Pebbles in palms: Counter-practices against despair

Abstract

With ongoing news of hardship and suffering in the United Kingdom and throughout the world, and in the context of austerity, shrinking public services and increasing social inequalities, it is sometimes difficult not to fall into despair, to feel hopeless or ineffectual. In this paper we consider counter‐practices to such despair and hopelessness that we hope will be helpful to all clinicians.

Narrative therapy approaches to team away days: Creating communities

“…We see community-building as an ongoing project, committing to protected time for team reflection, alongside follow up in relation to the outcomes and new solutions generated at away days. In order to develop sustaining workplace environments and team cultures, it is important to create psychological safety, centre counter-practices to despair and hold in mind that communities need nourishing conditions to thrive (Morgan et al, 2019). We propose collective narrative practices as one way of offering nourishment to your teams and invite you to think about how you might incorporate them in your next team away day.…”

“…We were also drawn to the value of connecting individuals and teams to the many different stories of each other's lives, and the skills, abilities, knowledges, values and wishes for the future that exist within teams, but may be quieter stories. These stories are often less in focus than those about challenges, organisational frustrations and the real-world social injustices which can invite feelings of despair for practitioners (Morgan et al, 2019). While these are important contexts (and challenging stories are acknowledged in collective narrative practices), we are also intending to hold a space for 'counter-practices against despair' (Morgan et al, 2019), which intend to offer sustenance and reasonable hope (Weingarten, 2010).…”

“…These stories are often less in focus than those about challenges, organisational frustrations and the real-world social injustices which can invite feelings of despair for practitioners (Morgan et al, 2019). While these are important contexts (and challenging stories are acknowledged in collective narrative practices), we are also intending to hold a space for 'counter-practices against despair' (Morgan et al, 2019), which intend to offer sustenance and reasonable hope (Weingarten, 2010). It is therefore important to not have a solely 'positive' focus during away days, but instead to acknowledge both hopefulness and challenge.…”