BIBLIOTHERAPY

Many clients who enjoy reading, watching, writing, journaling and reflection may appreciate a biblio-therapeutic approach to working together.

In fiction, working through how you feel about events or transitions in your own life by exploring the cathartic release of characters going through similar can be a powerful and moving experience that can inspire therapeutic change. Reading through the lens of the psychological experience of a character you identify with can illuminate, exemplify, focus, validate and transform.

In non-fiction there are many books, guides and podcasts on the market and it can be a challenge to know where to start. Exploring themes arising in therapy can help consolidate relevance  to your own thoughts and experiences, clarifying their resonance and stimulating action or change.

Remaining within our therapist-client framework we will identify the themes you are working on and draw up a ‘prescription’ of guided reading or screening to complete in your own time between sessions. This prescription will be tailored to you: the styles and genres you prefer and well as the time you have available. Sometimes it might be a book or books, sometimes a TV show, a film, an article, podcast, poem or short story.

We may also agree activities or guided practices based on the reading/screening to be completed over a number of weeks and reflect together on how you have found actionable insights from your work that are helpful in your own life.