Not everyone can effectively diagnose and treat us when we suffer with physical disease. It takes many years of intense study, rigorous training, and varied experiences to do so. Likewise, not everyone can effectively diagnose and treat us when we suffer with mental or emotional disease. It takes many years of intense study, rigorous training, and varied experiences to do so.
Why do we think it takes less to effectively diagnose and treat us when we suffer with diseases of our spirit? Do we even acknowledge the existence of diseases of our spirit? If not, why not? If so, why do we think that religious professionals such as priests, pastors, rabbis, imams, or other types of religious professionals are qualified to care for our spirits? They're religious professionals.
The expertise of religious professionals is their particular religion, it's sacred writings, history, doctrines, beliefs, moral code, and rituals. They're also trained to be administrators of the faith communities they serve. Religious professionals are experts in religion. They help the adherents of their religions be faithful adherents of their religion.
Some religious professionals do receive some training in psychology and counseling or guidance. Some go through Clinical Pastoral Education. Some become Licensed Pastoral Counselors. As a result they differ little from secular counselors. More importantly, most religious professionals receive no such training much less training in how to assess and treat our spirit. Religious professionals do not study and are not trained to care for our spirits.
Some might say that religious professionals are the experts qualified to care for our spirit. They assume that spirit is within the realm of religion. I disagree. Religion is the realm of religion and has no exclusive rights on our spirit. In my view, every one of us has a body, mind, and spirit. Spirit is essential not to religion but to being human.
We need medical professionals to care for our bodies. We need mental health professionals to care for our minds. We need religious professionals to care for those of us who are religious. And we need spirit care professionals to care for our spirit. I think this is an idea whose time has come: We need professionals who intensely study the human spirit, are rigorously trained to care for our spirit, and have richly varied experiences in doing so.
From my point of view, you make a very good point when you separate spirit from religion. “Spirit is essential not to religion but to being human” is a powerful statement as well as a powerful argument for divorcing spirit care from religious professionals.
ReplyDeleteSpirit is what makes everyone and everything who and what they are. Is there a religion for trees? For rocks? I think not, however both have spirit.
Is the need for spirit care professionals a uniquely human need, then? Or does this expand then into the infinite “all that is” of the universe?
Sara, if you're asking if trees and rocks have their own religions, I'd have to say I don't know. Maybe they do, maybe not. Like you, I am confident they are spirited. In my opinion, almost everything cares for our human spirit. We do well to care in return for the spirits of non-human beings. We also do well in my opinion to have some among us who excell at spirit care, professionals.
DeleteSeparately, I’m not yet entirely sold on the notion of all these professionals caring for the various aspects of me. So I’m not yet convinced that there needs to be another added to the mix. The model you describe is the model that exists in the 21st century. Perhaps older ways are as effective.
ReplyDeleteMight you consider that a Shaman is a “professional” who intensely studies the human spirit, and has in fact worked to heal the human spirit for tens of thousands of years?
Sara, are you suggesting that you would receive spirit care from a shaman as long as s/he was not part of "the mix" providing care along with physicians and therapists?
DeleteNo, that's not what I was suggesting. I wasn't clear enough. I was trying to tease out more of what the training and background for spirit care professionals might look like.
DeleteI was also wondering if a model for such a spirit care professional already existed in shamanic practice.
I'd welcome your thoughts on the questions you raise. What training and background do you think would make an excellent spirit care professional? Do you think that there is a traditional shamnic model that is a good fit with 21st century American health care?
DeleteI'm a student of shamanism and no expert. At this point, I think there is much to learn from the various shamanic traditions that is relavent to spirit care today. I'm not aware of a traditional shaminic model that already exists and is a good fit with current health care models. I don't think shamans traditionally work as spirit care professionals along with medical doctors and mental health specialists. I think that traditional shamans pretty much work not in collaboration with other providers but as solo providers or a group with a shared paradigm.
I’d be happy to share my thoughts, Mark. Please remember that I am writing as a spirited human, not as an expert, or even a knowledgeable amateur, on the subject of spirit care.
DeleteI see value in shamanic training for spirit care professionals. I am not necessarily speaking of an indigenous or tribal model of shamanism, but more of the ways in which shamanic practice is being adapted to contemporary thought and society. That many practice this today is testimony to its enduring value.
I see this as a mixture of traditional tools such as dream work, herbalism, psychopomp techniques, etc. overlaid onto modified methods of delivery. While not necessarily perfect, some of the work done by the Foundation for Shamanic Studies might be adapted as part of a curriculum.
For some reason, I find it far easier to describe what spirit professional training isn’t, rather than what it is. For example, I would be concerned about a training program for spirit care professionals that takes medical or mental health training as its model.
I see spirit care as more holistic and integrative, perhaps even calling in physical or mental health professionals as necessary in very specific situations. Still, some of the training that mental health professionals undergo might also prove of value.
Body and mind platforms currently feel very narrow to me, with their reliance on diagnostic codes and the use of pharmaceuticals to affect cures. I wouldn’t want to see spirit care reduced to a series of check boxes, making it formulaic. Spirit feels “big” to me, and caring for it feels like it might encompass a wide range of possibilities currently ignored. It’s anything but formulaic.
Sometimes what a person needs is a good “listening to”. Spirit care feels about love and connectedness to me. What feeds the spirit? That’s on what spirit professional training should focus.
This also begs the question of how to incorporate religious aspects, as I suspect there are many, perhaps the majority out there, who continue to see spirit as the purview of religion. I have said that I agree with your concept of removing spirit from the realm of religion. I’m just unsure how that happens. There is something in the phrase that many choose today when asked about religious belief: spiritual but not religious. IMO it speaks to a need to feel connected to the larger whole of the universe in some fashion, and speaks to the notion of connectedness I mentioned above.
These are just what I might consider to be “editorial” thoughts. I will be interested to read what you think of my meanderings. And I remain curious to read more about your ideas.
Sara, I agree spirit care professionals would do well to be trained in shamanic practices. I also think they need expertise in both religions and what in health care is called existential crisis or pain.
DeleteI come from the perspective of health care and see a lot of value in the medical model as a language rather than a constraint. Whether we like it or not, the medical model is the language of health care. IMO, spirit care professionals need to be fluent in it.
Besides being the language of health care, the medical model of assessing, identifying the problems and goals of care, and the interventions to address them is a very helpful tool and practice for anyone involved in healing.
I also see value in evidence-based research and care. Part of what I'm about is drawing attention to the need to not only liberate spirit care from religion, spiritualtiy, and psychology but to also establish some common language about and investigation of spirit.
I like what you've mentioned here. I do see your point about having spirit care professionals operate with a common language and frame of reference.
DeleteInterestingly, the medical model of assessing, etc. that you describe is what I have been recently begun working with in my alternative healing practice. It isn't easy.
The mission you've identified for yourself is a valuable discussion. I hope to see more commenting on your ideas.
While reading the Qigong book, the old masters seem to be all 4 of the professions; medical, mental, religious, and spiritual. (shen)
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