Once upon a time

The other day Animas Centre for Coaching held a blab, an online conversation, which uses live video. On this blab we were exploring the world of Narrative Coaching, and how the stories we are exposed to have an influence on how we live our lives, as well as the stories we tell ourselves about how life 'should' be. Often we are not even aware that those childhood stories play a part in our lives, however in my coaching,I often come across client's who are unhappy because life is not the happily ever after that they thought it would be. Or clients unhappy because all this money that they have worked so hard to get isn't bring them the happiness they thought it would. So many of our childhood stories tell us that money will make us happy, or that we will fall in love the the person of our dreams and life will be full of effortless magic...And that's not always the case, often it is not the case :-) But we get caught up in attempting to live the life of the story and not the life as reality.

In my work as a coach, I help clients explore the story that they are running and how this story clashes with their current reality, which might be causing them a challenge. And once we begin to notice the stories we are running, or the stories we are busy telling ourselves, we begin to notice how life actually is playing out. But not only that, once we realise that there is a story we can begin to re-write the story, we can change the characters that we are playing. Shifting from the victim over to the hero in our stories. 

So I wonder how are the narratives that you've grown up with playing apart in the life you are living now? Be great to hear from you so please feel free to leave a comment below.