going forward. In fact, the meaning question not only works retroactively, it also works proactively. You can redeem your past and build a future on the single answer to that question.

Now let's say that every member of your little group of amnesiacs all discover your individual purposes. You each have a role and you build your little society around those roles. Everything is going great. So great in fact that you become certain that the collective amnesia must have been the will of a benevolent organizer that trusted you all so much and knew that, given some time, you would figure out how to work together. You all become grateful to the benevolent organizer and actually build a system around remembering to remain grateful. You can see this good thing y'all created together going on indefinitely. And then, out of nowhere, the person whose purpose it was to cook, drops dead in a big batch of pasta with red sauce.

Now suddenly it becomes important to answer that last question, "What happens after I'm gone?" Having no awareness of death prior to the pasta plop, everyone goes into a panic. Trying to make sense out of what might have happened so that it never happens again, people start working backward to figure out what the chef must've done to get himself turned off. Was it breathing in too much of the pasta steam? Let's make a rule against that. Was the meat to marinara ratio off? Better make sure to balance it in the future. And most important of all, is it only chef's who die? And if so, who is going to cook now? You get my point. To move forward, they need a compelling story to keep this community going. And it has to be one that allows the benevolent organizer to still be benevolent or the other answers unravel. Trying to keep all these answers straight eventually starts to feel like a purpose in and of itself. And so, you volunteer to be the tracker of the things not to do so that people don't keep turning off. You become the holder of the Pasta Story. Or the PaStor for short. A new religion has begun. See how easy that was.

Anyway, my point is that without stories to make meaning out of our collective lives, we fear societal disaster. In fact, the number one challenge in societies all over the world are competing narratives. Actually, it's always been that way. It doesn't matter if it is in a neighborhood or a nation, the false belief that one person's story can negate another person's story has destroyed almost every structure that has ever existed in the planet and it shows no sign of stopping any time soon. At least not without intervention. And what pray tell is that intervention you ask? Well, I will tell you. The intervention is folks doing INR Work. And what is INR Work? It is Individual Narrative Responsibility.

INR Work Explained

INR, or Individual Narrative Responsibility, is a transformative methodology designed to empower individuals in the critical examination of the narratives shaping their lives. It invites participants to introspectively evaluate whether existing narratives propel them toward their desired self or act as impediments. INR facilitates a structured process wherein individuals discern the influence of these narratives on personal growth. By cultivating a heightened awareness of narrative dynamics, participants can actively engage in reshaping and adopting narratives that align with their aspirations. The ultimate goal is mastery—empowering individuals to craft narratives that catalyze positive personal evolution, fostering a more purposeful and fulfilling life.

In the video below, you see a little INR at play where I share a story that is an alternative to what really happened in my parent's relationship. Although this entrance into INR was unplanned, it functions in the same capacity where we take narrative responsibility by checking in with ourselves on how a story lands with us. As we feel the highs and lows of the story we are telling ourselves, we remain mindful that as the storyteller, we are responsible for every feeling that arises in the telling. If there are elements of the story that we don't prefer that we would like to shift, we are free to tell a different story--a more empowering story.

Of course, authoring a different story in no way entitles the teller to replace the original story as a total rewrite of history. The function of this device is simply as a check in tool for the teller to be mindful of how their personal narratives are impacting them. For example, in this story below, I tell an alternate romance story between my father and mother. The aim of it is that they fell so in love that they stayed together. The reality is that they divorced. But, by telling the alternate story, I could sense in myself that I still hold some feelings about them not being together and being raised by a single mother. I didn't change history. I did unlock some emotions chained to my history though. And now, from a place of responsibility, I can redesign elements of my life to fill in the gaps.

Your Narrative is Your Navigation

The stories you tell yourself about yourself and others is telling you what you are going away from as well as what you are headed toward. It also lets you know where you are stuck. Out of the depths of my soul, I can tell you that I am going toward a world of individual and collective liberation where every human who wants to can live a thriving life that learns from our histories and creates better ones moment by moment and decision never running away from narrative responsibility and always toward maximizing our imaginative capacities so that we can live and encourage others to live more fully. With every stroke of my keyboard and every breath out of my mouth carrying words from my heart to yours I can promise you that I will never stop seeking to share the grace I have been afforded that answers all four of those core stories with one word.

LOVE.