Tag Archives: Well-Being

Rediscovering a Religious or Spiritual Life

Many of us are frustrated by religion. According to the General Social Survey – a large, representative survey done every few years for the past several decades – the number of Americans who say they have no religion increased from 5% in 1972 to 29% last year, for example. The COVID-19 pandemic also provided a pause from religious attendance that allowed many of us to take a step back and reconsider how we really feel about our religious beliefs, practices, and commitments.

Why are so many people “done” with religion? Researchers in one study asked individuals who said they were once – but no longer – religious to write about their primary reason for the change. By far the most common reason (52%) was intellectual, such as when a person felt their previous religious beliefs conflicted with science or logic, or when they felt they simply “outgrew” their old beliefs. Another common reason (22%) was because individuals said they didn’t feel they could be a part of an institution they felt caused trauma to themselves or others or that they believed perpetrated hatred toward certain groups, such as members of the LGBTQ population. A third reason (15%) was because people experienced personal adversity they couldn’t reconcile with their religious beliefs. Finally, some (11%) noted social reasons, such as feeling like they didn’t “fit in” with a religious community.

Research suggests “religious dones” tend to have a history of religious and spiritual struggles but that these struggles often lift when they form a non-religious identity. On the other hand, studies show how, in religious settings and groups, formerly religious people often hide their newfound beliefs and values, again feeling a lack of belonging. In addition, a good deal of research points to the significant positive resources provided by religion and spirituality. Relinquishing these resources may come with some long-term costs. For instance, doing away with all of our religious and spiritual customs may mean our children do not experience several significant rituals or rites of passage that aid in their development.

It’s not healthy to suppress our struggles with religion. Are there ways to be honest with our frustrations while still pursuing a religious or spiritual dimension to our lives? Below are five ideas for how we might do so.

1. Go deeper into religion.

Sometimes, there are resources in our religious traditions that can help us work through our frustrations. For example, many religions have insightful analyses of how faith and science can be integrated. Traditions frequently have resources for helping us reconcile the suffering we’ve experienced with our religious beliefs. A deeper exploration often points to how our religious frustrations are rooted in how religious teachings are commonly interpreted and practiced – frequently by people less informed – instead of the best a religion has to offer. In this way, digging further into religion can be the spark for personal growth and deeper understanding.

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One Powerful Way to Help Young People Who Are Struggling

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As a parent, an educator, and an uncle, I worry about this generation of young people.

And there’s good reason to worry.

For example, according to the recently released Youth Behavior Risk Survey, 42% of American high school students felt so sad or hopeless during a 2-week period in 2021 that they stopped doing their usual activities (in 2011, this percentage was 28%). Sadness and hopelessness were especially high in females (57%) and LGBTQ youth (69%). As demonstrated by social psychologist Jean Twenge and others, loneliness also has been on the rise among young people. So have self-focus, individualism, and narcissism.

Do you relate to any of this? Do you personally know a young person who seems to be struggling with their mental health? Do you notice how many youths seem too narrowly self-focused?

What can we, as adults, do to help?

The short answer: we can help young people find more awe.

New Research on Awe in Kids

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about a research article, published recently in the journal Psychological Science. In two studies, researchers randomly assigned some 8-13 year olds to watch an animated movie clip eliciting awe, some to a clip eliciting joy, and some to a clip eliciting a neutral (control) response. Results showed that, compared to the joy and control conditions, the kids led to feel awe more likely participated in an effortful task and more likely demonstrated generosity toward refugees (a group not their own). Those led to feel awe also experienced more of a parasympathetic, calming bodily reaction associated with social engagement.

Awe is an emotional response to something vast that transcends our current frame of reference. The scientists who conducted the awe studies speculate about various activities that may nurture awe in young people. For instance, parents, teachers, or other adults might connect kids to stories that are highly unusual or even magical; music with unexpected harmonies or shifts in energy; amazing theatrical, artistic, or athletic performances; big buildings like cathedrals; and beautiful places in the natural world.

Much of this stands in contrast to the common view that great literature, music, theater, art, and time spent in nature don’t have much real-world impact and that they are expendable from school curricula.

Applying This Research to Help Young People

Of course, many factors likely threaten youth mental health. Although I personally would love to see a nationwide prohibition of social media until the age of 18 – or at least a change in school policies such that times could be intentionally carved out during the school day when cell phones are not accessible to students – these changes lie largely beyond my control. As a parent, I could restrict my kids’ technology use – and I wish I had done that when they were younger – but I feel that, ultimately, in this culture, adding family restrictions may cause other problems. Overuse of technology seems to be more of a systemic, cultural problem.

A more effective, more practical strategy may be to help the young people in my life find more awe. I can do my best to encourage a love of reading, theater, music, art, and sports. I can enroll my kids in schools that are environmentally-focused. When I’m teaching, I can bring my classes outside, when possible. I can bring my son to a live concert. I can bring my nephew to the zoo.

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Five Spiritual Practices that Increase Well-Being

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For thousands of years, religious and spiritual communities around the world have organized themselves around specific practices they find meaningful. In recent years, psychological scientists have been in conversation with such communities, trying to learn about these practices, sometimes refine them, and test the effects of related interventions on well-being. For those who consider themselves somehow spiritual – about 86% of American adults in one recent nationally representative survey – these activities may hold special significance. Although whether or not a practice really is “spiritual” depends on the person and what they hold sacred, these activities may be central parts of a lifestyle that prioritizes and integrates spirituality and well-being.

Below are five forms of spiritual practice that psychological research suggests increase well-being.

1. Meditation

Meditation practices refer to a broad collection of activities that seek to focus the mind. Really almost anything can be a support for attention during a meditation practice. For example, we can focus on our breathing, a meaningful word of our choice, a raisin, the movement of light on the floor as it comes through a window, the sound of a bird, sensations of emotional or physical pain, a text that holds spiritual significance, the kindness of a loved one, or the presence of the divine, just to name a few.

In recent years, a variety of apps have become available to help people engage in these kinds of activities. My favorite is the free “Healthy Minds Innovations” app from the Center for Healthy Minds at the University of Wisconsin – Madison.

2. Awe

Dacher Keltner defines awe as the feeling we get when we’re in the presence of a vast mystery that transcends our understanding of the world. For instance, we might feel awe in the presence of something huge, powerful, timeless, or intricate. Other people can leave us awestruck as well because of their astounding virtue, knowledge, or skill.

Priscilla Du Preez | Unsplash

Taking an intentional awe walk is one way we can seek awe. This might involve taking at least 15 minutes to stroll through a natural area, maybe one that brings us through a wooded area or field of flowers, or near a lake or river. Alternatively, we can take a walk under the night sky, at dawn or dusk, or while a thunderstorm is taking shape in the distance. As we take our walk, part of the practice entails taking our time to really try to take in what we notice as vast, for example by allowing ourselves to by swept away by a view or amazed by the detail of a flower.

3. Forgiveness

Forgiveness refers to a process of letting go of negative emotions and the urges to seek revenge or avoid another because of the pain they caused us. Importantly, forgiveness need not involve telling a person we forgive them, condoning or forgetting a hurtful action, or restoring a relationship.

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Staying in Awe

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Remembering Why We Live in this Place

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My wife and I have often told a pretty bleak story about the town in which we live. Common refrains include “there’s nothing to do here,” “it’s too conservative,” and “there’s nowhere good to eat.” Our kids have picked up on this. They share these sentiments with us and their friends as well, and actually have taken it a step further. They have sometimes wondered aloud: “Why do we live somewhere so flat? Why not live where there are mountains, or at least an ocean?”

Most of our friends live outside our town, and we have been gifted with some great ones. Some of our dear friends live in the city, others live outside the state, and some even live in different countries.

One of the ways we’ve learned to connect with our friends is to share photos of our everyday lives. In particular, after recently spending a week with some dear friends from Scotland, we started trading photos back-and-forth as a quick way of staying in touch. After all, a picture’s worth a thousand words.

We really enjoy these friends from Scotland, so much so that we’ve tried to convince them to visit us in our town. Of course, it’s hard to convince someone from another country to visit you in a town you portray so bleakly. So, as we’ve shared photos, we’ve started to make more of an effort to feature locations and happenings in our town we’re pleased with or even proud about.

As we do this, we’re slowly coming to a realization: being intentional about sharing photos of the lovely and the meaningful in our town is turning our attention from what we don’t have to gratitude for what we do.

There’s a small body of research exploring the effects of taking photos on personal well-being. Studies find that taking photos of the good increases positive emotions such as gratitude and overall life satisfaction. When these photos are shared with others, it tends to build connection. Other research shows that the task of taking photos increases engagement in the positive aspects of a situation. Furthermore, feeling grateful is tighly linked with overall happiness.

Andy Tix — View of the Mississippi River, taken with my IPhone SE

Sharing photos of the lovely and the meaningful from our town has helped us remember why we chose to live in this town in the first place. Very few towns the size of ours have the trails we do, giving us access to three beautiful rivers. There’s a charming vineyard on the outskirts of town that produces the area’s best wine and that features sangria and jazz every Sunday during the summer. We live on a quiet and safe street where we can sit at the end of a long day, kick up our feet, and enjoy each other’s company. In the winter, we have access to some of the region’s best winter activitieis, such as skiing and snowshoeing. The list goes on and on.

But, we couldn’t appreciate these good things until we started being intentional about taking and sharing photos with our friends. We needed an intentional activity to break us out of our pessimism.

So, you might join us in this practice. Think about someone you wish you were closer with, someone with whom you’d like to stay more connected. Start sending them a photo when you become aware of something positive and meaningful in your everyday life, and see if you can get them to reciprocate. You very well might find this creates a new perspective in you as well.

The Science and Practice of a Good Life

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Two years ago today, the World Health Organization officially declared COVID-19 to be a pandemic. Now, after two years of living with various restrictions, many of us are entering a new phase, with some long-neglected life options returning. We may be asking ourselves: “how do I want to live now?” As we wrestle with this question – aided by the greater perspective and wisdom that comes from adversity – we may benefit from considering what constitutes, for us, a good life.

Psychological scientists increasingly focus on three different visions of a good life.

First, a life of happiness tends to be characterized by pleasure, stability, and comfort. (On the flip side, a life of happiness seeks to minimize pain, instability, and discomfort.) Of course, we all find happiness in different ways, but research often shows how the experience of close relationships plays a vital role in this vision of a good life. For example, in a recent study, research participants rated having a party to be the daily activity most likely to make them happy. I’m also reminded of Elizabeth Gilbert’s quest for a good life in her bestselling book “Eat, Pray, Love,” and how her pursuit of pleasure translated for her to eating really good food in Italy. If we want to focus our lives on happiness, we might do well to habitually ask ourselves, “what would I most enjoy?”

A second vision for a good life involves the pursuit of meaning, characterized by purpose, coherence, and significance. (On the other hand, a life of meaning seeks to avoid aimlessness, fragmentation, and insignificance.) People living this kind of good life often feel like they are making the world somehow better. Religious and spiritual activities often play an important role. For instance, in “Eat, Pray, Love,” Elizabeth Gilbert sought a life of devotion through yoga and meditation in India. We can concentrate on this vision of a good life by consistently asking ourselves, “what would be most meaningful?”

Increasingly, psychologists of the good life discuss a third vision: a psychologically rich life. This kind of life comes with a variety of interesting experiences that produce changes in perspective. (The opposite of a psychologically rich life may be found in a lifestyle characterized by repetition, boredom, and stagnation.) Research shows how study abroad experiences in college, for example, tend to increase feelings of psychological richness. Live music, in-person art, and many other kinds of stimulating, mind-opening experiences may play a special role in nurturing a psychologically rich life as well. For those of us wanting to pursue this vision of a good life, we might do well to frequently ask ourselves, “what would be most interesting?”

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Contentment Whatever the Circumstances

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No matter how people feel about Christianity, I imagine most would aspire to the place St. Paul arrived at when he declared:

“I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.” (Philippians 4:11)

I don’t know about you, but I was hoping for a better 2021 than 2020. If anything, for me personally, 2021 brought more problems, not fewer. Family troubles intensified. Work conflict increased. And, though we have vaccines to mitigate the worst outcomes from COVID-19, the pandemic has not faded.

I wonder what Paul meant when he said he was content whatever the circumstances. Based on other things he wrote, I don’t believe he avoided or ignored the awful parts of life. After all, Paul was in prison at the time he wrote these words. In general, avoiding or ignoring difficult circumstances seems like a recipe for only increasing one’s problems in life long-term. So, the question I’m left with is: how can we honestly face life’s struggles and still be content?

Part of my prayer practice is to actively listen for God. Inspired by the Quakers, I set aside time regularly to be silent and see if any wisdom “bubbles up” or “reveals itself.” I also “listen for God” in other ways, such as in conversations I have with friends. Sometimes, if I can listen carefully enough (a big “if”), something does indeed “bubble up.” Sometimes, some of that “received wisdom” has stood the test of time.

I don’t know if any of this does a good job of answering my question – and I surely have a long way to go before I get to the place Paul was at – but when I consider how to honestly face life’s struggles and still be content, I find myself continually returning to four points of inspiration.

1. “Accept and expect irresolution.”

This is something my friend, the author and peace activist, John Noltner, likes to say. I clearly remember many years ago attending a small workshop with John when I first heard him emphasize this point. Years later, in silence, these words came back to me and they have stuck with me since.

I think part of what makes it so difficult to find contentment is we often look for final and complete resolution of our problems. Then, and only then, we believe, can we really reclaim our contentment.

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The Emotional Benefits of Exercising Outdoors in Winter

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Before this year, from December to March, I spent most of my adult life inside. During these months in Minnesota, where I live, high temperatures typically remain below freezing, and it’s not uncommon to wake up to a reading of below 0 degrees Fahrenheit, not counting “wind chill.”

Although I intentionally exercised several times per week, much of this time in previous years was passed in my gym where I watched old episodes of Friends while artificially bounding on an elliptical machine. This felt easier. When I considered going outside, images came to mind of my whole body shivering uncontrollably, my face becoming numb, my fingers and toes feeling like they might be seriously frostbitten, my nostril hairs freezing as I breathed in the cold, dry air.

With COVID-19 cases surging as we entered the winter months this year, I faced a clear choice: (1) continue the comfortable routine of previous years by working out inside my gym, knowing this would mean I would more likely contract and spread the virus, or (2) extend my summer and fall habits of exercising in the great outdoors. Favoring public health, I decided on the latter: I put my gym membership on temporary hold, and with some trepidation, I planned for a winter of outdoor adventure.

I’m now a few months into this new lifestyle. Some days, I walk or hike on paths near my home, aided by the most marvelous invention I never knew to keep myself from falling on the snow and ice: Yaktrax. Other days, when I have more flexibility in my schedule, I practice my classic ski technique at a local park or snowshoe along the pine tree-lined trails of my favorite local nature center. Weekends provide opportunities for more extended travel or adventure, such as half-day trips to formerly unexplored or underexplored Minnesota State Parks.

A few insights have been essential to making this work. First, I have new appreciation for the Scandinavian saying: “there’s no such thing as bad temperature, only bad clothing.” Although it was an investment, purchasing high-quality outdoor clothing from REI has been well worth it in terms of comfort in the cold. (There is a point where I “draw the line,” though, and for me that’s 0 degrees Fahrenheit, below which I move my body inside.) Most importantly, I’ve needed to shift my attitude toward winter. Inspired by recent psychological research by University of California – San Francisco researcher Virginia Sturm and colleagues – showing increased positive emotions and decreased emotional distress when individuals engage in regular “awe walks” – I’ve changed my focus from efficiency in exercise to getting lost in wonder as I look for what is vast, unexpected, and unique outside. If the conditions are right, I’ll also sometimes bring my camera to see if I can photograph some of the beauty around me.

Carpenter Nature Center, Hastings, Minnesota

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The Emotional Benefits of Sacred Moments

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“The higher goal of spiritual living is not to amass a wealth of information, but to face sacred moments.” (Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel)

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The year 2020 will go down in history as a year of public health, economic, and societal crisis. Much less acknowledged, however, is the profound emotional and spiritual malaise* many people feel. In fact, in the United States, emotional distress is three times higher than previous years and happiness is at a near 50-year low.

For many of us, something seems “off.” Perhaps this feels like a sense that something is vaguely “missing,” or maybe we “long” for something more or different. Probably many of us have grown “numb” to these feelings over the past several months – without fully realizing it. We may not understand why we’re feeling the way we do or appreciate how much our inner lives really have changed.

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It’s with all this in mind that I’ve been reflecting on some new research published this week in the journal Psychology of Religion and Spirituality.

In this study, 2,889 participants were asked about the frequency with which they generally experience “sacred moments” in their everyday lives. Specifically, individuals were instructed to rate, on a scale of 1 (never / not at all) to 5 (very often), how often they experience:

“a moment that felt set apart from everyday life,”
“a moment… that was really real,”
“a moment in which all distractions seemed to melt away,”
“a deep sense of connection with someone or something,”
“a sense of uplift,” and
“a sacred moment.”

Results from this research show that individuals’ experiences of sacred moments predicted “higher levels of positive emotions and greater presence of meaning, as well as lower levels of perceived stress, depressed distress, and anxious distress.”

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What is it about “sacred moments,” as defined and measured in the above study, that might be most essential, that might be most involved in predicting higher well-being? When I consider the scale items mentioned above, the one that stands out most focuses on moments of deep “connection with someone or something.” I imagine that deep experiences of connection drive the sense that moments feel “set apart from everyday life” and “really real,” for instance.

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Is Mental Health a Valid Reason to Not Socially Distance?

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Even as public health experts and government authorities continue to advocate for physical distancing to minimize the spread of COVID-19, compliance appears to be diminishing. For example, mobile phone data across the United States reveals trends, beginning toward the end of April, of individuals spending more time away from their homes.

Of the many reasons why individuals may not comply with physical distancing guidelines, concerns about mental health may be most prominent. A Gallup poll conducted in April, for instance, indicated how emotional and mental health seemed to be the strongest consideration for individuals maintaining distancing, as compared with concerns about physical health and financial hardship.

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United Nations COVID-19 Response | Unsplash

The pandemic clearly is not just a crisis for physical health and the medical system; it also is an enormous challenge for mental health and the mental health system. New data released over this past weekend by Jean Twenge hints at the magnitude of these problems. In her survey conducted on April 27^th, Twenge asked U. S. adults how sad or nervous they felt and compared those responses with demographically similar adults who answered the same questions in 2018. She found that roughly 70% of Americans demonstrate “moderate to severe” mental distress now, during the pandemic, a rate three times that reported in 2018. Young people show the greatest distress, a group other research has also found to be most socially isolated.

And yet, even as these problems become more evident, no major mental health organization – such as the American Psychological Association (APA) – publicly opposes physical distancing guidelines. Instead, mental health and behavioral experts point to ways to maintain distancing while at the same time attending to individuals’ mental health.

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