Spiritual transformation or as the impossible turns to obvious [theory]

Pawel M. SochaInstitute for the Study of Religions

Jagiellonian UniversityPsychology of Religion Unit

e-mail: p.socha@iphils.uj.edu.pl

SPIRITUAL TRANSFORMATION

OR AS THE IMPOSSIBLE TURNS TO

OBVIOUS

WHICH THEORIES CONTRIBUTED TO MY POSITION ON SPIRITUALITY?

Notion of the boundary (existential) situation (K. Jaspers) Phenomenological-cognitive theory of coping (R. Lazarus)Theory of spiritual intelligence (R. Emmons)Terror management theory (J. Greenberg, S. Solomon & T. Pyszczynski)Cognitive theory of the existential meaning (J. Bering)

THE KEYtotrans-formation

THE EXISTENTIAL SITUATIONGRENZSITUATION (Karl Jaspers)

Process of coping with the existential situation

Existential situation

Biological, terrifying, direct, purely sensual, „primary experience” of reality

Hay: relational consciousness - „here and now”, „mystery”, „noetic value”)

Greenberg, Solomon & Pyszczynski – existential terror

CONSTRUCTION OF THE HUMAN DIMENSION OF REALITY

PROCESSES OF APPRAISAL – feeling of alienation, necessities, limitations of time (mortality, transitoriness), of space, psychological deficits, inability to „get out of oneself”, economical, etc..

TRANSFORMATION• Transformation is the process of symbolic adaptation

• This involves the evolutionary and culturally developed abilities, consisting among others, of:

• Shared with animals, processes of orientation allowing for the recognition of threats and of their avoidance

• Available only to humans IMPERATIVE ability for thinking in terms of cause and reason (predicting, planning, imaging, etc.), and directing these cognitive processes into one’s self (self-awareness’ feedback)

• Evolutionary ability to attribute intentionality to any object

• Ability to manipulate one’s states of consciousness (mysticism)

• Ability to put off the logos in favour of the mythos

• Accumulation of the resources of knowledge, accessible also for next generations (creation of the culture)

In result of the transformation,

THE UNAVOIDABLE CAN BECOME

POSSIBLE, THE IMPOSSIBLE TURNS TO OBVIOUS

Existential situation

Biological, terrifying, direct, purely sensual, „primary experience” of reality

Hay: relational consciousness - „here and now”, „mystery”, „noetic value”)Greenberg, Solomon & Pyszczynski – existential terror

CONSTRUCTION OF THE HUMAN DIMENSION OF REALITY

PROCESES OF APPRAISAL – feeling of alienation, necessity, limitations of time (mortality, transitoriness), of space, psychological deficits, inability to „get out of oneself”, economical, etc..

TRANSFORMATION (SPIRITUAL)

RESOURCES: IDEALS AND PATTERNS OF CULTURE

AMONG OTHERS, ITS RESOURCES ARE:

Religion and religiousness

National identity

Family life

Rules of social relationships, e.g., morality

Forms of artistic expression

Techniques of personal growth and social integration

Psychotherapies

Existential situation

Biological, terrifying, direct, purely sensual, „primary experience” of reality

Hay: relational consciousness - „here and now”, „mystery”, „noetic value”)Greenberg, Solomon & Pyszczynski – existential terror

CONSTRUCTION OF THE HUMAN DIMENSION OF REALITY

PROCESES OF APPRAISAL – feeling of alienation, necessity, limitations of time (mortality, transitoriness), of space, psychological deficits, inability to „get out of oneself”, economical, etc..

TRANSFORMATION

RESOURCES: Religion and

religiousness National identity Family life Rules of social

relationships, e.g., morality

Forms of the artistic expression

Techniques of personal growth and social integration

Psychotherapies

THE OUTCOMES OF TRANSFORMATION

RADICALLY NEW UNDERSTANDING AND EXPERIENCING OF THE SITUATION AS

„HOLY”, „SACRED”

„MIRACULOUS”,

„SUPER-HUMAN”

– INCLUDING ONE’S OWN PERSON AS EXCEPTIONAL:

Experience of a „higher” meaning, affording an unusual control, certainty of knowledge, „higher” personal value, e.g., as chosen („chosen” can be even a nation), predestined to a special mission, salvation, or other reward

DETAILED ASPECTS OF SPIRITUAL

TRANSFORMATIONAND ITS OUTCOMES

Any experience of transformation is a reinterpretation of some element of reality, or its fragment, in a new way

For example, such a fragment can be:

• Part of self-perception (elements of the Self scheme, such as self-esteem, identification with another person, actual or fictional, etc.)

• Way of perception of others (e.g., through development of empathic skills)

• Vision of nature (e.g., development of ecological awareness)

• Adaptation of new patterns of the ethical or esthetical values

... But there are also: such experiences of transformation, as:

The subject’s subordination to a superior power (e.g., a feeling of absolute dependence – Schleiermacher’s theology)

Furnishing the subject with the forces or possibilities, not affordable before (e.g., ability of healing)

Or – on the opposite pole – putting off the responsibility for the flow of things to the transcendent agent, releasing the subject from decision making or from any activity (decrease of subjectivity)

... in the interaction with religious tradition:

Discovery of the new self resulting from the experience of meeting some personal (best if believed to be divine, supernatural) being, like:

JESUS CHRIST

BUDDHA

... Perfection or at least „exchange” of the part of the selfThe Buddhist Arhat

The Muslim convertJusuf Islam

... Becoming a „destined” person (a new self through revelation)

PROPHETS

EZECHIEL MUHAMMAD JOSEPH SMITH

… A SATANIC TRANSFORMATION(a new self through possession)

Sister Jeanne des Anges from Loudun

IS THE TRANSFORMING EXPERIENCE JUST THE RESULT OF IMAGERY???

The existential situation cannot actually happen. Why we would not just imagine it? Recall:Anxieties paralyzing the neurotic individualBreathtaking – both fearful and ecstatic – experience of the Himalaya conqueror

Is there any benefit from these instances?

Moreover…Every HEALTHY individual „likes to feel fear”We get bored with films without a suspenseRomantic love presented in literature or film „must” be unfortunate

COPING „AS IF” – we immunize

ourselves to the real situations

BUT WHY???