Click on any of the above links to get further guidance if you’d like a place to start with your spiritual healing. The basic philosophy that accompanies most spiritual healing traditions is that when we are disconnected from the Divine, we are severed from true well-being. Bryan was born in Philadelphia and remains an ardent supporter of Philadelphia sports. After attending FSU and FAU where he majored in writing, Bryan ventured out to follow in the footsteps of his idols, running straight into drug addiction. After being arrested by the President’s Secret Service, Bryan finally started to rebuild his life and beat that monkey off of his back through writing, playing music, and studying Buddhist philosophy. It’s also important to remember that your understanding of a Higher Power can change and evolve over time.
Inside The Alcoholic Brain
- Chaplains play a vital role in hospice care, providing spiritual and emotional support to patients, their families, and the hospice team.
- It is strange paradox, the more you focus on helping others, the more you discover how much you matter.
- This practice can be done by maintaining a gratitude journal or by simply acknowledging one thing each day that you are grateful for.
- After losing a child to suicide, the first year did indeed feel like complicated grief.
- Life’s challenges are inevitable, and they will surely come our way, but when we address spiritual malady, we develop emotional and mental resilience, which helps us navigate the tough times with ease.
It is constant maintenance of being spiritually connected with a god of your understanding. It is strange paradox, the more you focus on helping others, the more you discover how much you matter. Regardless of how it manifests itself, a spiritual malady is always rooted in an inner conflict. This inner conflict can be caused by many different things, such as childhood trauma, unresolved grief, or trauma related to addiction. We become so fixated on it that almost everything we do leads us to think about getting intoxicated.
The Spiritual Malady: A Hole in the Soul
They will purport to have the power to “heal” all your issues and provide you with the “one true path” towards enlightenment, illumination, self-realization, or Oneness. Second, if they are aware, they’re uncomfortable facing or confronting it, typically out of fear or a sense of embarrassment. I also highly recommend that you check out our article on Soul Work, which goes into great depth on ways of reconnecting with the soul. Spiritual healing occurs as we begin to consciously reconnect with our essential being – the wise, loving, powerful, creative entity that we are at our core.
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Especially being alcoholic more often than not, it is our nature to have that “my way or the highway” mentality. Intellectually, believing in something we cannot physically see or a scientifically proven exists is a hard pill to swallow, those intellectual individuals shut the idea out completely. These core beliefs make it harder for us to connect with a god of our understanding. David Roger Clawson, M.D., is a Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation physician with an interest in natural prevention and healing strategies for health and wellness. Foundational to this practice is the understanding of threat and defensive physiology versus safety and restorative physiology. The huge burden that humans bear is the ability to contemplate our own annihilation—death.
However, that does not mean addicts are confronting this spiritual ailment by themselves. While an addict’s spiritual malady triggers a compulsive need to use drugs, other people’s spiritual conflicts may take the form of a gambling problem, anxiety, depression, or eating disorder. As a result of this thought process, the spiritual illness they’re spiritual malady meaning up against is at the core of their addiction. Addiction is a spiritual disease because it represents an individual’s attempt to disconnect from reality and any sense of spirituality. Simply put, they feel a terrible loneliness at their very soul or center of being. However, this does not mean, necessarily, they’ve abandoned their faith.
Spiritual Malady and the Relapsing Nature of Alcoholism
When people become too self-reliant, they often start to think that they don’t need AA anymore. They may start to skip meetings, distance themselves from their support system, and eventually relapse. Unlike normal people (whatever that means) alcoholics are unsettled to the core. After reading ‘The Doctor’s Opinion,’ ‘Bill’s Story,’ and ‘There is a Solution,’ in the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous, we came to an understanding that we have no control whatsoever over alcohol or drugs.
- Alternatively, if you feel suicidal, please reach out for support.
- Moreover, it serves as a foundation for self-improvement, as individuals begin to prioritize spirituality over materialistic desires.
- In fact, sometimes it’s a wiser choice to reach out to those who are intimately acquainted with grief and can adequately hold space for you.
- This is frequently referred to as ‘breed and feed” physiology, although it is clearly much more than just that.
Most of us hate to deal with negative thoughts or emotions—it just doesn’t feel good. It is also important to maintain a consistent and disciplined spiritual practice to maintain spiritual health and wellness. In essence, individuals must realize that overcoming spiritual malady leads to a fulfilling life, full of love, happiness, and contentment. Through a combination of self-reflection, spiritual practices, and a supportive community, individuals can achieve a deep spiritual connection with themselves and others. When the road to spiritual recovery seems long and arduous, seeking guidance from a mental health professional can be a beneficial option. Trained professionals provide expert therapy to address underlying psychological or emotional issues that may have contributed to the spiritual malady.
They are essential tools that help one manage stress, maintain emotional balance, strengthen their faith and feel more fulfilled. It is important to understand the unique and significant things that differentiate a spiritual malady from other forms of illness. In this state of being, one can feel as though they are without direction and may be searching for something that will fill the void.
- By using this approach, a recovering addict can experience a notable change in their outlook.
- It requires a consistent commitment to maintaining spiritual health and practicing principles of honesty, humility, and service.
- As you stare into the mirror, enfold yourself in a hug and cradle yourself.
- Second, if they are aware, they’re uncomfortable facing or confronting it, typically out of fear or a sense of embarrassment.