Here is an interesting article I found by a renowned adolescent health research at Johns Hopkins university which supports the idea that spirituality is one of several protective factors which enhances social competence and promotes resilience in youth.

There definitely is a correlation between spirituality and social skills. Ramakrishna Math in Mumbai recently organised their 44th annual Inter-School Elocution and Recitation Competion along with 14th annual Inter-School Multi-Talent Competition, and 22nd annual Inter-School Reading Competition for the Hearing-Impaired Children.

For the Elocution competition they distributed a book among children (Junior V-VII and Senior VIII-X). The title of this book is: VIVEKANANDA HIS CALL TO THE NATION (112 pages). There are following chapters in the book.

A Brief Life of Swami Vivekananda

Faith and Strength

Powers of the Mind

Man: The Maker of his Destiny

Education and Society

Serve Man as God

Religion and Ethics

India: Our Motherland

Other Exhortations.

For more details on how these programs are organised, contact the following organisers.

Anish or Chayaben: Mob. 9769546687

Ramakrishna Math: e-mail: [email protected]

Website: www.rkmkhar.org

12th January is recognized by the Govt. of India as a NATIONAL YOUTH DAY. Celebrations are held across the country. Most of the participants are school and college students. I have attached a typical program outline. 

Thank you Vikram.   I have read Swami Vivekanand uncountable times.   Daily Meditation and journaling will definitely help them in emotional clearing. Gratitude list and daily compliments are some simple techniques of boosting compassion. when we talk about spirituality we talk about the depth of our being. It can not be same for all.  I have to narrow it down. so i can initiate by knowing  the quietness of mind. Looking forward to fresh insights.

Swami Vivekananda exhorts youth to practice brahmacharya. He points out that practice of Brahmacharya has a direct connection with a sharp memory and concentration of mind which are most essential for making progress in any kind of discipline including their studies and profession. Goal setting and working towards that goal is important for any kind of success. Young people should set long term and short term goals for their life. At the same time they should think about the ultimate goal of human life. Try to find out what it is.

The world around them offers them two paths. These are Yoga and Bhoga. These are two oposite paths. In Yoga the person has to conserve his/her energies and focus them towards acquisition of goals of their life. Bhoga is a path of enjoyment which fritters away all their energies and makes the mind weaker weaker. When the mind becomes weak it becomes more and more difficult to cope with emotional stresses that one encounters in his/her life. On the contrary path of Yoga makes the mind stronger and stronger.

              The correlation between spirituality and social skills can be positive depending on the influence of respective religions (the die-hard followers) on the practice of spirituality inherent in them. The historical importance given to concrete forms of religious practices when extended to sublime forms of spirituality it is bound to transform social skills as well. However the collective failure to grow out of the glorious past on par with the advances made through the path of science on time can hardly be an inspiration not only to this generation but any generation to come. When we allowed man-making to be replaced systematically into money-making it is bound to reflect on those innocent ones. The moot point is the spiritual role models of the current age.

        At adolescent’s level, being impressionable is a factor around which the intervention programs may be designed. A free session on attractive current affairs (cinema, relationship, love, politics etc.,) may be introduced in which the young participants may be allowed to express their opinions without any tags attached. In subsequent sessions, the relevance of the chosen topics in a specific social context may be touched upon. Involving well informed parents and favorite teachers too might help.

     Gradually, depending on the result of pre-assessment of awareness of participants regarding past and present religious/spiritual activities, spirituality may be explained as a socially relevant topic (ex: the role of organized religions and actual religious practices in a society). The bottom line of course will be full freedom to question or express their views. To let them question uninhibitedly itself is a first step in the projected direction. Let them vent all that they hold against spirituality and let those who stands for reply.

Obviously, the quality of the content and design of the program, its implementation and the role and contribution of the knowledgeable moderator are decisive factors...besides circumventing usual politics.

Here is an interesting article I found by a renowned adolescent health research at Johns Hopkins university which supports the idea that spirituality is one of several protective factors which enhances social competence and promotes resilience in youth.

Thank you Vikram .what you said is absolutely right. spirituality is also oriented to significance. What is important to individual- peace, meaning in life, materialistic or personal growth, health, happiness and belongingness. i  would like to work on this aspect too.

Thank you Koonani for  your profound and crisp suggestions. :) when i talk to y-gen about religion they talk about beliefs, practices and rate it some where between fear and love. They extend their views to ethics, morals, values and virtues . How do they experience the divine force,  how do they perceive life, death,supernatural or life forces  would be one of the aspect of my work.How can we portray spiritual role models before them is really a very creative idea.

spiritual development is a dynamic process. planning to conduct  a systematic study to locate its important milestones. Thanks once again for your  innovative thoughts.

Thank you Mary.  This article  gives a complete framework of youth development and very significant in further intervention. spiritual orientation could be a critical factor  in  impulse control, suicide prevention and drug and alcohol abuse in youths. spirituality is core  integral factor of multidimensional personality. peace and light.

The Summer 2008 issue of New Directions for Youth Development: Theory, Research, Practice is devoted to spiritual development.  There are a number of good articles in there by prominent researchers and activists in the youth development field.

at needs to be done here is to have a clear operational definition to quantity the notion of spiritual and then to distinguish it from other domains - for in reference the literature mentioned here - they fail to understand what you want to call spirituality. Psychological resilience should not be mistaken 

Hi Sahu

Yes we can desighn jointly many synopsis to study the correlation between spiritualty and social skills and to enhance peace of mind at adolescent level.

Dr. Altaf H Langrial

IUB

Thanks Barbara, Dr J-F and Dr Altaf. I  Agree with you Dr J-F. My motive to put forth this question is to  look for several possibilities.  As It has been defined as a core intelligence i want to study its effects in various domains of life. when we question about life the answers are mostly contradictory, ambiguous, vague, tentative, overlapping, variable and uncertain adding mystery and complexity to it.According to Zohar and Marshal spiritual intelligence is the capacity by which the most profound concepts and goals and the best motives could be understood. Ramirez and Braun 2009 also introduced spirituality as an important factor in psychological well being. various research have proposed that all relationships between spiritual intelligence and psychological, social and physical health are statistically significant and positive. looking for better perspective for effective intervention and research. Gracia!!

It will be helpful for children to know the following saying.

"If you want peace, do not find fault with others."

This saying comes from Holy Mother Sri Saradadevi, the wife of Sri Ramakrishna.

Other knowledge that can contribute to peace in life comes from teachings of Moses.

Honor your father and your mother.

You shall not murder.

You shall not commit adultery.

You shall not steal.

You shall not bear false witness against any one.

You shall not covet (examples: desiring to possess anything belonging to another person, asking for bribe, desiring to steal government funds)

Life becomes meaningful when a person is working towards some goal. Life without a goal is like a ship without a rudder. It gets tossed here and there without any direction. The captain of the ship has no work to do because he has no goal to achieve. So the goal is associated with the work. The work means karma. Bhagavad Gita says there are two kind of karma that one can perform.

1. Karma that leads to fulfilment of personal desires.                                                 2. Motiveless karma without expectation of any fruits, and done for the welfare of other people.

Most people are engaged in the first kind of work. Their goal is the fulfilment of their desires. All desires are not good desires. So one has to be careful in setting the goals. If some one has a desire which is contrary to teachings of Moses given above, he can lend himself into trouble. This is the law. Sri Krishna says in Bhagvad Gita, there are three types of gates to hell destructive of the self--lust, anger and greed; therefore these three should be shunned.

For materialistic and personal growth one should respectfully approach the teachers and professors specialized in their subject and learn some skills of trade and profession. The spiritual teacher teaches how to keep the internal nature (body mind complex) under control. Professors and teachers of trade will teach you how to keep external nature under control. Both this leads to acquisition of knowledge. And  knowledge is power. Proper utilization of such knowledge brings prosperity. While working for prosperity and growth, one should remember following teachings of spiritual masters.

In Bhagavad Gita, Sri Krishna says, there are four kind of people who worship me. The distressed person, the aspirant after knowledge, the seeker of wealth and the man of knowledge.

Jesus said, Seek thou the kingdom of God and everything else shall be added unto you.

Jesus said, What shall you gain by gaining the whole world and losing your soul.

Sri Ramakrishna said, What does a man get with money? Food, clothes and a dwelling place--nothing more. You cannot realize God with its help. Therefore money can never be the goal of life.

With regards health, it is universally accepted that cleanliness and hygene of the body contributes to health of the body. Similarly cleanliness of mind contributes to mental health. There are many kind of detergents available for the body but unfortunately there are no detergents available for washing the mind. So spiritual masters have prescribed following for keeping the mind pure.

Jesus said, Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

Human mind is made from food. A new born child has a very small undeveloped mind. As he eats and grows, he develops his mind just like the rest of the body. Therefore purity of food goes towards building of a pure mind. Whatever a person eats reflects in the functioning of his mind. Various religions have different restrictions on what to eat and what not to eat. This defines how a particular mind will function.

Jesus also said, Man shall not leave by bread alone, but by every word that cometh out of the mouth of the Lord.

Here we are talking about mental food which is the ideas inside the mind. If we assume that the ideas originate from heart, then if the heart is pure the ideas will also be pure. Generally ideas are found to be mixture of good and evil thoughts. Ideas are reflected in the actions (karma) of a person. If a person is repeatedly thinking evil and unrighteous thoughts, his actions will reflect these ideas. Therefore spiritual masters suggest repetition of good ideas in the mind. Swami Vivekananda used to warn youth saying, beware of what you think. You will be what you think. A devotee asked a question to Sri Ramakrisha.

A devotee: Is it possible to see God?

Sri Ramakrishna: Yes, certainly. Living in solitude now and then, repeating God's name and singing His glories, and discriminating between the Real and the unreal, are the means to employ to see Him.

All these, repeating God's name, singing, meditation and discrimination are mental processes which pushes away the evil thoughts and keeps the mind clean and pure.

Happiness (Ananda). Everybody in the world wants to be happy, whether he be a saint or a sinner. Sinners usually select short cuts to happiness and saints are in no hurry at all. So everybody seeks happiness according to their understanding. Bhagavad Gita describes three kinds of happiness. One resulting from realization of God, called Brahmananda. Another resulting form contact with sense objects, called Vishayananda.The third is the happiness which is self-delusive.

1. The happiness which one relishes through practice, in which one comes to the end of all pains, and which is like poison at first, but like nectar (Brahmananda) at the end, is declared to be Sattvika, born of the serenity of understanding that concerns itself with the Self (Brahma).

2. The happiness that arises from a contact between the objects and the senses, which is like nectar at the beginning, but like poison at the end, is said to be Rajasika.

3. That happiness which is self-delusive both at the beginning and at the end, and which arises from sleep, lassitude and inadvertence, is said to be Tamasika.

Belongingness. All ideas of belongingness are temporary in nature and cause of attachment to what is unreal. But in a limited sense they do serve their purpose. For example sense of belonging to a family, or an organisation or to a nation etc. These are good concepts and they serve their purpose. But the Vedanta philosophy preaches that God alone is real and the world is an illusion. To perceive the truth behind this saying of Sri Sankaracharya, Vedantists suggest the process of discrimination between what is real and the unreal. In short we can say that everything in the world around us has a temporary existence. So when we

attach our selves to anything of this world, it gives us a false sense of security. As long as the things and objects to which we are attached remain in our control, we feel happy but since the world must continuously change, some day these objects disappear from our sight and the result is misery and sorrow.

Therefore goal of Vedanta is only to seek which is real and permanent which never change and never disappear from our presence. This is your own Self (Brahma), which is the source of all happiness and knowledge.

Hi Nidhi,

My professional background is in spiritual care (MDiv, DMin candidate and Certified Spiritual Care Specialist) and I have worked in parish ministry and community outreach with youth. I created programming to engage youth who were either at risk of suicide or recovering from bullying and peer suicide.  My most important learning in creating an effective intervention was to design activities that were peer-led. Youth do not want to be 'told'. They want to connect, to explore and lead each other. By creating a peer-support environment with a good community service goal, youth will explore not only their spirituality but their life values and, I discovered, make  lasting friendships. 

 Vikram i think the basic difference between religion and spirituality is that you can not teach or preach spirituality. We can give them  environment that can create curiosity and they can explore their true self. religion is conservation of some thing, spirituality is exploration. spirituality is not renouncement but it is acceptance of self and others.  regards.

Hi  Lucinda, i liked your approach. This is really appreciable and most important aspect of life skills. Change of self lies at the heart of the experience.  i would be grateful if you could share some  activities you do with them. Regards.

Hi Nidhi,

The formal aspect of this program has discontinued as the youth grew personally to a point where they no longer needed it. At the outset, however, the group met monthly in the evening. Here's a typical schedule from our initial programming: 

6:00 pm Gathering (10 min)

6:10 pm Opening Check-in Empathy Game – reflect on one’s feelings/needs this month and at this moment (10 min)

6:20 pm Small Group Discussion – Topic: Healthy Selfishness (20 min)

6:45 pm Large Group Feedback Discussion (30 min)

7:15 pm Comfort Food Break (15 min)

7:30 pm Trust Game (5 min)

7:35 pm Open Mike/Art Sharing/Jam session (20 min)

7:55 pm Brag/Drag Session (15 min)

8:10 pm Journaling (15 min)

8:25 pm Closing Check-in/Empathy Game (5 - 10 min)

As many of the youth struggled with self-expression, we started with small groups and then took the topic back to the large group. Topics were generally about self-care and self-acceptance. We had a lot of crafts available and used them to create 'trust' games. The Open Mike/Sharing was very helpful as many of the youth were musical and could express their feelings through art, poetry or performance. The Brag/Drag session was about sharing something good about yourself or bringing someone new to the group. As the trust grew within the group, youth would sometimes share incidents where they had been bullied or sadness over a friend's suicide. We spent quiet time towards the end in journaling (we gave them gifts of personal journals to decorate) and closed with an emotional check-in, sometimes with a fun game to celebrate how good they felt after the evening. We provided a lot of freedom within the schedule if a youth needed to take a break or required personal support. It was very important to feed them as some of the youth were impoverished or suffered from eating disorders. The gatherings provided a 'safe' place for the youth where they could be their true selves and find peer acceptance. None of the youth who attended were actually from the church, they all came from the community and the church sponsored all expenses. 

Later on, as the group of youth coalesced we moved outside to longer hikes, picnics and community outreach/service (projects were chosen, organized and led by the youth). We found that once they got to know and trust each other their own self-esteem grew and they didn't want as much didactic programming. The focus of the meetings became more peer initiated. Over time the gatherings did dwindle as the youth moved into higher education or jobs. 

Thank you  Dear Lucinda, I really appreciate all efforts put up by your team. How  do you assess  the desirable change in their attitude and behaviour?  Do you run  this program at various levels ..? what is the duration of this program ?   More to hear.. love

Since my background is in judicial training, I am accountable to codes of ethics of both judicial organizations I.e. American Bar Association, and scientific reasoning I.e. The Daubert standards. However, even though there is no scientific proof that a human spirit exists, I feel that spirit as defined as energetic willpower of a human can come into the equation. Adolescents must be empowered, enabled by any means possible, including involvement in a Socratic dialogue with all stakeholders in any issue to improve themselves as well as mankind. It is this process that will instill creativity in the adolescent. Socratic methodologies must be used in all dialogues including primary, secondary, tertiary and post graduate environments. It is for the benefit of society that understanding through questioning be emphasized. Judicial practice as well as legal practice has used Socratic processes in order to facilitate the improvement of the Underserved. Why not use Socratic methods to enervate the spirit of mankind.

Nidhi:

I agree with you to a certain extent. Religion does not allow Socratic methods. Spirituality, to an extent, does. Religion is basically a code of living that is set in stone by a ' higher power '. That does not allow individual thinking. Spirituality is basically a human's willpower to learn or understand the world around them.

The definitions above are limited and do not provide the needed operational definition to quantity the notion of spiritual growth or experience 

 Dear Frank,

How can we specify this "individual Thinking " in spiritual growth..? There are various things we generally talk about.. Consciousness... Awareness... Awakening... Enlightenment .. and these are subjective  experiences. Now a days  efforts are being made to simplify it. Practicing yoga and meditation,  connecting with nature, nurturing compassion and empathy, incorporating gratitude, giving unconditional respect, inculcating feeling of acceptance of individual differences, flowing with the flow, believing in karmic laws, tapping cosmic energy are  considered various dimensions of spirituality. it helps an individual to know himself, to know others and to know  his/her environment. I do agree with Dr J-F that we need to quantify it for further intervention and empirical study of spirituality. A heartfelt thanks and warm regards.

Nidhi:

Namaste.

Thank you for ' following ' me. As an individual involved in the judicial education arena I am accountable to the principles and code of ethics of the profession. The Daubert standard makes it imperative to evidence, specifically scientific evidence, to dialogue with not only judicial practitioners, but society as a whole. On a sidebar ( pardon the pun ) since you enjoy Hindu music, I particularly enjoy Anoushka Shankar. Her 2011 album entitled ' Traveler ' struck a positive chord with me. Since students are ' travelers on a journey of investigation and discovery ' one can see that spirituality plays a huge part in her life. To answer your question. One of the most interesting parts of Hindu culture is something called ' Mandala '. As you are aware, a mandala is/or represents ' wholeness in the universe or the universe itself. It is both the micro and macro universe.  Specifically, it is the relationship of human kind to this universe (  or possibly multiverse if you believe in that proposal ). The mandala is a vehicle to explore art, science and life around us as well as infinity. It is such a powerful concept that Kitaro wrote or composed a piece for one of his albums called ' Mandala ' of which I truly enjoy listening to. To illucidate further on the characteristics of spirituality .............. It is a motivational, empowering and enabling tool found within each and everyone of us to assist in this journey of investigation and discovery. Even though science has not found any cold, hard evidence of our spirituality, evidence can be found in other paradigms. Spirituality encompasses many non tangible characteristics which you have greatly pointed out. Empathy is the most powerful of these. One of the requirements that I am attempting to include in global judicial education is empathy. Judicial practitioners, as well as society as a whole, must embrace the understanding that the most important stakeholder in a courtroom is the defendant. As John Q. Adams stated in his closing remarks in the Amistad case " Cinque (  the leader of the slaves ) is the reason why that court was in session ". Another characteristic is mindfulness of ourselves as well as our relationship to others. What is our story? What is our life experiences and understandings from those experiences? What is our motivation for living? Our purpose in life? Mohandas Gandhi truly illustrated the understanding of ' spirituality when he established the concept of non violence. He enthralled a whole people to understand and practice that ' spirit of peace ' . To conclude, it is almost impossible to quantify the term ' spirituality '. It must be felt to be fully understood.

Nidhi:

One other thing I should have included is the meaning and need for independent thinking. What I interpret as independent thinking is reasoning that is not hindered by controlled indoctrination. Religion  is a strict set of mores that must be abided by. Spirituality allows us to be Socratic. It allows us to question on our own. Ethics, morality and similar frameworks can be arrived at and understood through the understanding of evolution. We can learn these through experience and experimentation. Inductive and deductive reasoning, if used properly through questioning and research, can move us towards a peaceful, verdant and understanding biosphere.

Dear Frank,

 Namaste,

Sorry for late reply. Frankly speaking Frank.. I really found it difficult to understand  things  you  explained in judicial  language. :) But any how i managed to reach to the essence. Frank i love  Hindi music... especially Bollywood old classics.

I don't have much idea about mandala / yantra. Though it is symbol of universe but it is related with Hindu and Buddhist religious practice.

Research in neuroscience strongly suggest that the brain is wired for

cognitive constructs that produce meaning-making reflection. This suggests that

humans are naturally predisposed to think in spiritual terms. The brain unitizes neurological organizations resulting incognitive processes that seek the answer to meaningful questions (Singer, 1999; Singer & Gray, 1995).Deacon (1997) examined the evolution of symbolic imagination and its role in intellectual development. He proposed that the brain has the ability to construct symbolic imaginative processes resulting in deep reflective thinking about the meaning of life, experiences, and human existence. Zohar and Marshall (2001) defined spiritual intelligence as the intellectual ability to question why we are here and to be creative in our pursuit of answers. Thus, spiritual intelligence involves the cognitive processes resulting in both social modifications and consciousness transformations. Spiritual intelligence is rooted in the human need for understanding the world and our place in it.

Any investigation which attempts to find out something not already known is a piece of research.To know anything with any reliability we have to use a research method appropriate to the data and the research question.

we can not quantify spirituality but we can study spiritual  wisdom in " spiritual intelligence ". Regards.

I guess the challenge here is to quantity "spirituality" as a domain and a construct - this can be done based on socio-cultural understanding or on a theological ground or from a humanistic perspective - either way the challenge is to quantify "spirituality" than trying to be  say what it cannot be or should not be - whatever it is - "if is operationalized and quantified clearly" - should not be hard to research - another challenge comes in the way of "developmental psychology" (which I teach) with regards to - are adolescents aware of "awareness" in the sense of formal operations or even in the sense of Kohlberg concept of morality - if there was way to show that there is evidence in research to suggest that adolescents can reflect and practise  spirituality then a methodology can be developed well - suggesting spiritual intelligence is rooted in human need takes us metaphysics or an appreciation of what a need is actually is

Nidhi:

It is not necessary to apologize for something that was beyond your control ( your work takes presidents over secondary and tertiary tasks ). I like your poetry ( Frankly speaking Frank ). What terms, phrases or concepts could you not understand as regards to judgecraft? In terms of Hindi music, I prefer Ravi and Anoushka Shankar. The mandala, in my opinion, should be seen as a philosophical, cultural concept. Not a religious one. In my opinion, neuroscience is a science. And because of that, is in conflict with your statement " This suggests that humans are naturally predisposed to think in spiritual terms ". If science is based on research and evidence based practice, as well as observable practice, then how are you equating neuroscience with spirituality? In my opinion, spirituality cannot be observed on any plain. It is a feeling. On a sidebar ( pardon the pun ) I am currently attempting to inculcate ( include ) various twenty first century sciences ( epigenetics, connectomics, synaptomics, optogenetics, nutrigenomics, pharmacoepigenetics and pre and perinatal psychology and development ) into judicial training in order to alter judges approaches to mitigating circumstances in sentencing of guilty defendants. Judicial practitioners, as well as society, must recognize that each and every individual, because of their upbringing, as well as their ancestors, have mindsets, understandings and coping abilities based on their environment and nurturing. In judicial terms ' mens rea ' goes to mindset of the individual. If the individual, by reason of his immediate environment, is not aware of the proper mindset, how can we fault that individual for something he/she is not aware of? Judicial training is based on the androgogical approach. In other words, as an adult, we already have had experiences that help us to know what we do know and what we want to know in a specific arena. But if a person is not aware of concepts or understandings, including twenty first century sciences, by reason of either his/her immediate environment or current knowledge, how will he/she know what he/she wants to learn? What I am doing is to make that knowledge available to the judicial practitioner so that he/she can make that informed/educated decision. Society as a whole must be aware that our knowledge of ourselves must go much deeper scientifically. The more we understand ourselves, the greater the chance of understanding others. Sustained peace will be attained when we fully grasp and embrace the term ' understanding '.

Thanks Dr J-f for your valuable insight.  I appreciate your clarity of thoughts. In fact my thoughts were wandering.. still on their journey.   I would like to hear more from  You. Trying to understand this core intelligence more in context to socio-cultural understanding and Developmental psychology.  From humanistic perspective what i understood of spiritual journey is..

1. Spiritual Awakening..

2. Expansion of Awareness.

3. Discovery of a purpose over a life time

4. understanding our spiritual potential

5.shift from psychological fragmentation to spiritual wholeness

6. attuning to the right principles

7. incremental self improvement

8. personal transformation

 Right now  mainly studying it in context to early childhood. More to hear.

Regards!!

 Namste Frank,

This time no apology.. :). I appreciate your unique contribution and sincere efforts in your work area. Frank, i know science only provide us tools and evidences for a systematic study of any discipline. you are right, neuroscience is a science  and i am still of this opinion that people embody their spirituality. Spirituality is a dynamic quality all people are born with. British zoologist  Alister Hardy proposed that spirituality is an attribute that has been favoured by the process of natural selection. It has a positive function in enabling people to survive in their natural environments.

Highly creative and conscious people experience  spirituality at early age. Research of Persinger (1996),  Ramchandran and blakeslee (1998), Zohar and Marshal (2000)  has made significant contribution in this direction.

on a different note we all love the beauty and mystery of the world we are in : rain, rainbow, dew drops on flowers, greenness of leaf, music, laughter, solitude but we all are entrapped in  our respective battles : to succeed, to be recognized and to be contented. 

My attempt is to help in their transformation from their mechanical existence to spiritual existence. We unknowingly kill off our  spiritual potential. we should be in awe of the mystery of each person.

I highly appreciate your celtic wisdom . regards.

Having worked in a psychiatric context and in re-habitation i.e. drugs – it is important to clearly have an operational definition.

For example you are defining “spiritual” from the stand point of perhaps a cultural-mythological base and confounded with pop psychology and personal development concepts. For example “expansion of awareness” (2) taken seriously could be a concern of patient with mental health condition. So would be good is to clearly look at paradigms of faculties with regard to spirituality:

What is the philosophical definition of spirituality

What are some of theological definition of spirituality

What are some scientific definition of spirituality

What is the mathematical definition of spirituality – in other words do logic and relationship between constructs help or assist…

What is psychology definition of spirituality

Having distinguished the faculties – perhaps we can look at what are common and core ideas in them.

Then I think it is important to recognize “where does spirituality” sit now as in which faculty owns and defines it – in other words when does spirituality become a norm and vice a versa a heresy and according to whom.

This then brings to the topic you are wanting to express spirituality in the religious sense – once you introduce this, you will the challenge its merit to use psychological language and tools to explain, operationalize as you want to measure enhance spiritual awareness – which is a cognitive area and here is the problem – you have two different languages and put another way you are using a psychological tool to measure a spirituality – irrespective how you define it.

This then leads to another complex layer – of exploring spirituality with various religions and how they differ in their understanding of spirituality, its expressions, its meanings and rituals …ect

Then we must fundamentally explore what is the purpose of spirituality?

Judeo-Christian ideologies and tenants of spirituality differ in principle to eastern mysticism but the clue is perhaps to explore what the core issues.

But given that you are wanting to explore spirituality with the psychological construct – explore Flower’s work on this.

However, if spirituality is taken to linked to some level of moral development – then Kohlberg presents a framework and also Piaget and Gi

Also, given that I work in a developmental area – I am not sure whether spirituality and be accurately studied and explored in early childhood – as they are egocentric – also look up children in terms of moral realism and moral heteronomy – again this is only of merit if spirituality is somehow argued to increase and/or enhance self-awareness with regards to morality but children are egocentric.

And the heuristics that come to play

All the best

Thank you so much Dr J-F.  I will work on your suggestions . Will  share my thoughts.

Regards

for my opinion, i think kristin Neff would be appropriate to refer as she conducting the research on mindfulness and intervention using gestalt chair and also regards with adolescent and health focusing on handling psychological problem. 

Research on mindfulness - means something very different from a bio-neurological perspective - it is important not to read into things - also Gestalt principles cannot fully explain the concept of experiential reality to the extent of having a precept - all the parts in and/or episodic experiences sometimes still remain unconnected in adolescents given their development in cognitive domain - we must be careful not to pick and choose and/or add variables and/or use a theory that does not fully explains all aspects of human behaviour and development -

On this subject I am sending you a document written in French that answers your question

Thanks dr Fadel. It would be very nice if I can get english translation of this document.

regards