Existential & Narrative Therapy: Exploring Meaning, Identity, and the Stories We Live By

Dec 25

There are moments in life when the old ways of understanding ourselves stop working. Loss, identity shifts, and major transitions can leave us feeling unanchored, unsure of how to move forward or what matters now. Therapy can become a place to slow down, make sense of what has changed, and begin shaping a new relationship with yourself and your life.

Existential and Narrative Therapies are two distinct, evidence-informed psychotherapy approaches that support this kind of depth-oriented work. Together, they help people explore meaning, identity, responsibility, freedom, and the personal narratives that organize their lives—especially in the aftermath of trauma, loss, or transition (Frankl, 1992; White & Epston, 1990).

Existential therapy focuses on the human condition itself: questions of meaning, choice, responsibility, isolation, freedom, and mortality (Yalom, 1980). Narrative therapy, developed within a social-constructionist framework, centers on the stories people tell about themselves and their lives—and how those stories are shaped by culture, power, and lived experience (White & Epston, 1990). When integrated thoughtfully, these approaches support clients in reclaiming agency, re-authoring identity, and living with greater alignment and authenticity.

Existential Therapy: Making Meaning in the Face of Life’s Uncertainties

Existential therapy is grounded in a humanistic and philosophical approach that understands distress not only as a symptom to reduce, but as a signal that something meaningful is asking to be examined. Rather than focusing on diagnosis or pathology, this approach invites reflection on how you relate to meaning, choice, responsibility, freedom, loss, and uncertainty.

At its core, existential therapy asks questions such as:

Who am I becoming, beyond roles and expectations?
What gives my life meaning now?
How do I live with uncertainty, loss, and finitude without becoming frozen or disconnected?
What choices are mine to make, even in difficult circumstances?

Existential therapy does not offer easy answers. Instead, it creates space for clients to confront life’s givens while cultivating agency, authenticity, and meaning (Yalom, 1980; Van Deurzen, 2014).

Existentially oriented therapy has been shown to be particularly supportive for people navigating grief, trauma, chronic illness, identity transitions, and existential anxiety—especially when distress is rooted in questions of meaning, purpose, or direction rather than symptom presentation alone (Vos et al., 2015).

Narrative Therapy: Re-Authoring the Stories That Shape Our Lives

Narrative therapy is grounded in the understanding that identity is not fixed, but shaped through the stories we inherit, internalize, and tell about ourselves — stories influenced by personal experience, relationships, culture, and systems of power.

Rather than asking “What’s wrong with you?”, narrative therapy invites a different set of questions:

What stories have shaped how you see yourself?
How have trauma, culture, or oppression influenced these narratives?
What parts of you have been overlooked, silenced, or minimized?
What alternative stories already exist but have not yet been centered?

A core principle of narrative therapy is externalization — separating the person from the problem. This allows individuals to relate to their struggles with greater compassion, curiosity, and agency, rather than seeing difficulties as defining who they are (White & Epston, 1990).

Narrative approaches are widely used in trauma therapy, identity exploration, and work with marginalized communities, as they explicitly acknowledge how power, context, and systemic harm shape personal narratives. Through this lens, therapy becomes a process of reclaiming authorship, restoring dignity, and re-storying identity in ways that feel more aligned and life-affirming (Denborough, 2014).

Where Existential and Narrative Therapies Meet

In practice, existential and narrative therapies often complement one another.

Existential work explores meaning, choice, and responsibility at a deep human level. Narrative work explores how meaning is constructed, whose voices are centered, and how stories can be reshaped. Together, they support clients in understanding their lived experience while also reclaiming authorship over their lives.

In my work, these approaches are often woven together—particularly when clients are navigating identity shifts, grief, trauma, or periods of profound transition. Meaning-making does not happen in isolation; it happens within stories, relationships, and systems. And re-authoring a story often requires grappling with existential questions about who one is becoming.

Who Might Benefit from Existential & Narrative Therapy?

These approaches can be especially supportive for people navigating:

Grief, loss, or mourning
Identity exploration (gender, sexuality, culture, values)
Life transitions (relocation, career changes, relational shifts)
Existential anxiety or questions of meaning
Trauma that has disrupted one’s sense of self
Shame rooted in internalized narratives
Feeling “lost,” disconnected, or misaligned

They are particularly well-suited for individuals who are reflective, curious, and seeking depth—those who want therapy to be a space for exploration rather than quick fixes.

A Trauma-Informed Lens on Meaning and Story

Both existential and narrative therapies align naturally with trauma-informed care. Trauma can fracture meaning and distort identity, leaving people feeling unmoored from themselves and their lives. Rather than pathologizing these responses, existential and narrative approaches understand them as understandable adaptations to overwhelming experiences.

Narrative therapy helps externalize trauma responses, reducing shame and restoring a sense of agency. Existential therapy supports clients in making sense of suffering without minimizing its impact—while still honouring choice, autonomy, and dignity.

Together, these approaches prioritize consent, pacing, collaboration, and respect for lived experience—core principles of trauma-informed practice.

Case Reflection: When Identity Feels Unrecognizable

A client came to therapy following a series of major ruptures—loss, relocation, and the unraveling of a long-held identity. They described feeling unrecognizable to themselves, caught between who they had been and who they were expected to be, with no clear sense of who they were becoming.

Through narrative work, we began by identifying the dominant story shaping their self-understanding—one rooted in survival, responsibility, and external validation. Together, we traced how trauma, cultural expectations, and relational dynamics had authored this story over time. By externalizing self-criticism and shame, the client was able to relate to these patterns with more compassion and curiosity, rather than seeing them as personal failures.

Alongside this, existential inquiry opened space for deeper questions: What feels meaningful now? What values still matter when old identities no longer fit? What kind of life feels worth choosing in the face of uncertainty?
Rather than rushing toward answers, we stayed with these questions—allowing room for grief, ambiguity, and emerging desire.

Over time, previously overlooked moments of agency, resistance, and choice began to surface. The work wasn’t about “finding” a new identity or replacing one story with another. It was about loosening the grip of inherited narratives, reclaiming authorship, and allowing a more authentic sense of self to take shape—one grounded in truth, values, and lived experience rather than obligation.

Final Thoughts: You Are Not the Problem—The Story Can Change

Existential and Narrative Therapies remind us that distress is not a personal failure, but often a response to lost meaning, constrained choice, or inherited stories that no longer fit.

Healing, in this context, is not about fixing yourself. It’s about understanding the forces that shaped you, reclaiming your voice, and choosing how you want to live— again and again, over time

If you’re feeling untethered, questioning who you are, or sensing that an old story no longer holds, this kind of work may offer a spacious and grounding path forward. Therapy can be a place where meaning is not imposed—but slowly discovered, shaped, and lived into.

References

Denborough, D. (2014). Retelling the stories of our lives: Everyday narrative therapy to draw inspiration and transform experience. W. W. Norton & Company.

Frankl, V. E. (1992). Man’s Search for Meaning. Beacon Press.

Van Deurzen, E. (2014). Existential counselling & psychotherapy in practice (3rd ed.). Sage Publications.

Vos, J., Craig, M., & Cooper, M. (2015). Existential therapies: A meta-analysis of their effects on psychological outcomes. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 83(1), 115–128. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0037167

White, M., & Epston, D. (1990). Narrative means to therapeutic ends. W. W. Norton & Company.

Yalom, I. D. (1980). Existential psychotherapy. Basic Books.