hey there everybody and welcome to this presentation on the role of spirituality
in counseling I'm your host Dr Donnelly Snipes this is a topic I don't think we
really discuss enough partly because when people hear spirituality the first thing they think of
is religion and spirituality is so much more than religion you can be extremely spiritual
without being religious at all so it's important to recognize that spirituality involves a whole
lot more it encompasses a person's beliefs and their values what's important to them what they
believe is important in the world what they believe is the right thing to do for example
and an awareness of being part of a larger whole spirituality it doesn't necessarily mean you
believe in a higher power but for many people it does what it means is you recognize that you
don't live in isolation everything you do has an effect on other people and everything other
people do has an effect on you now it may not be a huge effect it may not be a direct effect but
it's important to recognize that you are part of a larger whole and enhancing spirituality
often means asking yourself one what can I do in order to benefit this larger whole
and in what ways will a healthier larger whole be beneficial to me how can I create this symbiotic
environment what are the goals of counseling well in counseling we want to help people
Envision and achieve their goals while acting in accordance with their values and beliefs so
since spirituality is defined by your values and beliefs then it's sort of integral into counseling
to help people evaluate what do you believe what is important to you what are your values
that's part of your spirituality and then saying where is it that you want to go
how do you define your rich and meaningful life and let's talk about how to get there
how does spirituality help with recovery well people's beliefs and
values impact how they interpret the world and their goals so if somebody feels like
um being a good person and tithing and giving and volunteering or whatever else is important
then they're going to use their energy and some of their resources for that and it will impact
how they interpret what's going on in terms of other people if other people aren't doing that
what do they think and it's important to recognize that people's beliefs and values help them find
meaning and even motivation in life if I've paint patience is one of my achilles heels and one of
my values is patience I think it's important I'm not good at it but I think it's important
so in order to become more of the person that I want to be in my rich and meaningful life
I recognize that part of that means working on developing greater patience and acceptance
so that helps me get motivated to work on those things because I realize that
that's important to me and therefore it's something I'm willing to use energy on
spirituality can also help people feel a sense of connection and recognize the impact of
their actions on the whole and the whole on their actions and yes you cannot change the entire world
you can't do something and make all of a sudden the entire country or even the entire city act
the way you want or do what you want or all of a sudden you know create World Peace it ain't going
to happen we'd love for it to but it's not but you can recognize and I usually say try to make
a sense of safety and contentment in your little corner of the world start with you and then those
that you live with the those in your neighborhood but recognizing how do your behaviors influence
them and how do their behaviors influence you and what can you do to create that synergy
spirituality as I mentioned is not necessarily about belief in a higher power and one of the
mnemonics that I love is perfects spirituality perfects and for a lot of people these values also
overlap with their religious beliefs but again you don't have to be religious to be spiritual
Prudence that is using wisdom and patience to work towards your goals not impulsively doing
the next thing that happens and encouraging people to be more prudent can help them nurture what is
important to them earnestness is giving your all giving a hundred percent to work toward what's
important to you and that's more of a behavior than a value but a lot of us believe that if
we're going to do something we should do it a hundred percent and not do it kind of halfway
respect for self and other and that goes back to recognizing that you don't live in a vacuum and
you impact other people and they impact you so how can you show respect and how does that impact you
when that happens forgiveness of self and other same thing that we were talking about with respect
how does that impact you when others forgive you how does that impact others around you when you
are forgiving how does it impact you when you're forgiving of others because others are going to
do things that irritate you and you're going to do things that irritate yourself so when we talk
about forgiveness how does that impact you and how can being more forgiving help you move toward
whatever is important in your rich and meaningful life how can it help you move toward those goals
that you've defined in counseling endurance is another characteristic of spirituality for
a lot of people and endurance means being able to withstand trials change is hard and I've said
it before change causes crisis and crisis causes change when people are in counseling it's usually
not a walk in the park but endurance and being willing to tolerate the discomfort to get to the
ultimate goal is important compassion for self and other is also really important in the counseling
and in the change process being mindful of how you're feeling and mindful of how others are
feeling because if other people are struggling and you're not compassionate how is that going
to impact you how is that going to help or hurt your ability to move toward your goals
truthfulness we talk about authenticity a lot and truthfulness is really important because
when you're lying to yourself or when you're lying to others then it often makes it harder to achieve
your goals in a way that is is Meaningful if you are lying to somebody and saying oh that's
fine when it's really not then you may start to Harbor resentment which ultimately needs to be
forgiven so truthfulness and authenticity can be really helpful and recognizing being truthful with
yourself looking at yourself taking an inventory and going hey I've got these good qualities and oh
yeah I have a few things over here that I need to work on that's fine in order to move towards your
rich and meaningful life you need to be aware of the places that need work as well as the
places that are already doing pretty well and then selflessness and I use this to really um represent
acknowledging the impact of other people in your life it's not the
warm-up for an opera where everything's me me me me it is yes I succeeded with the assistance of
recognizing and giving credit where credit is due I got to this point with the love and the support
and the resources or the mentorship or whatever of all of these other people because you didn't
do it all by yourself and thinking about all of that can also help you recognize um or enhance the
your little corner of the world again it may not work to enhance everything with everybody
but it can help you enhance your little corner of the world which will help you have more support
and hopefully more energy to move towards those goals that you've identified in counseling
you don't have to be religious to be spiritual each person's spirituality
is going to be somewhat different as clinicians it's important that we ask
people to explore their beliefs and values in relation to what's going on to help them
make meaning out of it and figure out okay where do I want to go from here
by encouraging mindfulness and purposeful action in everyday life we are encouraging spirituality
we are encouraging people to be aware of what they want what they need and to use
their energy in ways that are most in line with their values in order to work toward those goals