A Look into How It Can Improve Mental Health and Transform Lives
Spirituality can be a powerful tool in improving mental health and transforming lives. It is a journey that can help us to better understand ourselves and the world as a whole. It can be a source of comfort and guidance during times of uncertainty and can give us the strength to continue in difficult moments. It can also offer us a way to gain clarity and purpose in our lives.
Exploring spirituality can be a rewarding experience for those who are open and willing to embark on the journey. Through this exploration, we can learn to appreciate the beauty of life and the interconnectedness of all things. We can create a life of meaningfulness and fulfilment with a deeper understanding of ourselves and the world.
What is Spirituality?
Spirituality is often misunderstood to be a religious practice, but in fact, it goes beyond that. It is not solely about following a particular set of beliefs or worshiping a specific deity. Instead, it explores one's relationship with themselves, others, and the world around us. It also involves the knowledge that our lives have significance in a greater context and that we are part of a divine purpose. It involves exploring common themes, such as: love, compassion, altruism, life after death, wisdom and truth, with the understanding that some individuals such as saints or enlightened individuals have explored these themes in greater detail than the ordinary person. It is a journey of self-discovery and self-growth where we can learn to appreciate the beauty and interconnectedness of all things.
We often hear the word spirituality and religion used interchangeably, but there is a stark difference between the two. While spirituality can exist without religion, religion cannot exist without spirituality. Religion is a group of people who share the same beliefs and practices and often gather in communities. It can be likened to a building where people come together to worship, study, and fellowship. Spirituality, on the other hand, is an individual journey. It is an exploration of oneself and an attempt to understand the self in relation to others and the world around us.
Exploring the Relationship Between Spirituality & Mental Health
What role does spirituality have in mental health?
Spirituality is an important aspect that is often overlooked in the therapeutic process. It is often assumed that finding acceptance and support from friends, family, and other people will be enough to help someone recover. But what happens when a person has nobody to turn to when they need it most? What happens when they don't have a strong support system or feel uncomfortable reaching out to others? People facing mental health issues, especially in a crisis, sometimes don't want to talk to others or don't want to burden others. This is where spirituality can make a difference. Mental health issues can be incredibly lonely and isolating and sometimes make us feel like we are the only ones facing these issues. Spirituality can provide us with comfort and guidance when facing life's hardships. It can help us navigate through difficult times. It can be a source of strength when we feel we cannot go on.
Why Should Spirituality Be Considered in Mental Health?
Spirituality is often overlooked in mental health therapy, which is unfortunate because it can be a helpful and powerful tool for healing and growth. It can help create the conditions for change, provide support during difficult times, and offer hope to patients when they feel like they don't have any options. When we consider spirituality in therapy, we focus on more than just the role of religion and what it means to our patient's belief system. Instead, we focus on how spirituality can help patients to open up to their feelings, explore their feelings and thoughts, and find meaning in their lives.
When we consider spirituality in therapy, we encourage our patients to explore their relationship with themselves, others, and the world around them. We also encourage patients to explore their values, beliefs, and connections to others and the world around them.
Why Should We Include Spirituality in Mental Health?
As discussed above, spirituality can be a powerful tool in mental health therapy. But what exactly is the role of spirituality in mental health?
- We can explore our values, beliefs, and feelings through spirituality. It can help us analyze our feelings and emotions and sense of connection to others and the world around us.
- It can help us find meaning in our lives and can support us during difficult times.
- When we explore our spirituality, we can better understand our feelings and emotions and our connections to others and the world around us.
- We can also find our own meaning and purpose in life. When we understand ourselves and others better, we can create healthier relationships.
- We can also deal with life's hardships more effectively and healthily.
How Can Therapists Introduce Spirituality Into Their Work?
If we want to include spirituality in our work, then we first need to be comfortable with exploring our own spirituality. We must be honest with ourselves about what spirituality means to us and where we are in our journey.
We can begin by observing our feelings, thoughts, and reactions. We can ask ourselves what we feel around other people, our environment, and particular experiences. We can also explore our feelings and thoughts toward our work as therapists.
We can ask ourselves what we feel about our work and how it makes us feel. We can also explore how our feelings and reactions to our work or different people or situations may affect our work.
Here are some positive processes that ensure hope and significance within a therapy setting and self-guidance:
- Music- playing, hearing, singing, adoration
- Tuning into inspirational orators and lessons, applications, and online assets
- Quiet contemplation, escape, quietness
- Body & breathwork, aware development, Yoga
- Being in nature – the interconnectedness
- Being a piece of a confidence/ a religious network social help, having a place
- Imagination - drawing, painting, visiting craftsmanship displays, composing, moving
- Meeting with others to converse, energize, and gain from one another, guiding
- Perusing religious books, inspirational books, and biographies
- Caring for others – volunteering, demonstrations of arbitrary benevolence, sympathy
- Sport– being a part of a group, upholding
- Petitioning, association with God/the sacred profound encounters
- Ceremonies, images, routine, and structure
When People's Problems Are Caused by Their Spirituality
Spirituality can be a powerful tool in mental health. Still, it can also cause issues when it involves manipulation, taken to an extreme level and becomes an addiction. It is essential to quickly recognise the signs of an unhealthy relationship with spirituality to help our patients recover.
When we discuss spirituality in therapy, it is essential to understand that it is a personal journey. There is no perfect way to explore your spirituality. When recognising the signs of an unhealthy relationship with spirituality, we must look at the individual and their journey.
What does spirituality mean to them?
How do they express their spirituality?
Is their spirituality healthy, or does it harm them?
Does it interfere with their relationships, career, and health?
Does it affect their psychological health?
We can recognise many signs that there is a poor pre-existing connection between the patient and their spiritual/religious spectrum, such as:
- A negative perception of God, such as one who is punitive and judgmental without any mercy or sympathy, can lead to feelings of anger, guilt, or fear.
- Spiritual abuse, such as when a faith group or cult engages in controlling behaviour, financial exploitation, or isolating individuals from others, may require a safeguarding role.
- Rejecting medical help and looking at issues through a spiritual lens, such as demonic or jinn activity, may be less embarrassing than confronting mental illness.
- Using rituals and prayers as compulsions, being inflexible, dogmatic, expecting unrealistic standards from oneself or others, or promoting hatred of other groups are all things to consider.
- Struggles may arise when trying to reconcile different life experiences and beliefs and choosing to compartmentalise faith rather than incorporate it into one's life.
- Issues may arise when converting to a new faith or losing faith entirely.
- Conflict and problems within a faith community, questions of faith, doubts, and a feeling of "why me?" regarding a mental health or other life events can all have an impact.
- Ultimately, this can lead to a loss of hope and purpose.
What is essential is to recognise that spirituality is a journey, and there are no quick fixes. Exploring yourself and finding meaning in your life takes time and effort.
Conclusion
Spirituality can be a powerful tool in improving mental health and transforming lives. It is a journey that can help us to better understand everything around us. It can be a source of comfort and guidance during times of uncertainty and can give us the strength to continue in difficult moments. It can also offer us a way to gain clarity and purpose in our lives.
Exploring spirituality can be a rewarding experience for those who are open and willing to embark on the journey. Through this exploration, we can learn to appreciate the beauty of life and the interconnectedness of all things. We can create a life of meaningfulness and fulfilment with a deeper understanding of ourselves and the world.
This blog is mainly based on the book and training by Dr Hilary Garraway
References
- Anandarajah, G.M., Hight, E.M. (2001) Spirituality and medical practice: Using the HOPE as a practical tool for spiritual assessment. American Family Physician
- Dein (2010) Religion, spirituality and mental health Psychiatric times 27
- Department of Health (2009) Religion or belief: A practical guide for the NHS
- Hilary Garraway. (2021) Holistic Cognitive Behaviour Therapy: A Strengths-based Approach Integrating Body, Mind and Spirit within the Wider Context (Oxford: Pavillion publishing and Media Ltd)
- Koenig, McCullough & Larson (2001) Handbook of religion and health Oxford University Press
- Mental Health Foundation (1997) Spirituality and Mental Health Vol 4, Issue 6
- Post and Wade (2009) Religion and Spirituality in Psychotherapy: A Practice-Friendly Review of Research Journal of Clinical Psychology 65(2):131-46
- Rathod (2010) Developing Culturally Sensitive Cognitive Behaviour Therapy for Psychosis for Ethnic Minority Patients by Exploration and Incorporation of Service Users’ and Health Professionals’ Views and Opinions, Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapy,38, 511–533