Spirituality and Religion in Positive Psychology and Positive Psychiatry
摘要
Spirituality and Religion have often been used interchangeably. Spirituality is known to include the personal quest for understanding the answers to ultimate questions about life, the meaning of life, and the relationship with the sacred or transcendent. Spirituality is also a known concept where individuals with the help of non-duality practices raise their level of consciousness to merge with higher consciousness. While religion is considered a concept where individuals follow beliefs, rituals, specifically duality-based structured practices with a goal of merging with higher consciousness. Both concepts are identified with faith, hope, positivity, and benefiting mankind by providing physical, mental, and spiritual health. They are observed to create positive emotions and resilience in patients struggling from mental health conditions. Until the early nineteenth century, psychiatry and religion were closely connected. Religious institutions were responsible for the care of the mentally ill. It was observed that although spiritualism and religion have the same goal, religionism also involved many “do’s and don’ts” thus bringing in rigidity and at times inflexibility in many of the practices. Over the years, religion was considered responsible for many psychiatric illnesses. This created a negative impact amongst the psychiatric care providers for many years. However, with the introduction of “religious or spiritual problems” in DSM-IV as a new diagnostic category, it invited psychiatric professionals to respect the patient’s religious and spiritual beliefs and rituals. In 2016, the World Psychiatry Association published a position statement on spirituality and religion in psychiatry urging the inclusion of spirituality and religion in the training and clinical encounters with the goal of providing a more holistic and comprehensive form of mental health care. Research in neuroscience provided objective understanding of mechanisms in the brain (e.g., neurobiological subcortical limbic brain regions; dopamine systems utilizing opiate and GABA receptors in the ventral striatum, amygdala, and orbital frontal cortex; and various neuropeptides) that mediate homeostatic satisfactions human beings that practice belief systems of religion, spirituality, and positive emotions. The nineteenth century also gave birth to a concept of “mind-cure,” which referred to the purported healing powers of positive emotions and beliefs, thus eventually giving birth to a historical perspective of positive psychology and later positive psychiatry. Positive Psychiatry is known as the science and practice of psychiatry to understand and promote well-being utilizing the positive psychological characteristics of resilience, optimism, contentment, altruism, integrity, and intimacy in people who suffer from or are at high risk of developing mental or physical illness. Spirituality and religion are understandably known to be the components of individual positive psychological traits. Spirituality and the religions including Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Sikhism, Jainism, and Buddhism enhance positivity, positive psychology, prosocial behaviors, social relationships, and alleviation of clinical symptoms in psychiatric discord.