Everyone has a story. Every experience we have in life contributes to our life story. These experiences help create the personal narrative we tell ourselves, whether consciously or subconsciously.

Sometimes these personal narratives are positive. And in these cases, we can look back at ourselves and our lives from a place of contentment or pride. Yet sometimes, these personal narratives aren’t so positive, and we may look back at those events with sadness or shame. Or we may repress these events and deny that they happened. But the underlying message of the story and experience remains.

Our mental health and well-being can suffer when we remain stuck in our personal narrative and over-identify with the painful events in our lives. We must be able to change those narratives to ones that will better serve us. Expressing your story and formative events can help you reframe those narratives. When you change those narratives that no longer serve you, it is possible to find new meaning in your life. [1]

Using music intentionally can help you connect to and express your narrative. [2] In this blog post, I look at some ways that music can help you to do this. I also share ways that music therapy can support you if your situation could benefit from professional support.

Narrative Therapy

But first, I want to provide a brief overview of narrative therapy because this informs how I approach using music in my work to help those seeking new narratives. As a result, this also informs how I view the benefits of using music. In narrative therapy, the therapist supports the client in “re-authoring” their story. The therapist and client externalize and deconstruct the client’s story to create life-affirming narratives. This helps the client because the stories we tell ourselves and our beliefs around these stories have an impact on our mental health and well-being.

Narrative therapy believes that:

1. “Reality is socially constructed” [3]
2. “Reality is influenced by and communicated through language” [3]
3. “Having a narrative that can be understood helps us organize and maintain our reality” [3]
4. “There is no ‘objective reality'” or absolute truth [3]

And as a way to help clients create new narratives, therapists will help them to:

1. Tell their story or put together a narrative. This is also known as “re-authoring” or “re-storying.”
2. Externalize their narrative so that it can be viewed objectively as a problem to be overcome, rather than as a personal fault.
3. Deconstruct their narrative so that it can be easier to understand and see the different parts at play.
4. Change the storyline and create life-affirming narratives, while also recognizing the existence of multiple narratives.
5. Create their own sense of meaning and find purpose.

The Relationship Between Music and Personal Narrative: Our Stories In Song

To me, music can be a natural extension for telling stories. That is because music can be a means of expression. Music can express feelings and transport us to other dimensions which can help us to see the world and ourselves differently. Being able to enter into this state can help us to see ourselves as the hero or heroine in our story.

If you’re wanting to try doing some self-reflection through music, below are some ways you might want to use music in your own life to make sense of your personal narrative.

Song-Writing Around Your Personal Narrative

The most obvious way to express a part of your story through music is through song-writing. Song-writing is a way that you can externalize and reframe your experience because it requires you to reflect and write down your thoughts and feelings. Music is memorable and catchy, which can also lead to the lyrical thoughts and messages being further reinforced in your body and mind.

However, this could feel threatening if you don’t consider yourself to be a songwriter. (See that narrative you’re telling yourself?) If you consider yourself a musician or want to consider yourself a musician, you might feel comfortable with song-writing. (Although I encourage you to be open to trying it if it’s something beneath the initial discomfort that you feel drawn to doing.)

Regardless of whether or not you fully perceive yourself as a musician or songwriter, you could consider writing a song parody, in which you use a pre-existing song and change the lyrics to reflect your needs. Otherwise, you may consider doing some journaling around a particular life event and using that for lyrical inspiration. As you write the lyrics, you may find that a melody naturally arises.

Reflecting On Your Personal Narrative By Listening to Music

If song-writing feels too intimidating, you may find that listening to songs that are meaningful to you or that have meaningful lyrics is more accessible. When listening to someone else’s music, the music immediately becomes externalized because it’s someone else’s song. Yet, the lyrics speak to you and connect to your own experience. This could help you to reflect more deeply on your thoughts and feelings around a certain life event. Write down your thoughts after listening to the song. In doing this, you can gain new insights and meaning into your life.

Listening to music and reflecting on the lyrics could evolve to include creating a playlist of your life based on significant life events. Doing a life review like this can be meaningful to older adults or people with a terminal illness. If you are a family member or caregiver for someone in this type of situation, spend some time together enjoying the music they find meaningful because you may see a beneficial change in their mental well-being. As well, you may be surprised by the stories that can come up as a result of the music!

How Music Therapy Can Help You Process Personal Narrative

However, sometimes it can be hard to want to think about your story, let alone express it. And there are times when the personal narratives we create can be harmful to us. In these cases where it feels too much to explore on your own, it can be helpful to work with a therapist who can help you process and reframe your narrative. A therapist can help you tell a more accurate story, and I believe that music therapy aligns well with the themes and techniques of narrative therapy.

Music Therapy Can Create A Sense of Safety

Music therapy with a qualified music therapist can provide a sense of safety as you begin unpacking and exploring your personal narrative. The therapeutic relationship contributes to this, which involves more than just the relationship between the client and therapist.

Some ways that I may use music in my work as a music therapist and counselor to create a sense of safety include:

• Drumming or active music-making: With active music-making, we would use instruments that are accessible and perceived by you as non-threatening. In other words, if playing the guitar or using your voice feels like too much, you don’t have to; I have a variety of easy-to-place instruments with different sonic qualities that are available to play.
• Mindful music-listening can include listening to relaxing music and being aware of your body and breath or guided meditation with music.

The above experiences can help you to feel grounded and become centered within yourself in the present moment. These musical experiences can also lead to feelings of transcendence. Which, as I have previously written about, can be beneficial to other areas of your health.

Music Therapy Can Help You Uncover Your Narrative

Once you feel safe and able to share parts of your personal story, there are some ways I may invite you to share those parts. In addition to drumming or other forms of music-making and mindful music listening experiences, I may suggest identifying a song that captures the particular vibe or essence of the event(s) you want to explore in session. 

Listening to the music together can bring up connections and insights. It can help drop you deeper into the memory and feeling. Because the music and lyrics are external and separate from your direct experience, music can also make it feel possible or tolerable to look at the event. At the same time, discussing the lyrics creates some distance from your experience and can help you see it in a way that is gentler, kinder, and more loving towards yourself. 

As part of our early work together, it may be helpful for you to create a playlist based on your life and the events that had a significant impact on you. We may select songs together in the session, or you may choose to do it outside of the session. In the session, we can listen to those songs, and you can have the space for sharing the stories associated with them.

Music Therapy Can Help You Rewrite Your Narrative

Now that you’ve had a chance to unpack your personal narrative, we can work on rewriting it, if needed, or further externalizing it. I especially like to explore writing songs during this phase. That’s because it provides an opportunity for you to reflect on what the experience meant to you and create enhanced meaning. 

Song-writing can take the forms of simple affirmational chants to more complex song-writing that varies in structure. The approach we take depends on you and what you feel most comfortable with doing. Some people comfortably identify themselves as musicians, and free-form song-writing can work for them. We can work co-creatively in identifying chord progressions and lyrics. 

However, this approach can feel intimidating to someone who doesn’t confidently identify as a musician. In those cases, a parody approach can feel more accessible. For both types of clients, writing prompts can help identify and distill down what thoughts or feelings need expression.

For some people, an added benefit can be having the opportunity to perform their song. That could be in a session where we can record it. Or it could be at some open mic-type event. Yet some people may prefer keeping it to themselves.

In whatever format the performing takes, whether in front of others or only for oneself, there is benefit from using your voice to express your truth and authentic self.

Interested In Music Therapy To Help You Express Your Personal Narrative?

After reading this, you may realize that you could use some help expressing and processing your story. If you’d like to do this through the possible use of music, let me know. I offer a free 15-minute phone or online consultation that you can schedule here.

References