Transcript for
Narrative therapy with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families

Narrator (00:02):  Welcome to the Emerging Minds podcast.

Chris Dolman (00:07): Welcome, everyone. My name is Chris Dolman from Emerging Minds. In today’s episode, you will be hearing a conversation I had with Bill Wilson, an Aboriginal cultural consultant who works with us here. In this conversation, Bill will speak about his work with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander men and the different narrative approaches used in practise to highlight their strengths, skills, and resilience. This podcast picks up our conversation where we were talking about the importance of listening to how people are responding to the difficulties they face and how they are finding a way through those difficulties.

Bill Wilson (00:41): I think one of the biggest things for me around the narrative framework is that it does give a more opportunity to get a little bit of separation from the problem within it. And I think that’s important because I think with various workers who are married to their frameworks of engagement in particularly with Aboriginal people, is that you need to hear what are some of the strengths that exists within that particular person, or more specifically, within their entire kinship. What are the strengths that exists for them and what they draw resilience from.

And for me, I think that’s one of the things that works so well with our mob from a narrative perspective. You can get engrossed in what is the problem story or what are the issues for that particular person, and I think some workers can feel if they solve those issues, then they’ve done their work with that particular person. But I think it’s more around trying to find out what are the external supports.

And I think that’s one of the strengths of Aboriginal families is that in particularly the kinship. Their kinship structures that there are multiple sources of support for them that can assist them in their own journey from a narrative perspective with our mob, it allows them to share that problem story but also steps them into the spaces of what is their preferred story for themselves and for their families.

Chris Dolman (02:18): I was wishing how you draw derivative distinction that you start talking a bit about the strengths of the individual. Then you’re sort of as quick to broaden that more around the strengths of their kinship networks and that. In terms of the work that you do and I’ve done, why is that such a strong importance that you place on that? I wanted to make sure I got that distinction.

Bill Wilson (02:34): For me, I think what’s really important in Aboriginal communities is around that knowledge transmission within our kinship structures. We can get that from our mothers, from our fathers the important role that grandparents play in Aboriginal families as well, but also the roles of aunties and uncles as well. When I talk about that knowledge transmission, a lot of that can be around cultural obligations, assisting with issues around identity, assisting around issues of cultural practice as well.

Chris Dolman (03:02): It’s convenient, such those ideas can really stand in contrast to other kinds of understandings that we can potentially bring to this work can’t we around individuals holding knowledge or strengths. The individual is like a hero in their own life a little bit. And I guess what you’re highlighting has me thinking a bit about how much richer our conversations and the stories of people’s lives can be when we can link them to others.

Certainly, that’s one of the contributions I think that Aboriginal families have made to my work more broadly as well, was really always seeking to be on the lookout for those connections and contributions that other people in life have made to not just skills and strengths, but also what’s important to people as well.

What did you think of that idea about how those strengths may not always be enough to overcome a problem, but they’re still significant even though they don’t necessarily solve the problem. Is that something that you’ve found in your work as well, that they’re still worthy of conversation? Those things, even if problems aren’t solved for families?

Bill Wilson (04:01): Absolutely. And some of the work which I’ve done with Aboriginal men who have been incarcerated, this is one of the areas where we’ve spent a little bit of time unpacking that. Looking at what their individual strengths are within that, to manage those type of issues, but also who can support them within that as well, which is equally as important.

And we try to say in the framework that we work with, which is based on narrative practice, is that in particularly with Aboriginal men who aren’t as easy to talk about issues that impact or weigh heavily on them. So it’s around at least having some dialogue with another Aboriginal man who may have experienced some similar issues to them or may not have. But it’s around getting them to initially open up. One of the phrases that we use is problem shared is a problem halved and that there’s strength in numbers for us as Aboriginal men in particular.

Chris Dolman (04:59): Does that make different things possible for those men to hear these stories, these accounts from other men in somewhere?

Bill Wilson (05:04): And it’s almost about sort of debunking some of those myths of men in general, that we can manage things by ourselves. Men don’t show emotion. So it’s almost pushing back on some of those sort of stereotypes. And some of the things that we hear about neurobiology of the brain of a child and the various development stages of children and the key role that dads can play within that from a very, very early age. So we try to debunk a few of those myths and challenge some of those may be old way of practice.

Chris Dolman (05:40): I think that’s one of the things I value about and I’m grateful for in terms of narrative practices, sort of ways of having conversations that help debunk those myths or call into question, those kind of taken for granted ideas about how life should be and the listening out perhaps for exceptions, for when an example you’ve just given. I guess men have found perhaps done things that might be outside, what might be obligated or understand what might be required of them, I guess.

But have found other ways to perhaps be a father like you were saying, or be a partner, and then bring those into story lines to sort of start to ask a bit more about some of the history perhaps of these values or these ways of being a father that they prefer because they don’t come out of nowhere, do they? Again, they have a history, a cultural history they’ve come from somewhere, and it’s not easy, but I think here we can try and find ways to go research them in the history of that in their life and who might’ve contributed to that being important. It might be family or extended family or others.

Bill Wilson (06:37): One of the key exercises that we do with the men and one that I’m really passionate about is we do a comparison of fathers versus dads. And what do you align more with when we put it more broadly to the group? It’s a very interesting conversation. Myself personally, I believe there is a difference, and I’ll always talk to my children about you call me dad. I’d rather prefer to be dad, or in Ngarrindjeri we use the word ‘Nangoe’. So call me dad or call me ‘Nangoe’.

And the reason I say that, and I share that with the men, is that I think dads have an investment of time into their children where a father can biologically make a child. And for me, it’s about the investment that you can put into the child, and you reap what you sow. What I promise at the start I said, there’s no right or wrong here around that, but it does unpack a conversation of the roles of whether you calling yourself a father or a dad. And then also within that debunking some myths.

Chris Dolman (07:35): Your comments remind me about the importance of paying attention to language actually. And the people we meet with when we’re meeting with Aboriginal families and parents or children is that encouragement to stay close to people’s own words. You’re drawing a distinction between father and dad there. And I guess that, so each of those concepts to folks different responsibilities and different values, perhaps. But the broader idea around paying attention to language and staying close to people’s words, is that something that you and your colleagues has kind of found helpful in your work? Like close attention to how people describe language, their own experiences?

Bill Wilson (08:09): Yeah. Absolutely. We take that as a cue and a key when we’re in those sort of groups, having those discussions, and we’re conscious of using where we can, the language in which they’re laying out and describing as well so that they can hear that reflect back to them in that language. When I use language from an Aboriginal perspective, that’s another context because one of the things that not all nation groups are exposed to is the ability of their mother tongue, their own language. But what they do like to hear is a dialect of Aboriginal language. Even though it’s not theirs, they’re drawn to it. They resonate to it.

Chris Dolman (08:46): What do you think that offers them to hear even a dialect of another Aboriginal nations language?

Bill Wilson (08:52): It’s still exposing them to culture and cultural practice, which for some nation groups, hasn’t always been the case, in particular, a lot of the nation groups in that I’ve worked with closely in Victoria, in particular, Vic country regions. They haven’t had the exposure or the continuity of that culture. And in particular, language kept alive for them.

Chris Dolman (09:16): It’s interesting for me as a non-to Aboriginal practitioner, think about it, what are the implications of that for my work, then? You know what you’ve just told me?

Bill Wilson (09:24): One of the key things that we’ve tried to do in some of that work with other Aboriginal men is how important it is to establish the relationship and the rapport with them, which has to be built in a foundation of trust. And sometimes, that takes a little bit of time to establish that. As a seasoned practitioner yourself, there Chris, how do you go about setting up sort of cultivating that relationship, that rapport with your clients?

Chris Dolman (09:50): I think for me, establishing that relationship is important. One thing I find really important is to really attend to the power relations in the room and wanting to give the people I meet with a real say and lots of things about our conversation. I want to sort of really establish that ethic of collaboration between them. That I’m sort of positioning myself not as an expert on their life, but that I’ve got some skills perhaps around asking questions and having helpful conversations. But in fact, what’s important is I’m really understanding how they described their situation and what their concerns are, but also what’s important to them.

To highlight that last point, but really wanting to understand the person beyond the reach of the problem. What’s important to them in terms of their relationships? Or what they really give value to in terms of how they are as a person or partner or parent or child? But people have a chance to speak about other aspects of themselves and other aspects of their identity besides perhaps how the problem is portraying them or how they’re positioned by the problem, or even positioned by service systems that they’re involved with as well.

And I feel that by giving people a different place to stand in relation to their identity, one that is honourable and is agentic as well, to then speak about what’s problematic. They can speak from a different position about that. And maybe that’s one thing perhaps that contributes to trust as well as giving people, I think a real say over what we talk about, making sure that I’m asking people’s permission to ask them about particular things, even good things even about, strengths and skills, or what’s important to them to be always asking. Is it okay if I ask you a bit more about that?

And also, there are many other more significant relationships in their life that are going to endure beyond our working relationship. And so I guess what I hope to do is also somehow elevate those relationships in how we speak, we’re talking, exploring the contribution perhaps that other people have made to their life, but also the contribution that they’re making to other people’s lives in their families and communities as well this notion of two-way contributions. So there are a couple of things I think about when you ask me that question around those ideas of relationship and trust in that working relationship.

Bill Wilson (12:13): One of the things I always say to non-Aboriginal colleagues who are working with Aboriginal people, either individually or families, is that in terms of that initial first meeting, whilst as a worker, there’s maybe a level of assessment that might be going on. Well, there’s actually two assessments going on at the same time in there. One is the person themselves assessing you and essentially asking themselves, can this person be trusted with my stories as an Aboriginal person?

One of the things I always like to impart is that you never get a second opportunity to make a good first impression. And I think with, in particular, with Aboriginal people, first impressions count. In terms of the very first engagement, not only that you have as the worker. And I’m always conscious about this when I talk to organisations, but it’s also the engagement as they come into that door for the first time. Having a synergy of energy from the moment they walk into the door until the first time that they sit down, really building that strong rapport and the ability to remain inquisitive in that, which I think obviously is a big part of narrative practises and asking those questions with permission, when you are inquisitive.

Chris Dolman (13:30): Hearing you speak about assessment also reminds me around this idea of two assessments happening in the room. Sure, I might be required to make an assessment, whatever that means for that context of the person I’m working with. But again, I think what narrative ideas invite me into is to be thinking a bit about how can that assessment be as collaborative as possible to mitigate that power relation, to actually be finding ways to enable the person to be assessing life and making their own evaluation of what’s problematic.as well as what they prefer in their life as well, and assessing the kind of skills and strengths and cultural stories that are helpful for them as well. How important is it in assessments to give people, give families a chance to speak about, to be assessed if you like for their strengths and skills and what sustains them? Does that offer something to Aboriginal families in some way?

Bill Wilson (14:23): Yeah. I believe it does. I think you can have an effect of by just sort of having that conversation with them and sort of reutilizing their language back to them that it actually we can demonstrate to them that they’re a source of supports that are around them, even though they might not initially see them as the supports that they actually require. I think that’s what worth while doing those.

I think a lot of our assessments are certainly done in the deficit model. And I do have some concerns about that if that’s unpacked at a great deal of length in terms of their problem story becoming too big where they might feel that there’s no hope in terms of managing their way through that if it’s magnified and that’s the constant starting point. That there’s certainly are other strengths that need is equal amount of time to be magnified to them as well.

Chris Dolman (15:23): If they aren’t spoken about those other stories of strengths and schools, and what’s important, then by default, the problems are magnified, aren’t they? Because they’re the only story that people get to speak about, I guess, in that sense.

Bill Wilson (15:34): Absolutely.

Chris Dolman (15:34): And I think it’s interesting too, we might hear about a certain, what might be called strengths in families or ideas around their resilience.

Bill Wilson (15:43): I think when we do some of the work that we do within, particularly Aboriginal men within the prison system, it’s around getting them to identify and using that collaborative approach and that peer approach of what skills individuals have utilised.

Chris Dolman (16:01): So just asking them, “Can you tell us a time when you used this skill or whatever?” Sometimes it’s not always easy to get onto these themes, though, with people, I find they’re not always readily available for people to speak about other because often the problems are more prominent, particularly if they’ve had to tell and retell stories of what’s problematic, they’re much more prominent in people’s lives, how it is that you can kind of find ways to hear or ask about other stories of life. Is there things you’ve learned or discovered about what’s helpful?

Bill Wilson (16:31): One of the things that we do in terms of setting that up in that particular environment is some giving of ourselves in that as the facilitators sharing bits of our story, which doesn’t replicate their experiences or not. But it’s a bit of a space where they get a sense of why we’re in the room and not just as paid employees while we’re invested in this type of work specifically. So in that, I’m really probably unpacking my own personal values and principles and, in particular, my own work history of trying to support Aboriginal men in a number of fields.

And so I think it’s an opportunity for them to hear from me specifically if I’m wanting them to share certain elements of their life and being conscious that perhaps they’ve never done that before in particular, a group setting, which is not for everyone in terms of sharing that level of detail. But I think if you do set up their environment where you can get that buy-in and that trust in the room, and that’s by yourself giving something in that context as well.

Obviously, it’s a little different for me as an Aboriginal man. So I can speak to certain things about who my nation group is and those types of things, which does go a ways in sort of creating a bit of a link. I think it’s more personally when I sort of drill down more specifically about my values and principles. Within that, one of the exercises we do is that we talk about heroes are important people in our lives.

And we do that in a family context at a regional level, at a state level, and at a national level. And they’re specifically describing the values and principles of that. So when we normally talk about who’s in their family, I would say 80% of the men that we’ve worked with over three years would describe an Aboriginal female within their family, usually mum, nana, auntie, or big sister. Then we unpack with them around what is it about nana? And some of the things we hear is tough love, and they tell you what you need to hear and or what you want to hear. Unconditional love, no matter their decision-making from a child into adulthood, there’s always unconditional love.

Chris Dolman (18:44): And I guess as they speak about these figures, these from their life, the room becomes a lot fuller. Doesn’t it? There’s many other people in the room, as they evoke these people.

Bill Wilson (18:52): Absolutely. It does. And I’m trying to put a little bit of onus of, about us as men in the roles of dads and grandfathers and significant uncles. When are we going to take up that challenge of being more present in being described in the same way that a lot of these men were talking about their mums, their nanna’s, their aunties?

Chris Dolman (19:14): Do you think that question or that explanation kind of interests those fathers that you’re working with?

Bill Wilson (19:20): It does because it essentially starts getting them in talking about parenting practices and child-rearing child-raising issues, which all men have had different experiences. Within that while, a lot of them were that any Aboriginal mile role models in particularly through their formative years within that.

Chris Dolman (19:45): Thinking about my work with Aboriginal families, parents, young people, children, I think one thing I’m always concerned about is sort of that I might inadvertently bring in my own taken for granted ideas about how family life should be or how parenting should be or that kind of thing. So I guess my concern is that I can be inadvertently kind of imposing those assumptions on people or disqualifying perhaps inadvertently and not explicitly, but disqualifying their experiences or what’s important to them. But do you have some initial reflections on that in terms of other work you’ve done main partnership with non-Aboriginal practitioners? What’s important and helpful for us in those circumstances?

Bill Wilson (20:30): I guess it could take a bit of a decentred approach to that, which is, I think, always easier said than done because I think we’re all shaped by our own set of values and principles. And in particular, around issues of child-rearing child-raising, we all might have our own points of view in relation to that. But I guess is around really not dominating their sessions by their own values and principles in that, given in mind that we’ve all in that field have issues of mandatory notification and those types of things, but allowing the individual and the family to talk about their child-rearing practice.

And I think it’s about what are the strengths and the highlights within that, which might contradict or rub up against like I said, your own values and principles. But there’s many strengths within Aboriginal families around child-rearing and child-raising. And in particular, the broader kinship network that exists within Aboriginal families and how that can add value to the child-rearing and child-raising perspective of that particular child or those particular children within that family.

Chris Dolman (21:45): So do you think it’s important to co-research that a bit there’s other people that contribute to caring for children or raising children as well? So for me to be making sure I’m asking those questions.

Bill Wilson (21:55): Yes. I think about my own experiences in growing up and who were key people in my life through those child-rearing processes. And it was family on both sides of my mum and dads that had an impact in and shaped me as a child. And I saw it as an absolute strength.

Chris Dolman (22:17): Is there a story that comes to mind from your own life about that?

Bill Wilson (22:17): I remember as a young fellow growing up through the Christmas period. I would actually gravitate with a group of cousins, five or six of us. And we would go from my place until mum would say, “Right, you’ve been here way, get going.” Because there’s five of us, and we’d all be eating all the food in the house get going. So we’d go down to another auntie’s house, and we hang out there for a week, and it might be closer to the swimming pool.

So we strategically positioned ourselves at that auntie’s house, and she like, “Right. You’re eaten food. You get going.” And so we just keep shuttling around to six different homesteads. And my mom always knew where I was, that I was safe, that I was being fed, that I wasn’t doing things that would disappoint her or get her angry, but we had this sort of network of family that we would gravitate around.

And I don’t think that that networks is prominent now in the Aboriginal community that I grew up in. And I talked with other fellows who were around my age as well. And it’s something that we’ve identified with. We’re always in a network of love and family within that. And even though we might necessarily say our own mothers or fathers a lot in that time, they knew we were safe and knew what we were doing. So when you hear that saying, it takes a village to raise a child, that was essentially how I grew up. There was another to be network of family and love discipline that we grew up in and around.

Chris Dolman (23:54): Right. We’ve been talking a bit about the importance of getting onto the storylines of skills and strengths that aren’t just about individuals but link people to culture and community and land and family. And for some Aboriginal families, some Aboriginal people, those connections are fairly tenuous, I guess, or non-existent. So I’m interested in hearing a bit more about that and how you go about responding to that because we can talk about these connections, but sometimes I guess people don’t experience them as connections, do they? To land or culture.

Bill Wilson (24:27): Yeah. Absolutely. That was something that was really brought term sort of my attention with some of that work that I’ve done. A lot of them are about quite disconnected from their cultural heritage. And as a component of that, there’s been that interruption in that knowledge, transmission translation. So people have more questions than answers within that and impacts heavily. And it’s something that I had to be quite conscious of because I can speak very proudly about my heritage and my lineage. It almost magnifies their disconnection within that.

And it was something I really had to change my practise in terms of how I introduced that. I remember a couple of men coming up to me, sort of individually, and saying that “Hey brother, you really proud when you talk like that.” But it kind of highlights to me how far I’m away from where you are. So we have a lot of men and women and our children out there searching for their identity. Firstly, where they fit within their own families and then where they fit within that particular nation that they belong to.

Chris Dolman (25:37): It has me thinking about not assuming that somehow finding ways to ask carefully about that.

Bill Wilson (25:45): Who can ally with them who can support them in their journey of that cultural discovery?

Chris Dolman (25:50): I really liked that who can assist them in that discovery and that exploration, because again, that sort of takes away from an individualised kind of pursuit, doesn’t it? And is there a broader project and probably highlights also the political nature of what we’re talking about here? This disconnection is really not an individual failing, is it? There’s a sort of all sorts of policies and practises over a long period of time that have led to that.

Bill Wilson (26:14): Another exercise that works very well with the men is the Tree of Life that we’ve introduced.

Chris Dolman (26:20): So this is a narrative methodology, the Tree of Life using the tree as a metaphor?

Bill Wilson (26:24): Yep. Yep. It certainly offers them ability when we’re looking at the branches about who other supports within that. And I guess when we talk about the roots of the tree. Inevitably in that sort of context, it starts talking about their cultural identity seems to lend itself to those roots of the trees. It gets them to think a little bit broader in their content.

Chris Dolman (26:49): Yes. Because it enables them to sort of speak about these other aspects of life. You’ve just described that they wouldn’t otherwise get to sort of say so much about, I guess, and reconnect with those. Bill, our time’s coming to an end. So I just like to really express my appreciation for speaking with me today and being so generous and sharing with us your knowledge and for some of the personal stories you’ve shared as well as some other reflections, which have really had me thinking a lot about my own practise as well. So thanks for joining us on this Emerging Minds podcast.

Bill Wilson (27:18): Thanks for having me, Chris, it’s been a good yarn today.

Narrator (27:22): Visit our website at www.emergingminds.com.au to access a range of resources to assist your practice. Brought to you by The National Workforce Centre for Child Mental Health, led by Emerging Minds. The National Workforce Centre for Child Mental Health is funded by the Australian Government Department of Health, under the National Support for Child and Youth Mental Health program.