The mind that seems present in conversation is often narrating instead of listening.

EMDR sessions can feel powerful, yet change nothing, if the narrator—not the self—does the work.

Noticing the narration in real-time—not understanding it—is what lets real change begin.

I just came back from a conference where I presented on how to prepare clients before they process traumatic memories with EMDR. One of the ideas I shared was that before asking the brain to revisit and reorganize painful experiences, we need to make sure the Self is the one in the room doing the work.

The suggestion raised an obvious question: Who else could be there?

Telling a therapist that they may be dealing with the ego can sound strangely non-clinical. We use the word "ego" so casually that it has almost become an insult because it carries the idea of arrogance, self-importance, defensiveness, or fakeness. That’s why I tried to name it something else.

In my first book, I tried “hollow self” because I thought "ego" lacked substance. Once I understood its neurobiology better, I thought calling it “the narration self” was more appropriate because narrating is what this relational actor does.

Framing it as a "narrator" is useful because it allows us to understand its purpose within the system. Its main job is maintaining a coherent, defensible story about who you are. That story needs constant upkeep, so while you're living your actual life, some portion of your attention is somewhere else, reviewing what just happened, deciding what it meant, rehearsing how you'll describe it later, patching the version of events that keeps the story intact. As you may notice, its functioning still includes the self-referential “obsession” that gets most of the........

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