Session 2 - Building a Narrative with Jen Syrkiewicz

Practitioners:

Inspired Youth & Jen Syrkiewicz

Session Aims:

• Meet Jen Syrkiewicz

• Explore Narrative Composition

• Create Narratives from Experience

After a quick review of the last session and a discussion about progress we took a moment to think again about the end product. As an example of some national campaign messages, we looked at the following two films:

The group reflected on how the films had placed and challenged the audience using different styles and techniques.

The group were then introduced to Jen Syrkiewicz.

Jen is a talented and experienced communications specialist who has published two novels and a volume of poetry. She runs a writing business and is also a trained Hypnotherapist, Counsellor and NLP Practitioner. She also volunteers at Mind in her spare time!

Jen's first novel "Gardening in the Dark" was written to raise awareness of Bipolar Affective Disorder and how the condition affects the lives of those who suffer from it and the lives of those around them.

It was Jen's task to help the group form a narrative stucture and elements for what will become a 'script' for the multimedia. The script will not only be used to record sound and voices for the final piece but will also give a direction for the photography elements.

Jen began by focussing on people's individual talents; what they felt they were good at, what they felt they were best at and also what they believed other people thought they were good at.

It was something that most people had not given much thought and we were amazed as group members passively spoke of incredible achievements such as being a headteacher at the age of 36, having poetry published and being a natural at working with lace!

After much discussion Jen then turned our attention to moments where the group had experienced stigma relating to mental health issues.

The group threw themselves into the task and began to describe a range of situations where they had been judged, discriminated against or misunderstood. The group came up with some very honest recollections and scenarios which had a range of effects on their feelings and behaviour. Being judged by a stranger or someone close and often in public had really affected their self-confidence and their feelings about their ability to cope with their difficulties.

Jen left the session with plenty of narrative material in order to present a structure back to the group using their words and ideas.   We look forward to seeing the results!