Narrative Therapy Initiative

09/10/2026

Friends, we're asking our community to show up for someone who has shown up for so many of us.

Many of you who have attended Folx Tales know Frank Escamilla, the Bus Stop Prophet. Poet, storyteller, educator, mentor, and giver of the best bear hugs around. For over 25 years, Frank has been doing heart-centered community work across the U.S. and around the world, and his presence at Folx Tales has been a gift to all of us.

Frank is now facing open heart surgery to replace a congenital bicuspid valve he was born with (a condition he only recently learned about). His family is asking for prayers, support, and financial help to cover medical expenses, rehabilitation, and living costs during his recovery.

If Frank has ever moved you, made you laugh, held space for you, or reminded you of the light living within, this is a chance to give something back.

Please donate if you can, and share widely.

GoFundMe:

Hi everyone, Calling on the community to help support our teacher, friend,… Jay Poole needs your support for Help Frank, the Bus Stop Prophet, Heal His Heart

07/21/2026

Failure stories are persuasive. They recruit evidence, shape how people see themselves, and quietly overshadow the values and hopes that are also there.

The Success of Failure and the "Not Good Enough" Virus is a self-paced course developed by NTI faculty member Sarah Beth Hughes from a 2021 workshop by Steve Gaddis. It explores how these stories operate and offers concrete narrative practices for responding to them for yourself and for the people you work with.

Self-paced, 6 hours
$125 / $75 Student-Senior
6 CEs approved

For more information and to register, please visit the following link:

This course is based on a workshop Steve Gaddis taught in 2021. We have taken some of his lectures and exercises and put them together in this online course. Steve explores how we can be more aware of all the ways we are set up to fail and how we might stand against this. He explores how we might te...

06/18/2026

Words from a recent participant ...

"This training helped me to see the value in hanging out there a bit, lingering with this person, taking it slow and being curious. The crafting of questions when in that space was such an interesting and valuable exercise. Carve out the time to really sink into these ideas — then watch yourself change over time. You will fall in love all over again with the work you do every day."

If that resonates, The Success of Failure and the "Not Good Enough" Virus might be exactly what you're looking for.

Developed by NTI faculty member Sarah Beth Hughes from a 2021 workshop by Steve Gaddis, this self-paced course explores how failure stories shape our lives and our clinical work while offering narrative practices for responding to them.

The course take approximately 6 hours to complete and is approved for 6CEs.
$125 / $75 Student-Senior

👉 Enroll here: https://nti-school.teachable.com/p/the-success-of-failure

05/20/2026

Two weeks from today, we'll be gathering in Boston for Folx Tales 2026 — and we'd love for you to be there.

June 5 & 6 at the NonProfit Center in downtown Boston. Two days of conversation, narrative practice, and community, organized around the themes of Solidarity and Resistance, Radical Tenderness, and Power. Plus the Hootenanny Friday evening.

Folx Tales is open to anyone with an interest in narrative ideas, whatever your level of experience.

📍 89 South St, Boston, MA | 9am–5pm ET
💰 Sliding scale: $100 / $200 / $300 / $400 (If none of the tiers feel accessible, reach out — your presence matters more to us than what you can afford to pay.)
🎓 13 CEUs being applied for

👉 For more information and to register, please visit the following link:

Join NTI for a special gathering to care for each other, our community, and nurture resistance stories and solidarity practices in these times.

05/17/2026

Many conversations about failure stop quickly.

“Oh yes… capitalism… comparison… modern culture.”

We name it, but often stop there.

What might happen if we slow down and look more closely at how these ideas have shaped our own lives? Or our clients’ lives?

And what might be discovered in that unpacking?

This is the work we explore in The Success of Failure, the Narrative Therapy Initiative’s new self-paced online course.

For more information and to register, please visit the following link: https://nti-school.teachable.com/p/the-success-of-failure

05/16/2026

Who benefits when we feel like we are failing?

How did the story of failure become so successful?

Narrative therapy invites us to ask questions like this… not to blame, but to better understand the powerful ideas that shape how we see ourselves.

The Success of Failure is not a course about learning from failure.

It is about understanding how ideas about failure take hold of how we see ourselves, and how we might begin to loosen their grip.

For more information and to register, please visit the following link: https://nti-school.teachable.com/p/the-success-of-failure