In this episode of the Fear Less podcast, Will and Zack talk with TJ Bauman, a milieu specialist at Mountain Valley Treatment Center, about how Narrative Therapy and Jospeh Cambell’s “Hero’s Journey” framework are integrated into their unique approach to anxiety treatment. TJ specializes in experiential education, helps lead Mountain Valley’s adventure-based programming, and facilitates a therapeutic class titled "Journal Your Journey” where participants use a modified version of Hero's Journey framework to reflect on their process in treatment.

This discussion explores Narrative Therapy, narrative reasoning, and how “story” can used in treatment to help provide structure, context, and a way to make meaning of the various challenges that arise through the process of change. Zack provides insight into how the philosophical similarities between the “Hero’s Journey” framework and the process of Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) therapy led to design of Mountain Valley’s anxiety treatment program. TJ shares rich examples and stories from his daily work in the milieu, discussing how Mountain Valley’s narrative framework is applied in the milieu, the benefits it provides to participants in the program, and the role it plays in his highly effective approach to mentoring anxious youth.  Zack and TJ also share how the hero’s journey has applied and continues to apply to their own life, helping them make sense of their process of growth.

This episode provides valuable insights into the transformative power of “story” and how it can be used to a structure for understanding fear, and a process for conquering it. It's a compelling discussion that is meant for anyone looking to make fear “less”, so they can be more.

Zack's Anxiety Hack: Zack describes how narrative therapy can be applied to help all of us look at our lives as a story and that we are the author which can help us Fear Less!

Fear Less is sponsored by Mountain Valley Treatment Center.