How can spirituality help you?

Individuals practicing spirituality or religion are reporting better physical and mental health than those not practicing. Further, studies show that spirituality improves health outcomes for people living with chronic illness. In fact, one study out of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center showed that those who attended religious services weekly live longer than those who don’t. Another study from 2011 out of the University of Missouri reveals that religious and spiritual support helps both men and women cope with chronic illness.

How Spirituality Can Help the Chronically Ill

Practicing mediation or prayer can help chronically ill patients cope with pain and disease symptoms. Spirituality enriches a connection to God or another higher power and helps patients to manage challenges in a healthy and meaningful way.

When you find meaning in your experiences with being sick, you can experience a better quality of life despite the fact that your disease may be incurable. Moreover, spirituality helps us to better understand the world and our role in it. When we utilize spirituality or religion as tools to coping with illness and pain, we can better identify with the ways in which chronic illness changes our lives.

Barriers to Spirituality for the Chronically Ill

People with chronic illness often endure numerous losses, including friendships and family and the decline of function and independence. These losses often weaken spirituality or religious belief. When chronically ill individuals feel defeated, it is tough to make sense of beliefs. And when you are grieving and have nothing to reach to, both emotional and physical wellbeing suffer.

Another barrier to spirituality is the challenges that a chronic illness brings with it. Often, we get stuck trying to make sense of spiritual questions because there is no resolution to the challenges of illness. Without answers, our health and spirituality are adversely affected.

Link Between Well-Being and Spirituality

Research has shown that spirituality or religious activity is linked to better moods and a longer life span. Further, research on coping through religious or spiritual means during times of stress shows how spirituality is beneficial to reestablishing and promoting overall well-being.

When individuals are assimilated with an avenue for spirituality or religious practice or when faith is strong, they can respond positively to life’s stressors and consider multiple points of view. Further, spirituality can help patients see illness as just a part of life rather than some kind of punishment.

Help with Spirituality

We can seek spiritual connections in a variety of places, including our communities, our schools and our workplaces. We can look to spiritual guides for education, advice, as a sounding board, and as resources for finding spiritual meaning in response to our experiences with chronic illness. We can find spiritual advisors through religious based institutions, organizations similar to Spiritual Directors International and through our health care providers. Even on our own, we can acquire countless spiritual resources and practices to help us to better cope with chronic illness.

Spirituality Helps You Find Purpose

Spirituality is a viable resource to help chronically ill people fulfill their potentials and to discover themselves as they learn to live with and manage their diseases. It also offers an opportunity to appreciate life in a sacred way, to live each day with purpose, and to find meaning to life. Spirituality calls upon us to live in the present and with realism despite limitations posed by illness. Lastly, it helps us to live beyond our limitations and to experience life fully and with optimism.

To learn more on this topic:
Yoga for Arthritis
Moving Past the "Why Me?" Question
Setting Boundaries: How Always Saying "Yes" Can Sacrifice Self-Care