- Emerging research confirms the benefits of storytelling on mental health.
- The age-old socio-cultural practice has lately been incorporated into several therapies to treat mental health conditions.
What Is Storytelling?
Storytelling is a socio-cultural practice of sharing stories—sometimes with improvisation, theatrics, or embellishment. Every culture has its own stories or narratives. Most of the time, the stories are shared as a means of entertainment, education, cultural preservation, or instilling moral values.
Benefits Of Storytelling On Mental Health
Exploring personal stories, reflecting on them, changing these narratives, and sharing them not just makes us vulnerable, but also helps us to heal.
Therefore, storytelling is not just associated with entertainment. It is also said to have major mental health benefits, including:
- Enriching our creativity
- Fostering our imagination
- Boosting our listening skills
- Enriching memory retention and vocabulary
- Enhancing our general knowledge
- Enhancing our empathy and positive emotions
- Facilitating personal growth
Storytelling And Mental Healthcare Treatment
Storytelling benefits mental healthcare treatment in several ways. The component of storytelling is central to therapies like psychodrama, drama therapy, and playback theater that help treat mental health disorders like anxiety, depression, mood disorders, etc.
Storytelling assumes great significance in reminiscence therapy which is administered to people with memory disorders like dementia.
Reaping The Mental Health Benefits Of Storytelling
Storytelling goes beyond simply telling or writing stories. It is an extremely powerful non-medical tool in shaping mental health.
Therefore, frequently engaging in storytelling that benefits mental health in groups or individually can work wonders if you are suffering from depression or anxiety.
For instance, joining a book club or participating in storytelling sessions can help you tap into the mental health benefits of storytelling to improve mental health.
