Jim Byrne is a doctor of counselling who has developed a novel approach to narrative therapy, which includes an understanding of the power of social stories about ‘who we are’, and ‘what is possible for us’!
Introduction to this new book about Daniel O’Beeve’s Amazing Journey
Page of information constructed by Renata Taylor-Byrne,December 2018
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One feature of Jim’s approach is that he uses autobiographical writing to explore psychological and spiritual distortions in his clients and his readers.
For a number of years, he has been refining a story about the life of Daniel O’Beeve, which is intended to teach people just how much we can transcend our difficult social origins, if we are determined enough. As he would express it: “We can heal our souls and minds and hearts, given the belief in the possibility of a forward moving journey to a better life!”
He has found it very difficult to package Daniel’s story in a way that would preserve its value, while at the same time making it both accessible and appealing to potential readers.
His target audience is anybody who is interested in psychology, philosophy, mythology or spirituality, in the context of being born into a difficult, distorting, dysfunctional family of origin. Anybody who is interested in the possibility of self-growth in the context of an extremely challenging early childhood environment.
When he first discussed the packaging of the story with Daniel, Daniel wanted it to have a zany title, like this:
Knit Your Own Psychotherapist, by Daniel O’Beeve.
Jim asked Daniel for more on that (bizarre) idea, and Daniel expanded it like this:
“I would suggest this as the flysheet/cover text:
Knit Your Own Psychotherapist – With bits of old wool.
A semi-autobiographical story by a French-Irish psychologist
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“Entrée:
“I was born in an Irish Catholic ‘mad house’ at the end of the Second World War. My mother knitted – furiously, and unendingly – woollen garments, for the family and for sale – while standing on one foot, smoking a Woodbine, which dangled from her pursed and nicotine stained lips, while she sang patriotic Irish laments. She knitted my itchy underpants; my socks which would not stay up, because they were too loose; my nightshirts; jumpers with shawl collars that sweated and itched all through the hot summers in school. She even threatened to knit me a white suit for my First Holy Communion (while all my school peers would be fitted out with little gray, tailored suits of worsted fabric). But the worst crime of all, and the one that caused the most psychological damage to my child-mind was this: She knitted me a woollen helmet from leftover scraps of many colours, and insisted that I must wear it to school every day, despite the fact that it attracted every bully, within a five mile radius, to beat me”.~~~
Jim wasn’t keen on Daniel's suggested approach. He countered with this:
“Why don’t we call it something like:
The Construction of a Psychotherapist from Fragments of Broken Lives:
An Autobiographical narrative.
“Doesn’t that sound like it conveys the serious psychological content of your story?”
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Daniel rejected Jim’s response, and countered with an even wilder idea than the previous one. And so the conversation went back and forth, via email exchanges, for months and months and months.
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After many attempts to come up with a message which accurately reflects the nature of Daniel’s journey, they agreed upon this:
Daniel O’Beeve’s Amazing Journey:
From traumatic origins to transcendent love
The memoir of Daniel O’Beeve, a strong-willed seeker: 1945-1985
Transcribed by Jim Byrne
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