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Crises & Spiritual Struggles

1. Crises & Spiritual Struggles. Examples of Ongoing Struggles:. “ hiding things in me ” “gossip” “purity” “Non-Christian friends;” “bad peers;” “hanging out with the wrong people” “ Parents divorce and my dad fights to see me” “Pornography” “Addictions, getting attached to sin”

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Crises & Spiritual Struggles

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  2. Crises & Spiritual Struggles Examples of Ongoing Struggles: • “hiding things in me” • “gossip” • “purity” • “Non-Christian friends;” “bad peers;” “hanging out with the wrong people” • “Parents divorce and my dad fights to see me” • “Pornography” • “Addictions, getting attached to sin” • “Not reading the Bible” • “Sin - drinking” • “Watching too much T.V.;” “non-Christian T.V. shows”

  3. Crises & Spiritual Struggles Examples of Crises: • “Parents about to divorce (mom and step dad), difficulties with brother, struggle with self-mutilation, struggle with anorexia, slipping grades, 3 ended relationships, many intense family conflicts and more.” • “Becoming depressed” • “Divorce of parents” • “Loss of a couple friends”

  4. Furnishing the Soul • Hard wired to connect report • Spiritualization of attachment

  5. Furnishing the Soul: Seminar Agenda • Relational Spirituality: 5 Big Ideas • Overview of the STI • Furnishing the Soul workbook and soul projects

  6. Relational Spirituality:5 Big Ideas • Big Idea #1: Hard Wired to Connect • Big Idea #2: Unthought Knowns: We Know More Than We Can Say • Big Idea #3: Gut-Level Memories as Relational Filters • Big Idea #4: Tipping Points in Spiritual Transformation • Big Idea #5: Furnishing the Soul for Spiritual Transformation

  7. Big Idea #1:Hard Wired to Connect • Christian framework • Created in the image of God (Gen 1:26) • God as Trinity is relational in His very essence • Goal of spiritual transformation: Love God and love your neighbor (Matt 22:37-39) • Love is about the way we relate, which stems from our hearts (Matt 12:34-35) • We are designed or hard wired by God to connect relationally through love, and to grow in this capacity throughout our lives

  8. Big Idea #1:Hard Wired to Connect Attachment relationships & the brain x genes =

  9. Big Idea #1:Hard Wired to Connect • Foundling homes in 1930s & 1940s and “failure to thrive” • Ten percent mortality rate in best hospitals • All experienced loss: protest, despair, detachment • Early attachment experiences (or lack thereof) are imprinted into the brain structures maturing during a brain growth spurt in the first 2 years of life

  10. Big Idea #1:Hard Wired to Connect • Infant research: infants naturally and automatically seek “attunement” • God hard wired us such that we want to be known by others and God • Also hard wired to connect to meaning • “If you try to keep your life for yourself, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for me, you will find true life” (Matt 16:25-26)

  11. Big Idea #1:Hard Wired to Connect • The “deep magic” in Narnia • Jesus is talking about the “deep magic”--the underlying structure or order--that determines what makes human life meaningful • Meaning is found in giving our life away to God and others in sacrificial love • Meaning find its end in relationship, and finds its beginning in attachment relationships

  12. Big Idea #1:Hard Wired to Connect Attachment relationships & the brain ---> Attachment relationships are the transmitters of spiritual meaning, values, and morality “Spiritualization of Attachment”

  13. Big Idea #1:Hard Wired to Connect • Tuesdays with Morrie • The fundamental way we grow and change is through relationships • Hard wired to connect means that we cannot directly change our own soul by ourselves. We are profoundly dependent on God and others to help us transform into the likeness of Christ

  14. Big Idea #1:Hard Wired to Connect • John 15:1-5: Attached to the vine; relationally connected to Christ and the Church • I Peter 4:8-10; Eph 4:15-16; 1 Cor 12:27 • In sum: our souls naturally desire, or are hard wired for relational connections, and it is through these connections with God and others that we are spiritually transformed to increase our capacity to love

  15. Big Idea #2Unthought Knowns: We Know More Than We Can Say • The statue that didn’t look right

  16. Big Idea #2Unthought Knowns: We Know More Than We Can Say • Two distinct systems for processing information/ways of knowing Head Knowledge (Explicit Left Brain) Gut Level Knowledge (Implicit Right Brain) INTEGRATE Linear Logical Language- Based Explicit Memory Nonlinear Holistic Nonverbal Implicit memory Emotion Primary Categorical NARRATIVE

  17. Big Idea #2Unthought Knowns: We Know More Than We Can Say • Good Will Hunting

  18. Big Idea #2Unthought Knowns: We Know More Than We Can Say • Emotions--shape both our internal experiences and our experiences with God and other people. They give us a sense of what is meaningful • Emotion Defined--Emotion is the process of automatically and non-consciously evaluating the meaning of our experiences, particularly within the context of our relationships • Emotions--Starting point for engaging our hearts with God and others b/c they reveal our deepest values; meaning we automatically assign to events

  19. Big Idea #2Unthought Knowns: We Know More Than We Can Say • Gut level processing online at birth, fully developed by 15 months… • Infant-mother research: Dr. Seuss study • Infant mother mutual gazing • Infants have deep gut level knowledge or relationships in a nonverbal system of knowing (implicit relational knowledge )

  20. Big Idea #2Unthought Knowns: We Know More Than We Can Say • Gut level knowing continues throughout life • Gut level knowing, not head knowledge, drives how we relate to others because it is processed automatically, and is not under the direct control of knowledge in the explicit system (speed dating) • Head knowledge is important but must be integrated with gut level knowledge to affect our ability to love God and others

  21. Big Idea #2Unthought Knowns: We Know More Than We Can Say • Gut level knowledge of relationships operates in same way with God as with human • Gut level knowledge of God is influenced by experiences with significant caregivers • Open to transformation by continued relational experiences with God and others

  22. Big Idea #2Unthought Knowns: We Know More Than We Can Say • In sum: there are 2 distinct ways of knowing, head knowledge and “gut level” knowledge, and it is our gut level knowledge that drives the quality of our relationships with God and others. We know much more than we can say when it comes to relationships, and it is these “unthought knowns” at the core of our soul that must be transformed to grow in our capacity to love

  23. Big Idea #3Gut-Level Memories as Relational Filters What do you remember about yesterday? Do you always know when you are remembering something?

  24. Big Idea #3Gut-Level Memories as Attachment Filters • Memory Defined: Memory is the way past events affect future functioning. • Experiences cause certain patterns of neurons to fire together ---> increases probability of similar pattern firing again in future thereby affecting future functioning. • Example: Grass pathways

  25. Two Types of Memory Intellectual Memory Online at 18 mos. Verbal memory of facts (semantic) Memory of yourself in time (autobiographical) Sense of recollection Conscious attn required for encoding

  26. Two Types of Memory Intellectual Memory Online at 18 mos. Verbal memory of facts (semantic) Memory of yourself in time (autobiographical) Sense of recollection Conscious attn required for encoding Gut level Memory Online at birth; continues throughout life Emotions Behavioral responses Perceptions Bodily sensations No sense of recollection Conscious attn not required for encoding Attachment filters

  27. Big Idea #3Gut-Level Memories as Attachment Filters • Gut level memory--We remember how important people in our lives feel about us not in words, but in our bodies, emotions and in images--in gut level knowledge • Repeated experiences in important relationships are etched or encoded in gut level memory as nonverbal knowledge of self in relation to others

  28. Big Idea #3Gut-Level Memories as Attachment Filters • Gut level memories of emotionally significant others become “attachment filters” that shape how we feel about ourselves, God and others, and how we determine the meaning of events.

  29. Big Idea #3Gut-Level Memories as Attachment Filters • Attachment Filters • Secure • Dismissing • Preoccupied • Repeated Experiences • Emotional states & nonverbal signals accurately read/responded to • Emotional states & nonverbal signals ignored • Emotional states & nonverbal signals inconsistently responded/to instrusiveness

  30. Others’ Responses Gut level meaning (emotion) Gut level meaning (emotion) Experiences in the world Attachment Filters Big Idea #3Gut-Level Memories as Attachment Filters Relational Strategy Relational Strategy Reinforcement of Gut level meanings Soul Structure (Early) relational experiences

  31. Imagine God thinking about you. What do you assume God feels when you come to mind?

  32. Big Idea #4Tipping Points in Spiritual Transformation • Attachment filters are stubborn • Engrained pathways in the brain • We bring old adaptations to new situations and relational experiences with God and others because this is the only way we know how, at a gut level, to connect with others • Attachment filters are self-reinforcing

  33. Big Idea #4Tipping Points in Spiritual Transformation • Think of a time of significant spiritual growth in your life… • Spiritual transformation does not occur in a predictable, orderly, or proportional manner • Tipping points--minor shifts in our perspective, gut level beliefs, or experiences in relationships can suddenly lead to exponential changes in our relational filters

  34. Big Idea #4Tipping Points in Spiritual Transformation • Scientific discovery process (Poincare)

  35. Big Idea #5Furnishing the Soulfor Spiritual Transformation • Comedy improv • All of life is a spiritual improv--structured spontaneity • Relational connections shape (structure) attachment filters (spontaneity) in living out our spiritual improv

  36. Big Idea #5Furnishing the Soulfor Spiritual Transformation • Scientific discovery process • Andrew Wiles journey through a “dark unexplored mansion” • Breakthroughs (tipping points) come to those who have furnished the mind with expertise • Spiritual breakthroughs (tipping points) come to those who have furnished the soul with relational connections

  37. Big Idea #5Furnishing the Soulfor Spiritual Transformation • Storying Unthought Knowns: Bottom Up Integration • Connecting or translating our experiences into words through narratives and journaling • Imaging Head Knowledge: Top down Integration • Connecting, or “back-translating” head knowledge about God and spiritual transformation to our own experience and to the lives of mentors

  38. Big Idea #5Furnishing the Soulfor Spiritual Transformation • Spiritual disciplines (forms of relational connection with God) are the way we furnish our soul to prepare us for spiritual tipping points • Spiritual disciplines are designed in many ways to integrate two ways of knowing

  39. Images Stories Gut level meaning (emotion) Gut level meaning (emotion) Experiences in the world Attachment Filters Storying Unthought Knowns:Bottom Up Integration Translation Understand meaning Carried forward Soul Structure Early relational experiences

  40. Images Stories Implicit felt meaning Gut level meaning (emotion) Experiences in the world Storying Unthought Knowns:Bottom Up Integration Relationship w/ God & others Translation Understand meaning Carried forward Relational Filters Soul Structure Early relational experiences

  41. Overview of STI • Five domains of spiritual transformation based on “relational spirituality” model (5 big ideas) • Spiritual Meaning & Vitality • Spiritual Commitment & Community • Secure Spiritual Attachment • Preoccupied Spiritual Attachment • Dismissing Spiritual Attachment

  42. Overview of STI • 19 sub-domains of spiritual transformation

  43. Spiritual Meaning & Vitality Domain • Prayer Type Frequency • Prayer Type Impact • Spiritual Practices Frequency • Spiritual Practices Impact • Desolation/Consolation • Transformational Suffering • Spiritual Perspective • Spiritual Meaning • Spiritual Openness • Awareness of God

  44. Spiritual Commitment &Community Domain • Spiritual Service • Faith Centrality • Spiritual Community • Other-Centered Love

  45. Secure Spiritual Attachment Domain • Secure God Attachment • Forgiveness w/ God and Others • Realistic Acceptance

  46. Preoccupied Spiritual Attachment Domain • Preoccupied God Attachment • Disappointment with God • Instability with God

  47. Dismissing Spiritual Attachment Domain • Dismissing God Attachment

  48. Demographic/Open-EndedQuestions • Age/gender • Religious affiliation • Class rank • How long a Christian • Primary influence in becoming a Christian • Parents’ marital status • Parents’ spiritual status • Dating relationship status • Type of school • Crisis in past year • Describe rel w/ God & changes over past 3 months • Impact of youth ministry on spiritual growth

  49. High School STI Results

  50. Dialogue and Feedback

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