Dr. Paul Browde

Co-founder | Lead Trainer: Medical and Health

One of our team members, wearing glasses, is grinning at the camera.

"The stories we tell others and ourselves, not only describe our lives but shape them. While we cannot always choose the circumstances life delivers, we do have the ability to choose and re-invent the stories we tell.”

I co-founded Narativ, originally as a space for telling my own personal stories and for listening to the stories of others. In collaboration with the Open Society Foundations over the past ten years I have been a leading member of the Narativ team, teaching listening, and storytelling, as advocacy tools to marginalized groups in healthcare contexts. Groups we have worked with include sex workers, people with intellectual disabilities, recipients of oral substitution therapy, Roma doctors and AIDS activists in Eastern Europe, Africa and North America.

Although I am a physician, a psychiatrist, and a couple’s therapist, I prefer to think of myself as a guide. Every day I listen to people’s deep personal experiences, their despairs, their joys and their dreams; I marvel at the privilege of being thus entrusted.

My deepest aspiration is to create a world in which people connect with one another; and through this connection, love their lives.

As a guide I aim to build an authentic relationship with the individuals who sit across from me. There is no formula for doing this. Each person who consults me is unique, and my job is to be flexible, finding a way to create a relational space that is safe and connected.

Learn more about my work at paulbrowde.com.

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