ABSTRACT
This chapter identifies common themes that form a relational postmodern meta-narrative. The relational as intellectual discourse has philosophical foundations expressed through overlapping narratives and there is a desire for a distinctive identity for therapeutic modalities, whilst seeing the potential of the relational as an integrative symbol. A relational approach sees the mind as 'an interactive phenomenon whose contents are not present within it but are rather created within the interactive context in which it is realized'. The ability to recognize and meet the other avoids the theoretical violence that has been done in the name of defending positions and instead offers well-being by a relational experience of being in the moment with another. The relational emphasis now found in some forms of psychoanalysis and psychotherapy may be viewed as a contemporary and postmodern meta-narrative consisting of the categories identified earlier by Hargaden and Schwartz.
