Spirituality in Health Care - Transcendence

     As health-care professionals, it's critical to recognize & override any personal aversions we may have toward religion and or spirituality, because one or both of these will be profoundly meaningful AND healing to MOST of our patients.

     "A great number of researchers considered transcendence as an essential component of spirituality or as an indicator of spirituality. ... spirituality transcends the present context of reality and exists throughout and beyond time and space. ... spirituality is one indicator of the human capacity for transcendence. ... transcendence is a level of awareness through which a person achieves new perspectives & experiences that exceed ordinary physical boundaries. ... adolescents, following the death of a sibling developed new perspectives of self, others, sibling relationship, Higher Power, death, and life. ... transcendence is expanding conceptual boundaries of the self beyond limits posed by the immediate situation, physical limitations, or otherwise constricted views of life and human potential. ... transcendence is a rising above or going beyond the limits of material existence. ... transcendence is a developmental and evolutionary process of integration and inclusion into a greater wholeness. Liberation from suffering and opening to life and death were considered an essence of transcendence."


     Chiu L et al. An Integrative Review of the Concept of Spirituality in the Health Sciences. Western Journal of Nursing Research 2004; 26(4): 405-428.

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