Facilitated Life Review
The benefits of Life Review are many – contact us to form an ongoing group within your facility or center, or, to work with us individually.
Life review, or the telling of one’s story, may be done at any stage of life, but never more important than when an older adult. Everyone’s life has great meaning: we all experience joy, conflict, loss, pain, success and failure. Yet sometimes all this experience resides solely in our own minds and is not shared, processed, or released. Life review, structured or not, assists us in making meaning or sense of our lives; it helps us resolve conflict, reduce stress, and often feel a great sense of relief.
Some people prefer to simply reminisce, but in the presence of another. This would be unstructured, conversational, and without any sort of documenting of the facts. The process is casual, but very meaningful and informative.
Others prefer something more structured and deliberate, perhaps beginning with earliest childhood memories and continuing through all the important phases and events throughout one’s life. In this scenario, which we refer to as Facilitated Life Review, the older adult often wants to document, in some way, parts of their story. We have the ability to audio and/or video tape the conversation as an important legacy builder for future generations. If preferable, we can also transcribe portions of the review.
Engaging in the life review process with a likeminded group is a fun, impactful, and supportive way to both tell a part of your life story every week, and also to hear the stories of your peers. It is amazing how much participants have in common and how open and honest group members become over time. In the group setting, we can either start the process with childhood and work our way chronologically, or we can have group members select a random, interesting question each week from the several hundred we always have with us.
Whether individually, or in a group, your life story deserves to be told.
We can produce a 90-minute audio or video that can be left to family and friends or, for your own private review. The Life Review is customized to meet your goals – it can be aimed at leaving a message, lessons or life history behind for future generations to enjoy and learn from or it can facilitate a personal life review. The format is tailored to meet your needs – interview, storytelling, etc. This process is relevant for any age – but is particularly appropriate for those in later stages of life.
