The Power of the Narrative....It's Here!!! The Healthcare Narrative Playbook

I often hear..."so what do you "do" in your work?" Perhaps the best way to describe what I "do" is that I help individuals and organizations recognize and enhance what is going right when often a lot is also going wrong. In other words, I help to cultivate resilience. What I have learned, and continue to learn each day, is that to build resilience we need to tell, share, listen and understand our narratives -- identifying the hero's journey which we all travel. In the healthcare world, the fullness of our human experience is often cloaked in a diagnosis, rendering us a series of test results, medications and prognostications. The "person" is often lost while the patient's diagnosis is tended to. We enter the healthcare world with a story but we leave with a diagnosis...how can we continue to support and hear our stories and narratives along side the diagnosis?

So it is was with great pleasure that I accepted an invitation from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to be one of 30 thought-leaders from the United States and the United Kingdom in the field of health care narrative to gather together in Providence RI at the Business Innovation Factory to collaborate and create the first Healthcare Narrative Playbook. I am very proud of the depth and breadth of this interactive playbook as both a resource and guide, whether we are a caregiver, patient, clinician, clergy, friend or family member, tell, share, listen and understand our experience of health, illness and healing. Here is a 4 minute video explaining the concept: Healthcare Narrative Playbook Video

What can you do with the playbook? First, take some time to peruse through the various sections. Many of us have added our personal stories to the pages. Try some of the suggestions. Sample some of the resources listed. And most of all please share widely with your friends, caregivers, and community. Finally, I would welcome your comments and thoughts about the Healthcare Narrative Playbook -- what did you find helpful and what could be improved, as this is meant to be a living, breathing document...ultimately empowering and building resilience and changing our culture of health.


The Art of Mindfulness


The art of mindfulness -- noticing beauty made exquisite by its impermanence.  A special rite of spring in Boston is the return of the hanging nasturtiums to the courtyard of the Isabella Stuart Gardner Museum. The nasturtiums are displayed just 10-14 days each year at the beginning of April. I visited the nasturtiums today and was awed by their vivid, simple majesty. Rapunsel-like plants letting down their tresses. Grateful for the moment of beauty and the promise of spring.










Find a Bit of Beauty...Countdown to Spring #8

My found bit of beauty today came in the form of a little shell that usually sits silently and unexamined on my office bookshelf. Today, I took time to really notice its amazing qualities of symmetry, translucence, bumpiness, and complex coloration of this remarkable gift of nature. My little shell friend also reminded me that it is time to re-read Gift From the Sea. What bit of beauty did you find today?

Find a Bit of Beauty...Countdown to Spring #10

"Find a bit of beauty in the world today. Share it. If you can't find it, create it. Some days this may be hard to do. Persevere."

These are the words Lisa Adams (@AdamsLisa) shared in each of her posts. I wrote about Lisa last year and have continued to follow her writing through her blog and on Twitter throughout the year. Metastatic breast cancer took Lisa's life last week. She taught us much during her time with us, especially lessons on finding beauty in the world, even when things seem anything but beautiful. I often write about the qualities of resilience -- control, commitment, challenge and connection. Lisa continually cultivated these qualities on her good days and on her difficult ones as well. I am grateful to Lisa for reminding me that it is always possible to find a bit of beauty in the world even if we need to create it ourselves.

So, in honor of Lisa, I am dedicating my blog posts for the next 10 days, as we countdown to spring,to sharing a bit of beauty that I find in the world...will you join me?

#10 Daffodils on the kitchen table




Mindfulness Challenge Day 28 Haiku -- Boston Strong

As Boston emerged from an historic snowstorm, which dumped over two feet of snow in less than 24 hours over parts of Greater Boston, the resilience of its residents became apparent. A lone figure carefully and symbolically shoveled the finish line of the Boston Marathon...yes, we are Boston Strong!


Boston Strong

Only in Boston
The finish line is shoveled
We are Boston Strong


Mindfulness Challenge Day 27 Haiku -- Juno Arrives

The Blizzard of 2015, named Juno, came calling here in Massachusetts last night and predictions are it will contine to snow throughout today. The landscape looks surreal, reminiscent of scenes from the movie Dr Zhivago. I am grateful to be safe and warm inside; simply observing the magic of nature.

Juno Arrives

Blizzard called Juno
Blankets of snow cover all
Magic of nature

Mindfulness Challenge Day 26 Haiku -- Calm Before the Storm

I live in New England. In New England it snows in the winter. Sometimes it snows ALOT in the winter. Let's take a collective breath and realize that we WILL be snowed in for a few days, but we WILL dig out, and spring WILL arrive this year. Sometimes it is easier to embrace the "what is" and not fight it.

Calm Before the Storm

Calm before the storm
Preparations have been made
It is what it is