Narrative therapy

1. Introduction

Version followed: Michael White's "maps" as taught by Dulwich Centre (Adelaide), based on White (2007) Maps of Narrative Practice and White and Epston (1990) Narrative Means to Therapeutic Ends, plus Epston-tradition letter writing (McAllum Pilkington 2018) and the Dulwich collective Tree of Life method (Ncube and Denborough). The 2007 book itself is not drawn on; its maps are described from Dulwich training materials and course pages based on it. [source: Dulwich L1 handbook; Dulwich Maps course pages; Carr 1999]

Narrative therapy was developed by Michael White (Dulwich Centre, Adelaide, Australia) and David Epston (Auckland, New Zealand) during the 1980s. Their joint book appeared in 1990. It is a set of conversational practices ("maps"), not a manualised protocol. Its idea of change: people live by the stories they tell about themselves, and those stories shape life rather than simply describing it. Problem-saturated stories, often supported by wider cultural discourses, are "thin" and leave out much of lived experience. Life is multi-storied. Change happens when the problem is separated from the person's identity (externalising) and when neglected events in which the person acted on what they value are found, linked into a preferred storyline and richly described ("thickened"). That storyline is then witnessed by others, which makes it socially real. The therapist does not write the new story; they shape it through questions and through the structure of the conversation. [source: Dulwich L1 handbook; White, multiple-trauma paper; Carr 1999]

2. Framework

Narrative practice has no fixed phases, session count or protocol. The Dulwich materials describe the maps as guides, not fixed scripts, and say they can be used in a non-linear way. Carr (1999) presents the practices as a set, not a sequence. Neither source opened gives a typical number of sessions. [source: Dulwich L1 handbook; Carr 1999] [uncertain: session numbers]

The usual arc below is assembled from how the maps link to each other. It is a working sequence, not a published protocol. [synthesis, built from the sources cited per row]

Stage	Goal	Main maps	Move on when
A. Engagement and problem story	Hear the problem story fully while listening doubly for what the person values and how they have responded	Double listening; Statement of Position Map 1 (externalising); relative influence questions	The problem has an experience-near name, its effects are mapped, and the person has said where they stand on those effects and why [source: L1; SOP Map 2 lesson]
B. Finding openings	Notice and name unique outcomes or "sparkling moments", meaning actions that do not fit the problem story	Statement of Position Map 2; absent but implicit	The person recognises an initiative as their own and says it matters. The SOP Map 2 lesson advises returning to Map 1 if the person is pulled back into the problem before they feel the problem's effects have been acknowledged enough. [source: SOP Map 2 lesson]
C. Re-authoring and thickening	Link unique outcomes across time into a preferred storyline in both the landscape of action and the landscape of identity	Re-authoring map; re-membering; scaffolding	The alternative story has several linked events and named values, and the person can say what they intend next [source: White, multiple-trauma paper; L1]
D. Witnessing and documenting	Have the preferred story acknowledged by an audience and kept in circulation	Definitional ceremony / outsider witnesses; letters and certificates; consulting your consultants	The person reports the story being lived and recognised outside sessions [source: L1; Carr 1999]
E. Ending	Mark the ending as a rite of passage and pass on knowledge	Ending letters or certificates; taking-it-back / consulting your consultants	The person and therapist agree, often marked with a document or ceremony [source: L1 (letters to mark the end of therapy); Carr 1999]

Format. Individual, couple, family (White's work with children and families is a hallmark), group and community settings. Collective formats include Tree of Life groups and outsider-witness teams. Letters are usually sent after each session and read at the start of the next. [source: Carr 1999; Denborough Tree of Life history; McAllum Pilkington 2018]

Trauma sequencing. In work with multiple trauma, White makes restoring the person's "sense of myself" (identity grounded in what they value) the first priority, and proposes that this must be revitalised before dissociated memory can be re-associated. This works as the readiness criterion for any detailed trauma talk. [source: White, multiple-trauma paper]

3. Guiding principles

[source for all unless marked: Dulwich L1 handbook (values and intentions; core ideas; post-structuralist questions); Carr 1999]

The person is not the problem; the problem is the problem. Talk about the problem as an outside influence, not a trait.
People are experts on their own lives and have skills and know-how. Ask about their knowledge before offering yours.
Decentre the therapist's voice while centring the person's knowledge. You shape the conversation through questions, but the person's words and conclusions are the material. (The phrase "decentred and influential" is commonly attributed to White but did not appear in the materials opened [uncertain].)
Stories constitute lives. Treat the questions you choose as interventions that shape identity, not neutral information-gathering.
Life is multi-storied. Assume there is always more than the problem story, and look for it.
Identity is social and relational. Bring other people's voices (living, dead, imagined) into identity conversations.
Intentional-state over internal-state understandings. Describe actions in terms of purposes, values and commitments, not deficits or traits.
Non-normative, anti-pathologising practice. Avoid diagnostic labels as identities. Ask whether a goal reflects the person's values or a cultural norm.
Transparency and collaboration. Say where your ideas come from, and invite the person to evaluate rather than be evaluated.
Experience-near language. Use the person's own words for problems and preferred ways of being.
Attend to power and discourse. Ask which cultural stories are supporting the problem, and who benefits from them.
People are never passive recipients of trauma. Always look for and honour responses (White: "No-one is a passive recipient of trauma"). [source: White, multiple-trauma paper]
Double-storied, not single-storied conversations. Every trauma or problem account should leave the person also seeing their responses and values. [source: White, multiple-trauma paper]
Rigour in the structure, not a script. Following the order of a map carefully allows spontaneity within it.
Self-check questions. The L1 handout gives a post-structuralist checklist: am I allowing for more than one reality, whose language is being privileged, am I evaluating or inviting evaluation, am I transparent? Use it after sessions.
Social justice and community. Link lives through shared purposes and share hard-won knowledge with others.

4. Intervention inventory

All example language below is my own illustrative wording unless a short quote is cited. Question "categories" follow the cited sources; the wording does not.

4.1 Double listening

Purpose / when: Throughout, and especially at the start and in trauma work. Hear the problem story while also listening for the responses, values and hopes it implies. [source: White, multiple-trauma paper; Freedman, absent but implicit]
Steps: (1) Let the person tell the problem story in their own way. (2) Note small signs of response, protest, shame, frustration or care. White's example began from a faint note of shame. (3) Ask tentatively about one such sign. (4) Follow it towards what it says the person values. (5) Keep both storylines open: the problem's effects and the person's responses.
Example language (illustrative): "While you were telling me what happened, you said you 'couldn't stand' how your sister was treated. Can I ask about that?"
Watch for: Rushing past distress to find positives. The person must first feel the problem has been heard. It is working when the person starts using words for what they stand for, not only what happened to them.

4.2 Externalising conversations: Statement of Position Map 1

Purpose / when: Early, when a problem is experienced as part of the self ("I'm a depressive", "he's a liar"). Separates person from problem so the person can take a position on it. [source: Dulwich L1 handbook; Dulwich SOP Map 1 page; Carr 1999]
Steps (four stages, L1 handbook):
1. Name the problem. Agree on an experience-near, particular name, not a professional or global one. Turn verbs and adjectives into nouns ("I worry" becomes "the worries"). Use the person's own words. Let the name change as the conversation goes on, and allow more than one problem.
2. Map the effects. Ask about the problem's effects in many areas: daily tasks, relationships at home, school or work, how the person sees themselves, body and feelings, and hopes and plans. Include its history: when it arrived and what helped it grow.
3. Evaluate the effects. Invite the person to say whether each effect is OK, not OK, or both. Do not assume the answer.
4. Justify the evaluation. Ask why they take that position. This brings out values, hopes and principles, which become the starting point for re-authoring.
Optional personification: With children, the problem may be given a character name. Carr reports White's "Mr Mischief" for soiling. [source: Carr 1999]
Example language (illustrative): "If you had to give the worry a name of its own, what would fit?" / "What does the worry tell you about yourself?" / "Is it OK with you that it's been keeping you home on weekends, or not OK, or some of each?" / "Why isn't that OK with you? What does that say about what you want for your life?"
Watch for: Imposing your name for the problem. Externalising so quickly that the person feels unheard. Externalising violence or abuse in a way that lessens responsibility (see 5.6). It is working when the person speaks about "the X" spontaneously, takes positions ("I'm not having it"), and shows less shame.

4.3 Relative influence questioning (including contextual questions)

Purpose / when: Alongside externalising, to map two things: the problem's influence on the person and relationships, and the person's influence on the problem. The second half usually reveals unique outcomes. [source: Carr 1999]
Steps: (1) Map the problem's influence across areas of life and relationships. (2) Then ask about times when the person had some influence over it. (3) Use "who was in charge" questions about particular moments. (4) Ask contextual questions: what feeds the problem and what starves it, who is on its side and who is against it.
Example language (illustrative): "Last week, who was more in charge, you or the temper?" / "What helps the temper get stronger? What weakens it?" / "Who in the family is most against the temper?"
Watch for: Turning it into a scoring exercise. Keep it curious. It is working when the person can name moments of their own influence.

4.4 Deconstructing questions (exposing discourses)

Purpose / when: When taken-for-granted ideas (about gender, success, bodies, parenting, culture) seem to support the problem or pull the person away from what they want. [source: Freedman, absent but implicit; Dulwich L1 handbook post-structuralist questions]
Steps: (1) Notice a "should" or a norm the person measures themselves against. (2) Ask where the idea comes from and how it was learned. (3) Ask what effects it has on their life and relationships. (4) Ask whose interests it serves and whether it fits their own values. (5) Follow the person's interest. Freedman notes that people may not want a broader power discussion.
Example language (illustrative): "Where did you learn that a good mother never needs help?" / "What effect has that idea had on how you see yourself?" / "Does it fit with what you value, or does it come from somewhere else?"
Watch for: Lecturing about social theory. It is working when the person separates their own preferences from imported norms.

4.5 Identifying unique outcomes ("sparkling moments")

Purpose / when: Whenever an event does not fit the problem story, such as a time the person resisted, stood up to, or was not dominated by the problem. These are the entry points for re-authoring. [source: Carr 1999; Dulwich L1 handbook; SOP Map 2 lesson]
Steps: (1) Listen for or ask about exceptions, especially recent ones involving the person's own agency. The SOP Map 2 lesson notes that events mostly due to luck make weaker starting points. (2) Check that the person sees it as significant. Don't assume it matters to them. (3) Ask how they did it and what it says about them. (4) Move into SOP Map 2 or the re-authoring map.
Example language (illustrative): "You mentioned you went to the shop on Tuesday even though the fear was loud. Is that something new? How did you manage that?"
Watch for: Cheerleading or praising. Let the person decide whether it is significant.

4.6 Statement of Position Map 2 (unique-outcome conversations)

Purpose / when: Uses the same four stages as Map 1, but starts from an initiative or unique outcome instead of the problem. The Dulwich presenter calls it the simplest map to try first after Map 1. It can be linked to a value named in Map 1. [source: Dulwich SOP Map 2 lesson (Hayward)]
Steps: (1) Characterise a recent initiative: describe it and name it in the person's words or images. (2) Connect / map effects: what came before it (events and thinking), its effects on others and on the person, what followed, what was learned, links to other parts of life, who would appreciate it, and possible futures. (3) Position: how they experience the initiative and whether it fits what they believe. (4) Values / justify: why they hold that view, and how it connects to what they want for their life. Throughout, keep events, time and theme (plot) in mind. If the conversation is pulled back to the problem, return to Map 1 until the problem has been adequately acknowledged, then look for a way back.
Example language (illustrative): "What would you call what you did there?" / "What led up to it? What were you thinking just before?" / "How do you feel about having done it?" / "Why does that matter to you?"
Watch for: Repeated pull back to the problem. The lesson suggests asking what about the problem still needs to be understood. It is working when the person names the initiative and a value behind it.

4.7 Absent but implicit

Purpose / when: When distress seems to be the only material (pain, despair, frustration, injustice), or when a problem seems to have no exceptions. Based on White's reading of Bateson and Derrida: any expression of experience is understood in contrast to something else, often something the person values. Freedman relays White's pairings: frustration implies purposes, despair implies hopes, a sense of injustice implies an idea of justice, ongoing pain may testify to what was precious and violated. [source: Freedman, absent but implicit]
Steps (no formal map in the source; this order is inferred from Freedman's examples) [synthesis on order]: (1) Listen doubly for what the distress contrasts with. (2) Ask tentatively what the distress is a response or protest to. (3) Explore what it suggests the person values (landscape of identity). (4) Ask for stories of living by that value (landscape of action), and thicken them. (5) In couples or families, ask why it matters to say this in front of the others. (6) Move towards action consistent with the value. Carey, Walther and Russell (2009) published a fuller map, which is not drawn on here [uncertain].
Example language (illustrative): "If this anger were a protest, what would it be protesting about?" / "Has something that matters to you been trampled on here? Can you put it into words?" / "I get the sense there's something you miss. Is that right?"
Watch for: Simply flipping the problem into its opposite (unhappy means wants happiness). Freedman warns this misses what people actually value and puts the therapist's ideas at the centre. Ask, don't assert. With despair or giving up, ask permission first, then explore what the person still holds onto or continues with (White, via Freedman).

4.8 Re-authoring conversations (landscape of action / landscape of identity)

Purpose / when: Once a unique outcome has been recognised. The aim is to develop it into a rich, preferred storyline linked across time. [source: White, multiple-trauma paper; Carr 1999; Dulwich L1 handbook]
Two landscapes: Landscape of action: events, their sequence, when they happened, and the plot or theme. Landscape of identity: what the events say about the person's intentions, values, hopes, beliefs and commitments. Older texts call this the "landscape of consciousness" (Carr 1999).
Steps:
1. Start from a unique outcome and get its details in the landscape of action: what, when, where, who, and what led up to it.
2. Ask a landscape-of-identity question: what does this say about what the person values or intends?
3. Zigzag: use that identity conclusion to look for other events, recent and in the more distant past, that express the same value. Then return to identity questions about each event. Each action question builds on an identity conclusion and the reverse. [source: White, multiple-trauma paper]
4. Use distance / other-perspective questions to reach history: what would a sibling, friend or grandparent remember about the person that fits this? In White's Julie example, asking what her siblings would say surfaced a childhood story of protecting them. [source: White, multiple-trauma paper]
5. Bring the storyline into the present and near future: recent actions that reflect the value, then next steps. Use tentative, subjunctive wording ("What if…", "Suppose you were to…"). [source: Carr 1999]
6. Optionally ask the person to name the emerging story or "project". [source: Carr 1999]
White's image: alternative stories grow from "atolls" to "islands", then "archipelagos", then "continents". Expect slow, cumulative thickening. [source: White, multiple-trauma paper]
Training-exercise variants (Dulwich L1): (a) Describing a new skill richly: what the person is pleased about, how they prepared, who else was involved, the specific actions, why it mattered, links to values and past examples, what it makes possible. (b) Reducing a problem's influence: a recent moment of resistance and its context, the skill or knowledge used, the problem's tactics and history, allies, and the family or cultural legacies and teachers of the skill, then the future. (c) Landscape of identity from a valued trait: its purposes, future uses, the values it reflects, and who would not be surprised by it. [source: Dulwich L1 handbook; question wording not reproduced]
Example language (illustrative): "When you stood between your brother and your dad, what were you hoping for him?" (identity) → "Are there other times, maybe much earlier, when you acted on that hope?" (action) → "What does it say about you that you've kept doing this over the years?" (identity) → "If you were to act on that this week, what might it look like?" (future)
Watch for: Staying only in action (a list of events) or only in identity (abstract praise). It is working when the person links several events into a theme and uses intentional-state words ("I was trying to…", "I care about…"). The Dulwich course also names an "Actions to Identity Map" taught by video only. Its content is not described here [uncertain].

4.9 Re-membering conversations

Purpose / when: To reorganise the "club of life" ("membership" in one's life): upgrade the voices of figures who support the preferred identity and downgrade those who supported the problem. Grows out of White's 1988 "saying hullo again" work on grief: bringing the lost relationship back in, instead of saying goodbye. David Epston introduced the term after reading Barbara Myerhoff. [source: Dulwich L1 handbook; Carr 1999]
Steps (L1 version 2, seven steps): (1) Identify a figure, living or dead, known personally or not (even a pet, a toy or an author), who would recognise and affirm the unique outcome or value. (2) Draw out details of the relationship. (3) The figure's contribution to the person's life. (4) How the figure saw or would see the person: the person's identity through the figure's eyes. (5) The person's contribution to the figure's life. (6) What this contribution meant for the figure's identity, and the person's view of the figure. (7) Keep the figure close as a member of the person's life going forward. [source: Dulwich L1 handbook, Handout 19 categories]
Grief application: Keep the deceased's voice alive and available rather than helping the person move on and forget. [source: Carr 1999]
Example language (illustrative): "Who in your life would be least surprised that you stood up for yourself like that?" / "What did your grandmother bring to your life?" / "If she could see you now, what would she notice?" / "What do you think you brought to her life?" / "How could you keep her voice close in the coming weeks?"
Watch for: Choosing a figure whose memory is mixed. Check the person's choice. The two-way contribution steps (5–6) are often skipped but are central, because they show the person as contributing and not only receiving. It is working when the person speaks of themselves with the warmth the figure would show.

4.10 Definitional ceremonies and outsider-witness practice

Purpose / when: When a preferred story has some substance and would gain authenticity from being acknowledged by an audience. Comes from Barbara Myerhoff's anthropology. Witnesses may be professionals, family, friends, or people with insider knowledge of the same problem (for example, other children in White's "Paul" example). [source: White, multiple-trauma paper; Dulwich L1 handbook]
Preparation [synthesis + L1]: Get the person's consent to the format and the witnesses. Brief witnesses on the four response categories and the rule against advice and praise. Plan seating so witnesses can listen without being addressed.
Steps (three tellings; White):
1. Telling: the therapist interviews the person using re-authoring questions while the witnesses listen in silence.
2. Retelling: the person and therapist swap places with the witnesses (or the person listens). The therapist interviews the witnesses, who speak with each other about the person, not to the person, in four categories: (a) the expression: which words or images caught their attention; (b) the image: what this suggests about the person's values, purposes or hopes; (c) resonance / embodying: what in their own life explains why it struck a chord; (d) transport / catharsis: where the experience has moved them to, and how they are different for having heard it.
3. Retelling of the retelling: the therapist interviews the person about what they heard, what stood out, and why.
4. Optionally, a debrief where everyone, the therapist included, explains the questions asked and their reasons (transparency) [uncertain: not in the sources; commonly taught].
Rules: Witnesses avoid empathy statements, advice, praise, interpretation and grand pronouncements. White found these rarely produce resonance. Keep the three stages distinct and formal. If they slide into ordinary conversation, the effect is lost. [source: White, multiple-trauma paper]
Extended performance: Witnesses may follow up afterwards with letters or small gifts. In White's "Marianne" example this included letters and café vouchers. [source: White, multiple-trauma paper]
Example language (illustrative, therapist to witness): "Which of the things Sam said stayed with you?" / "What picture did that give you of what Sam stands for?" / "What is it about your own life that made that stand out for you?" / "Where has listening to this taken you?"
Training exercise (L1): groups of four (interviewee, interviewer, two witnesses). The interviewee brings a picture representing a value, and roles rotate. [source: Dulwich L1 handbook; Dulwich Maps course page]
Watch for: Witnesses applauding or giving advice. Interrupt gently and redirect to the categories. It is working when the person later quotes the witnesses and reports feeling "seen".

4.11 Scaffolding conversations (scaffolding distance map)

Purpose / when: The Dulwich course calls it a "Map of Maps" that connects the other maps, covered in Chapter 6 of Maps of Narrative Practice. Au-Yeung (2023) calls White's scaffolding conversations a core meta-framework of narrative practice. Chan et al. (2020) turned it into a five-level coding tool. [source: Dulwich Maps course page; Au-Yeung 2023 abstract]
Detail: The level-by-level structure of White's map (and its links to Vygotsky) was not in any source opened, so it is not described here [uncertain]. Read Chapter 6 of White (2007) directly.
Practical use [synthesis]: Pace questions in small steps from the familiar and concrete (describing a specific event) towards more distant and abstract tasks (naming what it means, linking events into themes, forming conclusions about life and identity, planning action from those conclusions). If the person answers "I don't know", treat the step as too large and step back to a more concrete question rather than asking again.

4.12 Responding to trauma: double-storied conversations

Purpose / when: With people experiencing the effects of single or multiple trauma, whose sense of self has been diminished. [source: White, multiple-trauma paper]
Steps (from White's paper): (1) Prioritise restoring the "sense of myself": identity grounded in what the person values. (2) Listen doubly: alongside the trauma account, ask about the person's responses to the trauma, however small, and the knowledges and "practices of living" behind them. (3) Find and honour what the person values (Julie: children's lives) before any detailed account. (4) Re-author the response story through action and identity questions and other people's perspectives. (5) Use outsider witnesses with insider knowledge where appropriate. (6) Re-associating dissociated memory is described as following, not preceding, revitalisation of the sense of self.
Readiness, dosing, grounding and closure: White's paper says the therapist should hear whatever the person wants to share. It gives no exposure-style dosing, and narrative work does not use systematic exposure. [source: White, multiple-trauma paper] Practical rules [synthesis]: (a) Before detailed trauma talk, check that a preferred identity territory is in place (the person can name what they value and at least one response). (b) Let the person set the pace and depth, and tell them they can stop or pause at any time. (c) Keep each session double-storied: never end on the trauma account without returning to responses and values. (d) Close with a present-focused, grounding question and a plan for the next days. (e) Treat memories as the person's lived experience, never as historical facts to be uncovered. Never use suggestion, imagery or leading questions to "find" memories.
Example language (illustrative): "While that was happening, was there anything you did, even inside your head, to protect something that mattered to you?" / "What were you holding onto through all of that?"
Watch for: Signs of overwhelm (see 5.3). It is working when the person's descriptions shift from being acted upon to acting, and when they report a recovering sense of who they are.

4.13 Collaborative note-taking in session

Purpose / when: Every session where letters will be written. Notes are made with and for the person and become the raw material for the letter. [source: McAllum Pilkington 2018]
Steps: (1) Ask permission to take notes and follow the person's preference. Don't take notes when full presence is needed, for example with someone dying. (2) Write the person's own phrases verbatim. (3) Offer to write down significant statements. (4) Note key questions, plus stories of agency, virtue and love. (5) Read emerging new storylines back aloud during the session.
Example language (illustrative): "That's a striking way to put it. Would you like me to write that down?"
Watch for: Notes becoming a barrier. Put the pen down when emotion runs high.

4.14 Narrative therapeutic letters

Purpose / when: After sessions, to keep the preferred story in circulation, record the person's knowledge, and extend the conversation. McAllum Pilkington's core ethic is to write for the person, not about them. She cites Nylund and Thomas (1994) for the client-reported claim that a letter is worth on average about 3.2 sessions. Treat this as an informal survey figure. [source: McAllum Pilkington 2018; Carr 1999; Dulwich L1 handbook]
Steps:
1. Write as soon as possible after the session.
2. Opening disclaimer: this is my version, please correct it, and you have full editorial rights.
3. Body: acknowledge the problem's effects. Record any deconstruction of unhelpful ideas. Give identity descriptions that counter the problem story, using the person's words. Highlight virtue. Reorder material by theme so it reads fluently.
4. Questions: include key questions asked and the person's answers in narrative form.
5. Extending questions: a few new questions that occurred to you afterwards. Use sparingly.
6. Warm close: looking forward to the next meeting, and repeating that anything that doesn't fit can be discarded.
7. Send by email or post and bring a copy to the next session. With permission, read it aloud in full without pausing, then ask how the person sees themselves differently and what they would call that view.
Variants: short or illustrated letters for children; brief letters for very unwell people; letters for someone else to read aloud; life-story letters, especially near death; letters for future audiences (for example, children who will read them after a parent dies); letters inviting family members in; letter-writing campaigns (Madigan); third-person stories. [source: McAllum Pilkington 2018]
Example language (illustrative, letter extract): "You told me that 'the fog' had been deciding how you spent your evenings, but that on Thursday you 'just put my boots on anyway'. I've been wondering what you knew about yourself in that moment that the fog didn't."
Watch for: Confidentiality. Discuss who else might read it and leave out anything that could harm the person or others if seen. Clinical files are read widely, so ask the person what should go on file, and get consent before filing letters. The person can stop the practice at any time.

4.15 Other therapeutic documents

Purpose / when: To mark achievements, transitions and knowledge. Carr lists letters of invitation (to reluctant family members), redundancy letters (a person "retires" from an unhelpful role), letters of prediction (sealed and opened later), counter-referral letters (back to the referrer, describing the person's achievements), letters of reference, special-occasion letters, self-stories, certificates and declarations. The L1 handbook adds therapy notes, lists, artistic responses and collaborative documents. [source: Carr 1999; Dulwich L1 handbook]
Steps: (1) Discuss the purpose of the document with the person. (2) Decide together who will receive it. (3) Write it in the person's language, recording turning points, stands taken, and values that are implied but not stated. (4) Present it with some ceremony when that fits. (5) For prediction letters, review later whether the predictions came true. [source: Carr 1999; Dulwich L1 handbook]
Example language (illustrative, certificate): "This certifies that Mia has taken back her mornings from the Sneaky Tiredness and has agreed to advise other children who are troubled by it."
Watch for: Documents that sound like professional assessments. Keep them literary, not diagnostic. The Epston-tradition "leagues" (for example, anti-anorexia leagues) are not described in the sources [uncertain].

4.16 Taking-it-back and consulting your consultants

Purpose / when: Near or after a turning point. The person's hard-won knowledge is documented and, with consent, shared with others facing similar problems. This places the person as a consultant. Therapists also tell people how their story has helped others. [source: Carr 1999; Dulwich L1 handbook]
Steps: (1) Ask what the person has learned about dealing with the problem. (2) Document it (interview notes, a letter, a recording, a list of tips). (3) Ask permission to share it, anonymised. (4) Share it, and report back to the person on others' responses.
Example language (illustrative): "You know things about getting free of panic that I can't learn from books. Would you be willing for me to write some of it down and, without your name, share it with someone who is where you were six months ago?"
Watch for: Pressure to contribute. Make clear it is optional. It is working when the person speaks of their knowledge with pride.

4.17 Small and larger collective practices (linking lives)

Purpose / when: So people don't face problems alone, to access insider knowledge, to celebrate developments and to support new identities. [source: Dulwich L1 handbook]
Small practices: ask who would not be surprised by a development, or who has "gone ahead" on this path. Share a person's story with others who may benefit, with permission. Use "stuffed consultants" (toys as witnesses for children) or the person's own other selves as witnesses or advisers, for example a younger self, or a "bold self" advising a "timid self".
Larger practices: a regular consultation team or single witness; colleague partnerships that respond to letters or recordings; a registry of possible witnesses; letter-writing campaigns and witness groups; archives of consultants' documents.
Linking lives: connect people through shared purposes and values rather than diagnostic labels. Be aware that individualism, pathologising discourses and funding structures work against this.
Example language (illustrative): "If your bold self could give your timid self one piece of advice about tomorrow's meeting, what would it be?"

4.18 Tree of Life (collective narrative methodology)

Purpose / when: A group method for children, young people and adults who have experienced hardship. It lets them speak about their lives and difficulties without being re-traumatised, starting from strengths and connection. It was developed in southern Africa by Zimbabwean psychologist Ncazelo Ncube(-Mlilo) with David Denborough (Dulwich Centre) and REPSSI, adapting a 1984 exercise by Hope and Timmel (Training for Transformation). A REPSSI/Dulwich manual followed in 2005. [source: Denborough, Tracing the history of Tree of Life]
Steps (four parts):
1. Tree of Life: each person draws a tree. Roots = heritage (ancestry, family, community legacies). Trunk = what they value and their skills. Branches = hopes, dreams, wishes. Leaves = important people, including those who have died, who are honoured in the same way as the living. (The original exercise's "bugs" were removed; problems are discussed in Storms instead. The original's fruits, buds and thorns are not part of the version described.) Other common elements such as "ground" and "fruits" as gifts received appear in later adaptations and were not confirmed in the source opened [uncertain].
2. Forest of Life: the trees are put together as a forest before individual retelling, giving "unity in diversity".
3. Storms of Life: problems are externalised through the metaphor. The group first talks about hazards trees face, then dangers children (or people) face, as a collective rather than individual disclosure. The group affirms that trees are not to blame for storms and neither are people. Then it explores how animals respond to storms and how people respond, to show they are not passive. It ends with what the group can do together.
4. Celebration and acknowledgement: a ritual with key adults and community members, often with certificates.
Example language (illustrative): "What dangers do trees in a forest face?" → "Do storms come because a tree has done something wrong?" → "When storms come, what do animals do to protect themselves and their young?" → "What do young people here do when storms come into their lives?"
Watch for: Individual disclosure being pushed in the Storms section. Keep it collective. Adapt the metaphor to local culture (a principle the source stresses). Team of Life, a sports-metaphor variant, is named but not described in the source [uncertain].

4.19 Transparency and situating practices

Purpose / when: Throughout. Makes the therapist's influence visible and reduces expert dominance. [source: Carr 1999; Dulwich L1 handbook]
Steps: (1) Say where your questions and ideas come from: your experience, training and values. (2) Ask whether a line of questioning is useful or whether the person would prefer another direction. (3) With children and families, take turns and give everyone a voice. Carr describes White's turn-taking questioning with a child diagnosed with ADHD. (4) Check whose language is being used.
Example language (illustrative): "I'm asking about your grandfather because in my work I've often found that people we've lost still have things to say about us. Is this a useful direction, or shall we go elsewhere?"
Watch for: Polite agreement. Invite real disagreement.

5. Handling problems

Sources rarely deal with difficulties directly. Items are tagged with their source or marked [synthesis].

5.1 Stuck: the conversation keeps returning to the problem

The person may not yet feel the problem's effects have been acknowledged. Return to Statement of Position Map 1 and map the effects more fully. Then look again for an opening into Map 2. If it keeps happening, ask what about the problem and its effects still needs to be understood. [source: SOP Map 2 lesson]
If no unique outcomes appear, use the absent but implicit: ask what the distress is a protest against or what it implies is precious. [source: Freedman]
If the person answers "I don't know", treat the question as too big a step. Ask something more concrete and closer to experience (a specific moment, what they did, what they noticed), then build up again. [synthesis, in the spirit of scaffolding]

5.2 Despair, hopelessness and suicide risk

For despair or giving up, White (via Freedman) suggests tentative, permission-seeking questions about what the person still holds onto or continues with. [source: Freedman]
Narrative conversations do not replace standard risk assessment. If hopelessness, suicidal ideation or self-harm come up, carry out your service's structured risk assessment, safety planning and lethal-means counselling (safe storage or removal), and involve crisis services as indicated. Narrative questions about what keeps the person going and who matters to them (re-membering) can then support the safety plan. [synthesis]
Do not externalise suicidal thoughts in a way that suggests risk is lower than it is. Name the risk plainly to the person and to colleagues. [synthesis]

5.3 Overwhelm or dissociation during trauma-related talk

White prioritises restoring the sense of self before any re-association of dissociated memory. If someone becomes overwhelmed, you have moved too soon. [source: White, multiple-trauma paper]
In-session response [synthesis]: stop the account. Speak slowly and orient the person to the present (name the room, the date, your presence; ask them to notice their feet on the floor or name objects they can see). Then move to the response story: "Before we go on, can we look at what you did to get through that?" End only once the person is oriented. Check in briefly between sessions if your service allows it. Next time, agree a signal for pausing and spend longer on identity territory before returning.
Never press for detail, and never use suggestion or imagery to fill gaps in memory. [synthesis, required by this guide's rules]

5.4 The person rejects externalising or the name doesn't fit

Names are negotiated and may change. Ask the person for a better name or a better metaphor. Allow more than one problem. [source: Dulwich L1 handbook]
Some people experience externalising as minimising ("it's not a thing, it's me") or as childish. Explain the purpose openly, offer it as an experiment, or use plain-language versions ("this pattern", "what's been happening"). If it still doesn't fit, use relative-influence or absent-but-implicit questions without personification. [synthesis]
In families, different members may name the problem differently. Map each name's effects, or look for a shared name for the effect on the family (for example, "the arguments"). [synthesis]

5.5 Ruptures: feeling unheard, pushed, or "positive-spun"

Common causes: moving to unique outcomes too fast, flipping the problem into its opposite, or putting your ideas at the centre. [source: Freedman (flipping); SOP Map 2 lesson (premature move)]
Response [synthesis]: name it and take responsibility ("I think I jumped ahead to the good bits before I'd really understood how hard this has been"). Ask what would have been more useful. Return to mapping effects. Use transparency practices (4.19) to give the person control of direction.
Outsider witnesses who praise, advise or interpret can leave the person feeling judged. Stop and redirect to the four categories, and debrief the person afterwards. [source: White, multiple-trauma paper (rules); synthesis (repair)]

5.6 Violence, abuse and responsibility (modality-specific)

Narrative Practices Adelaide's work with men who use violence drew on White's teaching and on Alan Jenkins's Invitations to Responsibility (1990). The detailed guidance in those sources is not drawn on here [uncertain]. White's chapter "Externalizing and responsibility" (in Narrative Practice: Continuing the conversations) is also not drawn on here [uncertain]. [source: Re-Authoring Teaching violence page; Dulwich SOP Map 1 page]
Practical rules [synthesis]: do not externalise violence or abuse itself in a way that suggests it acted independently of the person who used it ("the anger made him do it"). Instead, externalise the attitudes, beliefs, entitlements and cultural ideas that support the abuse, while holding the person who used violence responsible for their actions. Treat the victim's safety as the priority. Do not hold conjoint sessions where there is ongoing violence or coercive control. Follow your local safeguarding and child-protection reporting duties. With survivors, externalise the effects of the abuse (shame, self-blame) and use double listening for their responses and protests. Never externalise the abuser's responsibility onto the survivor.

5.7 "Non-adherence" and passive involvement

Narrative therapy has no set homework, so non-adherence looks different: unread letters, missed sessions, or an outsider-witness or document practice the person doesn't take up. [synthesis]
Response [synthesis]: ask what the letter or task was like for them, without judgement. Shorten letters or read them aloud in session (as McAllum Pilkington does). Offer other formats (drawings, audio). Treat missed sessions as information about the problem's tactics, not about the person's motivation: "What has the problem been doing to keep you away?" Confirm that taking part in any practice is the person's choice. [source for reading letters aloud: McAllum Pilkington 2018]

5.8 Mandated, reluctant or silent clients

Map the effects of the referral itself ("the court order", "other people's worries about you") as an externalised problem. Ask what the person wants from the situation. [synthesis]
With children, use play, drawings, "stuffed consultants" and turn-taking. [source: Dulwich L1 handbook; Carr 1999]
Letters of invitation can be sent to absent or reluctant family members. [source: Carr 1999]

5.9 Service constraints: diagnosis, files and risk documentation

Services may require diagnoses and deficit-based notes. Write clinical files as your service requires, and ask the person what they want recorded. Keep narrative letters separate from the file unless the person consents. [source: McAllum Pilkington 2018 (files and consent); synthesis]
Use the person's experience-near names in conversation even when the file uses a diagnosis. Be open with the person about this double requirement. [synthesis]

5.10 Cultural fit and collective contexts

Tree of Life and other collective methods must be adapted to local culture and not imposed from elsewhere. Community members can be trained as facilitators. [source: Denborough, Tree of Life history]
In cultures where the self is understood collectively, re-membering, collective documents and community witnessing may fit better than individual re-authoring. [synthesis]

5.11 Therapist pitfalls

Map-following as a script. The L1 materials stress that maps are guides, not scripts. [source: Dulwich L1 handbook]
Cheerleading, praise and "pointing out positives" put the therapist in the position of judge. Ask the person to evaluate instead. [source: Dulwich L1 handbook (evaluate vs invite evaluation); synthesis]
Treating narrative therapy as only externalising. Externalising is an entry point; re-authoring, re-membering and witnessing are where preferred stories are thickened. [synthesis]

Sources

Sources:

Further reading (not drawn on; referenced via the sources above):

White, M., and Epston, D. (1990). Narrative Means to Therapeutic Ends. New York: Norton.
White, M. (2007). Maps of Narrative Practice. New York: Norton.
White, M. (2011). Narrative Practice: Continuing the conversations. New York: Norton (chapter "Externalizing and responsibility").
White, M. (1988). Saying hullo again: the incorporation of the lost relationship in the resolution of grief. Dulwich Centre Newsletter.
Jenkins, A. (1990). Invitations to Responsibility. Adelaide: Dulwich Centre Publications.
Carey, M., Walther, S., and Russell, S. (2009). The absent but implicit: a map to support therapeutic enquiry. Family Process, 48(3).
Hope, A., and Timmel, S. (1984). Training for Transformation.
Nylund, D., and Thomas, J. (1994). The economics of narrative. Family Therapy Networker (cited by McAllum Pilkington).
Chan, et al. (2020). Five-level scaffolding tool (cited by Au-Yeung 2023).

Not reachable during research (permission refused): Dulwich "Externalising: commonly asked questions"; Dulwich Re-Authoring Map lesson; Rob Hall, "Pitfalls and challenges in work with men who use violence" (pratiquesnarratives.com).

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