When Avraham Avinu’s right-hand man Eliezer is introduced to the family of Rivkah Eliezer relates at length how he encountered Rivkah. The Torah devotes tens of sentences to this story even though the event was just described a few pesukim earlier. This Chazal teach shows that even the narratives of the servants of our Avos are valuable. ForRabbiYosefCornfeld MSW a narrative therapist at the Jerusalem Narrative Therapy Institute Chazal’s message runs deeper: “It’s not just the story itself but also its retelling that gives it meaning.” 

The central tenet of narrative therapy culled from the sociology field by social workersMichaelWhite andDavidEpston is that every human is filled with resources strengths and skills and problems are something external to the person and culturally constructed. 

In narrative counseling the therapist and client work as a team to deconstruct meaningless painful or destructive stories by discovering what outside source authored them and then replace these stories with narratives that contain meaning and value authored by the client himself. Unlike in traditional psychotherapy the narrative therapist is not a healer but rather a coauthor facilitating the client’s growth as he reviews and rewrites the narrative script of his life. 

Within the context of marriage its positive optimistic view of a couple’s natural ability to work together makes it an effective and increasingly popular tool in marriage therapy. The following hypothetical scenarios of typical issues arising between couples and addressed by narrative therapists demonstrate how narrative therapy helps rewrite life scripts for richer more fulfilling stories.