Sacred Psychoanalysis - etheses Repository - University of ...

One solution is to identify parameters that locate a ‘working concept’ - broad enough to be
inclusive and yet focused enough to be meaningful - situated within a particular context
such as the therapeutic. 66 A therapeutic paradigm offers a six-part taxonomy:
• Meaning - the ontological significance of life; making sense of life situations; deriving
purpose from existence
• Value - beliefs and standards that are cherished; having to do with the truth, beauty,
worth of a thought, object or behaviour; often discussed as ‘ultimate values’
• Transcendence - experience and appreciation of a dimension beyond the self; expanding
self-boundaries
• Connecting - relationships with self, others, God/higher power, and the environment
• Becoming - an unfolding of life that elicits reflection and experience, including a sense
of oneness and knowing (Martsolf and Mickley 1998: 294)
• Loving - the ‘forgotten dimension’ identified by Swinton (Swinton 2001, 2002) implicit
in other definitions. 67
Drawing on these contextual and phenomenological approaches a working definition is
offered by Cook:
Spirituality is a distinctive, potentially creative and universal dimension of human
experience arising both within the inner subjective awareness of individuals and
within communities, social groups and transitions. It may be experienced as
relationship with that which is ultimately ‘inner’, imminent and personal, in the self
and others, and/or as relationship with that which is wholly ‘other’, transcendent and
beyond the self. It is experienced as being of fundamental or ultimate importance
66 Research on spirituality from: transpersonal and humanistic psychology and psychotherapy (Elkins et al.
1988; Vaughan 1991); education (Beck 1986; Wright 2000); nursing, including palliative care and midwifery
(Martsolf and Mickley 1998; Hall 2003; Wright 2004); learning disabilities (Swinton 2001, 2002); addictions
(Cook 2004); and counselling and psychotherapy (Ross 2003, 2006) forms the basis of this taxonomy.
67 They also reach consensus on the fruit of spirituality described by clusters of ideas, feelings, states including
authenticity, letting go of the past, facing our fear, insight and forgiveness, compassion, awareness, peace,
liberation, wonder, gratitude, hope, courage, energy, detachment and gentleness.
35