As social beings, we all tell stories….sometimes expressed and sometimes left unexpressed sitting quietly in our subconscious but nevertheless, affecting our lives. Understanding our WholeStories helps us understand ourselves and those around us.

The SEST Approach encourages individuals to more fully communicate about themselves, their thoughts, emotions, and desires through the medium of storytelling. It is a flexible approach, recognizing the “wholeness” of the individual and accepting individuals for who they are in the moment. SEST is supported by its own theoretical framework built upon well-researched areas such as story grammar, cognitive behavior therapy, emotional intelligence, and positive psychology. It can be used starting with children as young as age seven.

SEST is about promoting an authentic, shared communication between the therapist and the child. It teaches children and adults to tell their stories, their WholeStories, with all the joy, anger or sorrow they hold. The SEST therapist listens without judgment and accepts their story as told, using it as a starting point for discussion. Rather than tell the child what to say or do and how to do it, the SEST Approach includes tools and strategies that help children find their own answers, in their own time and in their own way. SEST therapists are guides and teachers, but the pathway to learning is set by the child. Through SEST, children build attention and listening skills, self-awareness, self-monitoring, self-expression and self-control, alongside building perspective taking and a greater appreciation of how they interface with others and within the social world.