Reviewing the Stories We Live By: How reconsidering the personal narrative can have a life changing impact: Video Course

This engaging and intellectually stimulating seminar with Joanna Fortune starts with the premise that our sense of well-being is highly reliant on our family narrative – the stories we’ve been told, the stories we’ve understood and perceived, the stories we’ve used to pattern our behaviours. This seminar will explore how we can reclaim editorial control over our personal, family narratives and what psychological benefit is to be gained from doing so in terms of emotional resilience.  Joanna will draw upon, and make reference to, the use of narrative play in early child development and how gaps in this stage of developmental play can be practically repaired later in life.  We will discuss how it is not simply the content of our family narratives that matters but also the process in which those narratives were shared / told and by whom. Through case examples, we will explore a variety of therapeutic techniques that can be applied to explore a client’s inter-generational self and gently challenge the stories a person lives by. Our aim will be to support a client in making their own edits to redirect the trajectory their default narrative has set them on.

Joanna will evaluate a variety of psychotherapeutic tools that aim to engage a client’s personal narrative and explore their applications and effectiveness. From story-stem techniques to art / mosaic and sand-tray to Lahad’s 6PSM (6 Part Story Making) we will consider the value of supporting clients in finding their own words to say it – whatever it might be.

About the speaker

Joanna Fortune is an accredited psychotherapist and author. She founded the Solamh Parent Child Relationship Clinic in Dublin in 2010 (www.solamh.com) where she works with families around a variety of issues, specialising in attachment therapy. She is a recognised supervisor, trainer and conference speaker in her field. In 2017 she delivered a TEDx Talk on the topic “Social media – the ultimate shame game?”. Having previously written a parenting column for the Sunday Times (Ireland Edition) she continues to write and contribute to articles on child development and parenting in various other print publications.

She is also a regular media contributor to a variety of Irish radio and TV shows including regular appearances on Ireland AM and RTE’s Today Show amongst others. She is the consultant on the weekly parenting slot on Newstalk FM’s Sean Moncrieff Show. She has contributed to a number of books and publications and her first solo written book for parents, published by Gill Books Ireland 2018 and Bookouture UK 2020, is called 15 minute parenting – the quick and easy way to connect with your child.