A Spiritual Approach to Psychotherapy with Kenneth Pargament, PhD

Montare Media presents Season 2, episode 23 of the Discover U Podcast with JD Kalmenson: A Spiritual Approach to Psychotherapy with Kenneth Pargament, PhD.

Learn More about Montare Behavioral Health: https://montarebehavioralhealth.com/about/digital-library/

JD Kalmenson’s interviews Dr. Kenneth Pargament to gain a deeper understanding of the intersection of psychotherapy and spirituality. How can psychologists be better prepared to deal with encounters with the sacred dimension of life? How and when is it better to consult a chaplain than a psychotherapist? In what ways can spirituality ease mental health issues like depression? These are some of the questions you will hear explored in this soul nourishing podcast. 

Kenneth Pargament is a professor emeritus of psychology at Bowling Green State University. He has authored The Psychology of Religion and Coping and Spiritually Integrated Psychotherapy.  Dr. Pargament is Editor-in-Chief of the two-volume APA Handbook of Psychology, Religion, and Spirituality. With Julie Exline, he has authored the recently released Working with Spiritual Struggles in Psychotherapy:  From Research to Practice. He was Distinguished Scholar at the Institute for Spirituality and Health at the Texas Medical Center.  His awards include the Oskar Pfister Award from the American Psychiatric Association in 2009, the first Outstanding Contribution to the Applied Psychology of Religion and Spirituality Award from APA in 2017, and an honorary doctor-of-letters from Pepperdine University in 2013.  He was recently named One of the 50 Most Influential Living Psychologists.

Host Kalmenson is the CEO/Founder of Renewal Health Group, a family of addiction treatment centers, and Montare Behavioral Health, a comprehensive brand of mental health treatment facilities in Southern California. Kalmenson is a Yale Chabad Scholar, a skilled facilitator, teacher, counselor, and speaker, who has provided chaplain services to prisons, local groups and remote villages throughout the world. His diverse experience as a rabbi, chaplain, and CEO has inspired his passion and deep understanding of the necessity for effective mental health treatment and long-term sobriety.

Follow JD at JDKalmenson.com

Transcript

JD Kalmenson: 

Welcome to another episode of Discover U, our podcast, exploring innovative solutions to issues in behavioral health. I'm JD Kalmenson, CEO of Montare Behavioral Health, a family of dynamic treatment centers in Southern California. I am honored and excited to introduce you to our wonderful guest today, Kenneth Pargament. Dr. Kenneth is a professor emeritus of psychology at Bowling Green State University. He has authored the Psychology of Religion and Coping, and Spiritually Integrated Psychotherapy. Dr. Pargament is editor in chief of the two Volume APA Handbook of Psychology, Religion, and Spirituality. With Julie Exline, he has authored the recently released, Working with Spiritual Struggles in Psychotherapy: from Research to Practice. He was distinguished scholar at the Institute for Spirituality and Health at the Texas Medical Center and his awards include the Oscar Pfister Award from the American Psychiatric Association in 2009, the first outstanding contribution to the applied Psychology of Religion and Spirituality Award from APA in 2017, and an honorary doctor of letters from Pepperdine University in 2013.He was recently named one of the 50 most influential living psychologists. Welcome, Ken. So happy to have you with us today, and thank you for taking the time to discuss.

Ken Pargament:

Thank you. My pleasure to be here.

JD Kalmenson:

Thank you. So, right before we jump in, can you tell us a little bit about how you personally got interested in this area?

Ken Pargament:

Well, it's an interesting kind of story. I had, I went into psychology because I thought psychologists deal with the big questions, you know, why are we here? What's the meaning of it all? How do we help people who are suffering? How do we make the world a better place? So I went to graduate school in clinical psychology and, and was somewhat surprised to find that very little of psychology at that time was dealing with, you know, the big picture questions. It was the time of behaviorism. And I, I only semi jokingly say that my very first client was a three- pound pigeon who taught me about operant conditioning principles, you know, principles of reward and punishment and reinforcement which was great and can be quite useful in, in the field. But my pigeon was, was strangely silent when it came to the big questions. So that's what got me interested in looking at other, other places. And I found that I was really kind of intrigued by religious writings and even more by visiting various religious institutions churches, mosques, temples, synagogues, and talking to people about how their faith was involved in, in coming to terms with major questions in life. And, and maybe not just for better, but sometimes for worse. So I kind of started doing research on it, caught the bug, and then here I am 40, 45 years later.

JD Kalmenson:

That's amazing. That's really amazing. And what's really special about that specific story is that you didn't lose interest and then just throw it all aside. But you really sort of took some of the undercurrents of what excited you about it to begin with, and really connected it to religion, to the bigger questions. And you managed to just really connect these two interests that you were…

Ken Pargament:

Yeah, it's true. It was personally important to me too. I, I grew up in a conservative Jewish family in Washington, DC and being Jewish was always an important part of my own identity, but I wasn't sure why or how it was making such a difference. And so part of it was personal interest, trying to sort my own self out, answering my own questions in this. And so both personal and professional reasons.

JD Kalmenson:

That's incredible. Now, before we even continue, I would love to hear a baseline definition of what spirituality is in your estimation. Is it something that ultimately transcends ourselves? Is it an elevation of ourselves or any other sort of definition that you have as a working baseline of spirituality?

Ken Pargament:

Yeah, I think it kind of rests on the idea that we're not only psychological, social, and physical beings, we're spiritual beings, and that we have a, we come into the world, I believe, with a yearning for something that goes beyond ourselves and something at times that's deeper within ourselves. Something, call it transcendent. I like the term sacred, that we have this yearning to, to find and hold onto and develop a relationship with something sacred in our lives. And that may be that certainly includes our concepts of the divine and God and whatever our terms for the higher power we may prefer. But the sacred also includes, oh, goes beyond that…. beyond our, the typical notions of divinity to include things like nature. Music work can become sacred. It becomes a vocation. Science can be sacred poetry, the arts and so on. And it's, so for some people they may not experience God or divine and traditional forms, but they're still spiritual in a sense of yearning for a relationship with the sacred. However, they may define and experience that. So that's spirituality is, I think it encompasses traditional religious ideas and practices, but it sometimes goes beyond that as well. 

JD Kalmenson:

That's really special. So I guess the word sacred is, is the reoccurring theme here. And that's a really subjective term that everyone would have their own individualized definition for, but it's something that they view as sacred. And would you say that spirituality is the worship of that entity? That the individual deems a sacred or just the fact, the mere fact that they have something sacred in their life?

Ken Pargament:

Yeah. I think that's true. I another way I've, I I spent many weeks pacing around my backyard trying to come up with a kind of scientific definition of spirituality. And whenever I presented to people, they would start yawning <laugh>. They weren't interested in scientific definition. I found it more useful to think of spirituality in more metaphorical terms mm-hmm. <Affirmative>. And one of the metaphors I really like is spirituality as a way of seeing, it's a way of seeing and perceiving oneself and one's life. It's kind of, it takes issue with that old saying it is what it is. Spirituality says, well, not necessarily. That there's a deeper dimension to the kind of superficial material dimension of life. And that if we look more deeply, we can find that depth and we can find something that really transforms the way we think about ourselves, the world, and other people. So it's kind of like a, think about it as a, a pair of lens of eyeglasses that you put the glasses on and then the world is transformed. You're starting to see the world with greater depth and, and value and meaning. 

Once you see with greater depth and kind of see the sacred and various aspects of life, it changes your relationship to it. So we've done research, for instance, that shows that people who see their, their marriages as sacred treat their marriages differently than people who may see it as a contract, an important contract, a valued contract, but not sacred. People who see the environment is sacred are more likely to try to preserve and protect it, less likely to pollute, because I mean, it makes good sense. It's sacred. You wouldn't want to desecrate something of such deep value and meaning to you. So that it's not just kind of an abstract kind of notion we're talking about here. We're talking about something that changes our relationship to the world. 

JD Kalmenson:

Yes. Yes. And seeing is a really good way to sum that up. So that, that is a powerful example of it. You know, if you say something to someone and they don't necessarily agree with you in a very deep way, a lot of times they'll say, I hear you. But if they say, I see you really know that they're on the same page as you.

You know, there is an interesting expression that I'm sure you're very familiar with. “There are no atheists in foxholes.”

Ken Pargament:

Ah, yeah.

JD Kalmenson:

Right. And it's easy to understand that when left with no alternative. And facing death, we might be open to ideas that we otherwise would not. In fact, many years ago, I remember reading in the Reader's Digest over a decade ago that there was a certain group, an atheist advocacy group who were lobbying for chaplains for soldiers in the military to be able to stay strong to their atheist beliefs, so that they wouldn't fall prey to this adage, You know, there are no atheists in foxholes. And I just remember being struck by the irony of you know, chaplains for atheists. But the idea is that sometimes, you know, in certain environments, we would be open and receptive to divine intervention.

Ken Pargament:

Yeah.

JD Kalmenson:

Would you call that genuine and authentic, or would you call that a last resort measure? You know, there's a, they, I'm reminded of a story about an atheist who's hanging off a cliff, and he screams into the heavens, “if there's anyone up there, save me”. And a heavenly voice booms out and says, “Let go of the cliff, and you will be saved.” Frustrated, he looks back up and he says, “Anyone else up there?” You know, is that a spiritual expression or would you call that survival and not necessarily really similar to a typical religious experience?

Ken Pargament:

Well I think as you're suggesting the, that old saying no atheists in foxholes is like a lot of old sayings, not, accurate, that you can find atheists in foxholes.  Rabbi Reef Brenner wrote a book based on interviews with hundreds of Holocaust survivors describing their religious experience before, during, and after the Holocaust, and he found several who were atheist before atheist during and atheist afterwards. So yeah, you can find, as you know, the examples of people who hold onto their atheism, but there does seem to be, the research suggests there really is a, a quickening of the religious impulse in times of, in the most dire times. Following 9/11 in the United States one survey found that 90% of people were turning to a religion for solace and support and comfort. 90%. There was a study done in Europe of Google searches looking at the number of searches for the term prayer. And, and this study was done in March of 2020 when the reality of covid, the covid virus was hitting the world. And they found this sharp, dramatic increase in prayer searches in that month when the number of covid cases was doubling every day. And other studies show, for instance, following earthquakes, people are much more likely to engage in religious practices. So there's something about, I believe, coming to terms with your own human limitations, facing your frailty infinitude that prompts looking for answers beyond our traditional secular resources and, and ways of dealing with life. 

JD Kalmenson:

That makes sense. I mean, even Christopher Higgins, the well-known atheist, famously said, even despite all his criticism of religion, that he found it immensely helpful as a psychological crutch. So there's clearly something universal about the comfort and the solace that you referenced. And what's interesting is that psychologically trying times where we face our own mortality, you know, our humanity sort of nudges us in that direction. Not necessarily a spiritual awakening, but just the, the simple mechanics of how we respond and react to certain situations of dire, of dire straits and need.

Ken Pargament:

Yeah. Well, you know, the notion of psychological crutch, I think has been used in the past in somewhat of a derogatory way. 

JD Kalmenson:

I think he meant it in a derogatory way. 

Ken Pargament:

Yeah. But I mean, that, that's a long tradition in psychology. Freud, for instance when it came to religion, believed that it was also a defense mechanism, a crutch, and believed that we would be better if we kind of, kind of turned away from this, what he thought of as an infantile way of dealing with the world to more mature kind of, you know, face the realities of life approach. And certainly I think people can make use of their faith in defensive ways and as crutches, I'm not sure I would see that as a terrible thing. We all need to rely on aids and support and each other at different times in our lives. So I don't see a real problem or weakness in that. But the other part of it though, is that if we take seriously the idea that we yearn for a spiritual connection, well, part of turning to your faith in difficult times is trying to hold onto that spiritual connection. It's not just a psychological mechanism, it's a spiritual mechanism that, that I think just can't be explained away by purely psychological interpretations. 

JD Kalmenson:

I love that, that that's, that's very profound. And it, and it, it takes away the trivialization of that experience, turning it into just another survival mechanism. You referenced before a study about how different Holocaust survivors went through that hellish nightmare and their different reactions, or their different relationships with faith before, during, and after. And that leads me to something that really has bothered me for a while. Unfortunately, many people experience trauma, but there are different ways that they experience that trauma, especially vis-a-vis how it impacts their faith or their relationship with a divine or the sacred. So many people walk away from trauma with their faith in inherent goodness of the universe in God, shaken, challenged, bruised, but then there are others who walk away with their faith, unshaken, and they just continue as if nothing had happened. 

You look at these people who've experienced that type of trauma and say, how do you believe? And they don't understand why it's difficult. I'm asking you, is there a psychological explanation for this distinction, for the differences in the way certain folks react and respond post a traumatic incident like that? 

Ken Pargament:

Well, great question. And it's actually been the, the focus, my own interest with Julie Exline. Over the past 20 years, we've been doing research on what, what we would call spiritual struggles, and the notion that trauma affects people not only psychologically, socially, and physically, but also spiritually. And, and we've found, for instance, that 75% of people in the United States report spiritual struggles at some point in life. And they may involve feeling punished or angry at God. They may involve doubts about fundamental religious claims and truths. They may involve questions of ultimate meaning. Moral struggles in which you feel like you're not living up to your higher spiritual values, struggles with other people about religious and spiritual issues. These are all different kinds of spiritual struggle. And again, they're not at all unusual. In fact, we, we maintain that they're actually a normal part of development, that you don't go through life without struggling at times, cognitively, socially, you know, morally.

And those, those struggles are actually, it can be a launching pad for growth and transformation. And in fact, you know, it's the, if you look at the major world religions and the stories of the religious you know, the religious models from, from Moses and Abraham to Jesus, to Buddha to Mohammed, they're all, they all go through periods of struggle. And that's a key part of the story. The struggle that they go through within themselves with their people with God. And how they come to terms with that struggle, well, generally they're transformed by it. So, the question you're raising how is it that some people struggle, and some people don't, is really a really great question. And we've been doing research on that too, so we can go into that. But I just, I just wanted to provide that kind of background. This is, I think it's a normal part of life of struggling at times. 

JD Kalmenson: 

Right. I'm curious if you would say, because I understand that it's a complex answer, why some might lose their faith after a traumatic episode, and some may not.

Different folks respond to trauma differently, and a lot of it has largely to do with the way their nervous system was prior to the traumatic episode and event. Were they vulnerable and susceptible? Or were they at a very healthy baseline, and if they were at a very healthy baseline that the resiliency that they will intrinsically possess will empower them to be able to you know, get right back up.

Ken Pargament:

Very good. Yeah. We actually, along those lines, we did a study of people in the United States who had experienced trauma. And what we found was that whether trauma was then followed by PTSD symptoms, traumatic symptoms, in part depended on whether they were experiencing spiritual struggles.  

You're right that the people who are more likely to struggle are people who may have a weaker spiritual and religious framework to begin with, so they don't have a way to make sense of the struggle. They, they don't have a place to put it in their in their own worldview. If they don't have support for the struggle too, for any questions that come up, they're also more likely to struggle. And sometimes questions about faith, questions about God are not met with support and met with stigma. You shouldn't believe that. You shouldn't feel that God's going to punish you even more if you're raising questions. So having support is really important. 

JD Kalmenson: 

Correct. And even the very fact that there is a basic built-in belief of meaning and purpose in every experience, helps us reconcile the pain and the trauma and why it had to happen, and it being connected to something much larger than ourselves, whether we may or may not understand it. I mean, that itself becomes a, an incredible tool. And you really see this going all the way back to the biblical story of Joseph. Where he's able to forgive his brothers and find it within his heart to exhibit this largess of spirit, to sustain them and to not hold any grudge and not harbor any resentment, because he tells them, “You think that you committed this crime and atrocity to me, first of all, you did not. It had to have been ordained by some higher form of orchestration, but more importantly, it's maybe, maybe the entire series of events were only there so that I could rise to prominence and help sustain the world at large during this time of hunger and famine.” So he was able to see in the betrayal of his brothers and the fact that they sold him into slavery, all the silver linings of finding meaning and purpose in trauma.

Ken Pargament: 

Great example of how someone can use the struggle as a launching pad for transformation. Beautiful example. You know, there's a metaphor, and you may be familiar with it. It's a Japanese art form called Kintsugi. And what it is, is it's creating ceramics, but you start with a piece of ceramic, and you shatter it. 

You then put the ceramic back together again with gold or silver filigree like a glue. And in putting the piece back together again you see the brokenness of the piece, but it has become whole with the gold and silver filigree, and it becomes something that was maybe even more beautiful than when it was perfect. And the notion, the kind of philosophy in it is that we become whole through brokenness. 

JD Kalmenson:

Right, right.

Ken Pargament:

That wholeness kind of rests on brokenness and being able to find ways to put the pieces together. And in some ways, if you think of your life that way, and I've used this with many of my clients in therapy, you can think about your life then as a work of art. You're trying to put the pieces of your life together in a way that make you more whole. And it's, it may not be a, a short-term process, it may be a lifelong work of art that you're creating.

JD Kalmenson: 

That's beautiful. I mean, actually reminds me of the, of the famous tale about the, the, the water carrier who had these two water pots. I'm, I'm sure you might be familiar with it. One was a little chipped and one was whole. And the chipped water pot would lose half of its water on the water carrier's journey cuz of the drip dripping, the constant dripping of water that would come out. And as the tale goes, he complains to the water carrier about his brokenness, feeling rather ashamed and inadequate that for the same amount of effort and labor, the water carrier only had half the water from his pot. And the water carrier, you know, showed him along the path that he knew about his flaws. And that's why on his side, he had planted seeds and beautiful flowers had begun to blossom and sprout all resulting from his flawed or his brokenness, or as Leonard Cohen put it in his song Anthem: There's a crack, There's a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in,

Ken Pargament:

You know. That's right. Yeah. 

JD Kalmenson:

So religion and spirituality, if you wanna integrate them into psychological practice, is this, is this something that can be done on a universal level, or is it only appropriate for somebody who has a prior sense of faith and religion? 

Ken Pargament: 

We've been doing a lot of work on actually training practitioners in spiritually competent psychotherapy. The, the sad case of it is, is that that most graduate students in mental health programs don't have a single course in religion or spirituality. They have no training whatsoever. And so if they're working with a client who's religious or spiritual, they really don't have any firm ground to stand on in terms of what do they do. And I think as a result, many practitioners just change the subject say that it's off limits and or say, well, you need to talk to your clergy about that. It's not something I can talk with you about. But we found that you can train practitioners to do work in, in spiritually integrated therapy in, we, we have an eight-hour program. And it, we were able to show that it increased their knowledge and their skills and their attitudes for work here.

And the, coming back to your question, it worked for therapists who were themselves religious, and it worked for therapists who were not religious or spiritual themselves at all. And you can be an atheist and still recognize that it's an important part of a life of your clients and recognize that and help them draw on those resources. And the flip side is, is even if you're personally religious or spiritual, that doesn't mean you're necessarily well equipped to help people who are coming in with psychological problems in which their spirituality is interwoven. You know, you need to learn how to deal with that and how to talk about it in ways that are sensitive and respectful of, of your clients, regardless of your own personal spiritual commitments.

JD Kalmenson: 

I agree. I mean, it makes us, you know, brings to mind the idea that sometimes not voting is actually a form of voting. Not bringing it into the treatment plan, not bringing into the not bringing in this very powerful part of their lives and integrating it into their other struggles is very much taking a stand. And it, it could be projecting in a, in a way that's not helpful for the client. It's really all about the client.

Ken Pargament:

That's right. I, the, I've been doing this now for many, many years, and in the old days when I would do some workshops on addressing spirituality and therapy, it was often met with either some disinterest or even antagonism. But that's changed now. And I think nowadays, most people in the field are, are, are more just confused. They don't know how to approach it because they haven't been trained in it. But that's really good news because they're, they're also open and more curious about it. And, and we're finding that there's, that creates a real, the door is now open for more integration than we've ever seen. And, and good training and people willing to, you know, bring the spiritual dimension into treatment. And, and we really believe that it makes a difference.

JD Kalmenson:

Yes. And I see that there's a sort of societal trend, which really is elevating spirituality on the rise in so many different segments of society and really not necessarily connected to religion. I, you know, I'll give you in a couple of examples. We, you know, I live in Los Angeles. There is a psychic on every corner, and they have to be, you know, paying their bills. So there's a lot of people who, who are going there. And that is some type of an obsession or, or a desire and aspiration to connect to something larger than their own, you know, five senses, their own limited experience. You know, psychedelics is right now back on the rise. It's making its way into behavioral health treatment, ayahuasca, a lot of these life changing experiences, you know, that are occurring across different aspects, you know, different factions of society. So you sort of see manifestations and ripples of an increased trend in spirituality across all sectors, religious, non-religious, even in the secular arena. So it's gonna have to also make its way into behavioral health, mental health treatment, which is supposed to deal with the totality of the human being.

Ken Pargament:

I think. So it's, it's an exciting time. And it's neat to see the various programs and, and the practices that are now being developed and disseminated. You know, people are religious, experience their religion and spirituality in many different ways. We prefer different pathways. We seek out different destinations in life. And so the term religion, spirituality is a very large umbrella that encompasses many different religious interests and groups and people and identities. And so we need a, a full variety, not, and not all people will respond well to the same religious or spiritual practice. We need full variety. Like, we need variety of foods cause we have different tastes. And I think we're starting to see that in the spiritual realm too, or a large menu of spiritual practices and disciplines that people are beginning to develop and, and starting to taste.

JD Kalmenson:

Yes, Yes. Well said. 

As someone who is engaged in chaplaincy and rabbinical work myself, and also being a part of providing psychological treatment across our many treatment centers, I personally see so much crossover between the two disciplines. What I'd love to get your take on, your opinion on is what would be the correct litmus test to determine whether someone should seek out a spiritual counselor or a psychotherapist? If somebody needs help, what would they, what, what, you know, what sort of symptoms, what would be the barometer to help them know where to seek the help out? And I wanna share a story with you. There was a couple who were having marriage problems.

And they go to a rabbi who suggested that they start keeping the Sabbath, which is a day in which we don't work. And the strictest way to observe it is to really plug out from electronics. Anyway, they leave the rabbi's office and they're very frustrated that he took their moment of need and what they believed was an exploitation of their problem, and try to shove a religious ritual down their throat. They go to a therapist, and a therapist listens very carefully, and after analysis turns to them and says, All you guys really need is a Friday night candlelight dinner without television or phones. And then they walk away and they realize that the rabbi and the therapist were in this case saying the same thing. The effect of it would be the same. Not always is that the case. Sometimes you're gonna hear very different advice coming from these very different sources and disciplines. How does one know which direction they should take

Ken Pargament:

It's a, it's a great, great question and something we're, we're all struggling with right now as we're starting to, to move towards a more holistic approach, bio psychosocial, spiritual approach to treatment. I'm not a huge fan of creating the lines between, say, chaplaincy ministry and psychology too historically. I think chaplains should be knowledgeable about the social dimension, the psychological dimension, the physical dimension, even though clearly their expertise is in the religious and spiritual dimension. Psychologists, for instance, should also be knowledgeable about the psychological, social and physical dimension, even though their expertise is clearly in the psychological. But we all are concerned with the wellbeing of the whole person. 

For instance, I worked with a woman who felt that because she'd had an abortion at the age of 14 following a rape she was Roman Catholic, she could never be forgiven in her church. And she was outside of God's grace. And you know, I talked with her about it and worked with her as a psychologist, but I believe she was really looking for some religiously based affirmation, a confession. And she hadn't been to her church, her parish for 20 years. Well, what I did, I, I, I'm not a priest. I'm not a rabbi. I have no legitimation to do any of that religious legitimation. So I connected her to a priest who was willing to work with her to the sacrament of reconciliation confession. And so we worked together on the case. It wasn't one or the other. It was working together for me to have offered forgiveness with any kind of religious authority would've really been unethical even.

And so, yeah, there we're, there are many instances, I think, where we have to respect our boundaries and not overstep what we do. I'm not a clergy and clergy are not trained in psychology. Many of them most are not. So trying to find that, that right point of connection and balance, it makes a big difference. 

JD Kalmenson:

That’s really something that you've, you highlight in, in, in the book that in your book, Working with Spiritual Struggles in Psychotherapy, you know, you point out something profound that practitioners have to listen carefully to the language in their clients' complaints. Like, phrases like, “My world's falling apart”, or “life is so unfair”, or “I'm feeling punished, when my suffering end?” You know, these words strongly signal not just a regular surface level mental health issue, but something deeper existential or potentially transcendent dimension to their pain.

Ken Pargament:

Yeah. Thank you for noticing that. That's great. That's absolutely one of the key points into the whole book. Thank you.

JD Kalmenson:

Yeah, no, and, and, and you have to really be attuned to that. I, we, I always share with our therapists that I think that their role is to be an investigative journalist. It's like, almost like a, a Sherlock Holmes on a crime scene that, you know, don't speculate and project previous stories onto this crime here, gather the data and really pay attention to every detail, I'd love to also know if there are any sort of universal tips that you would recommend that would help folks increase the place of spirituality in their daily lives? 

Ken Pargament:

Yeah. I think that's, there are some things that we can do quite practically. One is to, we can ask people what do they hold sacred? It's a wonderful question, and it's especially a good question for, say, people who've been experiencing depression where they may be feeling like life has no deeper value or deeper meaning where they've lost touch with something sacred in their lives. And trying to help people locate their sacred spark and blow on it, fan, the fan that flame, because that sacred spark is often an antidote to depression. It may be oh, it can take so many different forms. It may be photography, it may be art, it may be doing volunteer work, It may be spending more time with your family, whatever it is. When people are in touch with their sacred spark, they light up, they become more engaged in life and start to feel that they have more of a reason for living.

And therapists can help locate that sacred spark by being more explicit about it, by saying, “so tell me, what do you hold sacred?” And I found that single question often, again, deep into conversation and leads to some really important conversation and, and at times change for people too. So that's, that's one piece of it is where do you, you know, what do you hold sacred? A second part of a second question is where do you find the sacred? So maybe you find it outdoors, maybe you find it in study and, and prayer and reflection. Maybe you find it through science, maybe you find it through loving relationships. But whatever that, that place of the sacred may be, it's a place that you can encourage clients to access, because it is a resource. It's a resource that can help them regardless of what their psychological problem may be.

 And then we can help clients make a commitment to their spiritual growth. Because there's, there's the word discipline. It's common to almost every religious, every religious tradition. It's a really important word. It means, hey, you've gotta practice it. You can't do it just one time and expect a miracle. If you wanna grow spiritually, you have to really embed it in your life. Make it a part of your life. Practice it repeatedly. That's why people go to synagogue and churches, sometimes multiple times a day, repeating some of the same prayers and the same rituals, because it becomes embedded in your life. And then through that process, that's when you begin to see transformation. 

JD Kalmenson: 

Throughout our discussion, you've used the word sacred to really describe the experience of spirituality. If somebody engages with their sacred for selfish reasons because they like the way it meets them feel, or other ulterior motives, does that compromise the sacredness of the sacred? 

Ken Pargament: 

Great. Another great provocative question really. And we, we do know that sometimes people engage in sacred spiritual practices for what have been called extrinsic reasons for to sell products to gain status in a community, to feel like you're spiritually superior to other people, and as opposed to engaging in it because of that yearning for a spiritual connection, which is the core of spirituality. And we know in those, those two kinds of people that the person who's engaging in the sacred quest, a relationship with the sacred, because it's who they are, they experience many, many more benefits through that process than the person who's using or misusing the sacred to, to meet other needs.

Having said that, though, I want to be careful about not drawing that too much of a distinction, because the reality is our motives are always mixed.

No one has absolutely pure motivation to do anything because we're human beings. So we have our side of appetites, and we have our higher side of, you know, spiritual drives and desires for self-actualization and, and growth and flourishing. And you know what? You gotta meet all those needs somehow. You gotta find a way to put it together to create a life of wholeness, not a life of perfection, because we can't get there. That would be like the ceramic without any breaks in it.  The question is, how you put your life together, even though you're gonna have some chips and some breaks. And it's not gonna be perfect. And you'll see that, you know, you've been broken at times, but that's okay. That's all part of being human. So I think finding ways to mix our very human motivation with our highest spiritual motivation, that's the challenge for all of us. How do we, how do we put that together? 

JD Kalmenson:

Right. Right. And as long as we're asking the question and we're not complacent, that's really the light at the end of the tunnel. We'll get there.

Ken Pargament:

That's right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's a wholeness I think is a wonderful goal in life. Do we ever become fully whole? Maybe there are some saint like creatures out there who, who are able to do that? Certainly there are people who are wonderful examples of humanity, but I think for the vast majority of us we're always, we're heading in the direction to greater wholeness. But it's, it's always a work in progress, and yes. That can be good enough.

JD Kalmenson:

And that's part of what makes us so special. I've, you know, you use the word art. Art is supposed to mimic a scene. So let's say you have a photograph of the scene. Yeah, it's supposed to look like the photograph, but if it would completely look like the photograph, it actually wouldn't have the same appeal and value. It's the subjective interpretation of the photograph, but aspiring to emulate the photograph, so that duality is really the art of life.

Ken Pargament:

Yeah.

JD Kalmenson:

Thank you so much. Really, really appreciated your expertise and your insight onto these really foundational issues that we are all facing. It was really, it was really inspiring. How can people find out more about the work that you do? 

Ken Pargament:

Well, I have a website kennethpargament.com., kennethpargament.com. So I have a lot of my papers and things that I've been up to on the website, if you're interested in that. And, and it also mentions my books and things. If you're interested in taking a deeper dive into the, some of the things we've been talking about.

JD Kalmenson: 

Incredible. And thank you audience for joining us too. If you haven't read Dr. Pargament's books, I highly recommend that you do. They are filled with wisdom about how to approach a meaningful and rewarding life. I hope you enjoy today's episode of Discover U, and that it gave you new insight, a different way of thinking about yourself and the world. At Montare, we want you to know that you're never alone in your journey. To find out more about our innovative treatment programs, you can find us at Montarebh.com, and listen to this podcast on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Wishing all of you excellent health, a safe and fulfilling day. See you next time.