Spirituality and Aging

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 Spirituality and Aging
   

r o b e rt c . atc h l e y

The Johns Hopkins University Press

Baltimore
 © 2009 The Johns Hopkins University Press
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Atchley, Robert C.
Spirituality and aging / Robert C. Atchley.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN-13: 978-0-8018-9119-9 (hardcover : alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 0-8018-9119-1 (hardcover : alk. paper)
1. Spirituality. 2. Spiritual biography. 3. Older people—Religious life.
I. Title.
BL624.A795 2009
204.084´6—dc22 2008020970

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Illustration on page 95 is by Melissa S. Atchley.

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To Awakened Being, with gratitude
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 Contents

Preface ix
Acknowledgments xv

Introduction: Setting the Stage 1

part i ba sic fr a me s of referenc e

1 The Nature of Spiritual Experience 13

2 Spiritual Development 29

3 Spirituality, Spiritual Self, and Spiritual Identity 46

part ii spirit ual journe ying

4 Becoming a Sage and a Spiritual Elder:

Transpersonal Psychology 73

5 Transpersonal Sociology and Serving from Spirit 91

part iii e x a mple s using an e xpanded vie w

6 Continuity, Spiritual Growth, and Coping in

Later Adulthood 109

7 Spiritual Beliefs and Practices and the Experience of

Time and Aging 121

8 Spirituality and the Experience of Dying and Death 133

Conclusion: Summary, Reflections, and Implications 145

 viii contents

Appendix A. Spirituality Inventory 161

Appendix B. Questions for Reflection and
Spiritual Self-Assessment 183
Notes 187
References 191
Index 197
 Preface

People over 40 are primary consumers of literature, workshops, retreats, and

personal growth programs concerning spirituality. “Spiritual life” is a major
focus and motivator for large numbers of the people gerontologists seek to
study, serve, and design programs and policies for. Yet gerontology as a field of
knowledge and practice has lagged far behind its target population in under-
standing the importance of spirituality for aging people and developing com-
plex concepts and language about spirituality. In this book I illustrate some
ways of thinking about and discussing spirituality—what it is, why it is impor-
tant, and how spirituality influences the experience of aging and vice versa. I
hope to create a large conceptual/theoretical/experiential space within which
readers can effectively understand, communicate, and study spirituality and
aging.
The term spirituality refers to an inner field of human experience. It is a
capacity that can grow enormously over time. Many of the most spiritually
developed human beings are older men and women.
Spirituality has great potential as a vital region of continued psychological
and social growth throughout adulthood. Most adults have had experiences
they would label spiritual, and most see themselves as being on a spiritual
journey. Perspectives on spirituality are often couched in the language and
culture of various religious traditions, but since the 1960s a body of concepts,
language, and theory concerning spirituality has developed in American cul-
ture that allows us to communicate, across religious boundaries, about spiri-
tuality as a topic in its own right. This language focuses on the spiritual expe-
riences, aspirations, and resources we share as human beings.
This book is about what spirituality is, how it develops, and how it inter-
acts with aging. It provides a conceptual map of this territory and orients
the reader to spiritual development and what it means to be on a conscious
spiritual journey. It will be useful to scholars who wish to study or teach about
 x pr e fa c e

spirituality and aging and to those who wish to address the spiritual needs of
aging people. I hope it will also be of use to individuals interested in spiritual
growth, especially in middle and later life. The book attempts to clarify con-
cepts and provide a theoretical framework that can advance understanding of
this topic, which is so important to so many aging people.

the origins of the book

I believe I have an obligation to give readers an opportunity to see this book as

an outgrowth of my thirty-year interest in spirituality and aging. Please bear
with me here; the account is somewhat detailed and the trail may seem wind-
ing, but each part of it is important in the continuous expansion and integra-
tion of my understanding of what spirituality is and how it relates to aging.
I have been interested in spiritual experience since I was a young boy, but
my conscious spiritual journey did not begin until the mid-1970s, when I was
about 35. At that time I began a systematic study of the literature in the field
of spirituality, and I found this field rich in perspectives and insights but also
confusing. At this point I was about ten years into my academic career teach-
ing gerontology, doing gerontology research, and writing articles, mono-
graphs, and textbooks in gerontology.
I was struck by the extent to which research and teaching about adult de-
velopment and aging had ignored spiritual concerns. Many people I encoun-
tered in my research and on my personal spiritual journey were elders who
had been consciously nurturing their spiritual capacities for many decades
and for whom spirituality was a strong motivating force in their lives, a sig-
nificant anchor for lifestyle decision making, and an important resource in
coping with what life brought.
By 1980, I had collected enough scholarly material on spiritual develop-
ment to begin to include this subject in my graduate course on adult psy-
chosocial development. I also began to include questions on spirituality in
my twenty-year longitudinal study of aging and adaptation (Atchley 1999).
Steadily, for more than a decade, I developed a fluency with the emerging
nonreligious vocabulary on spirituality, because I saw this language as a key
for communicating about spirituality while avoiding the experience of divi-
sion that often accompanies the use of religious concepts and language about
spirituality in interfaith or secular settings.
In 1992, I attended a conference called “Conscious Aging,” which was spon-
sored by the Omega Institute and featured speakers such as Ram Dass and
 pr e fa c e xi

Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, from the world of spiritual awakening and

development, and Maggie Kuhn, Rick Moody, and Thomas Cole, from the
world of gerontology. I was invited by the Omega staff to be part of a think
tank, “The Future of Conscious Aging,” in the summer of 1995. As a concept,
conscious aging did not mean being aware of one’s aging; it meant aging in a
spiritually awakened state.
In that time period I also began publishing my ideas about spirituality
and spiritual development. I published articles on spiritual development and
wisdom (Atchley 1993) and the everyday nature of spiritual development in
later life (Atchley 1997a), and I added material on the nature of spirituality
and spiritual development and its relationship to aging in the eighth edition
of my gerontology textbook, Social Forces and Aging (Atchley 1997b). I also
published the results of my longitudinal study, which showed that the impor-
tance of spiritual development increased over time (Atchley 1999). This study
is mentioned at several points in this book.
I have adapted three previously published articles for this volume: “The
Influence of Spiritual Beliefs and Practices on the Relation between Time and
Aging” (Atchley 2001), which appears as Chapter 7; “Becoming a Spiritual
Elder” (Atchley 2003), which is part of Chapter 4; and “Continuity, Spiritual
Growth, and Coping in Later Adulthood” (Atchley 2006), which is Chapter 6.
I mention this background to make three points: (1) I have been working in
the field of aging for forty years and the field of spirituality and spiritual devel-
opment for thirty years; (2) I have expended much effort researching, talking
with people, contemplating, and writing about spirituality and aging; and (3) I
have sought feedback on my work from others who have also been writing on
spirituality—from students, from professionals working in the field of aging,
and from members of the general public who are interested in the subject of
spirituality and aging.
I did not develop my ideas and language about spirituality and aging sit-
ting in an “ivory tower.” I developed them using an open-feedback system in
which I read and contemplated, interviewed aging people, listened to sages,
observed aging people in a variety of environments, meditated, wrote sum-
maries and tentative conclusions, took those imperfect insights out into the
field and got feedback (by no means uniformly positive), and went back to the
drawing board over and over again. I have readjusted my frames of reference
and information base many times over the course of this journey. A main
challenge is to stay open to discovery. The more I can keep my attachments to
my own ideas loose, the greater the possibility for new clarity to appear.
 xii pr e fa c e

This book is an attempt to share what I have learned as of 2008. No doubt

I have much more to learn, but I have a well-tested and serviceable picture of
the complexity and grandeur and struggles involved in the spiritual region of
human life and how this region influences aging, and vice versa.
During the period when these ideas were developing, I was myself growing
older. When I began teaching and writing about spirituality, I was in my 40s,
and as I put the finishing touches on this book early in 2008, I am 68. This
is not a necessary qualification for understanding the subject of this book,
but my personal experiences of both spirituality and aging provide me with
a depth and richness of experience that I think has made me a better, more
tuned-in reader, listener, and participant. Living with the concepts and lan-
guage of spirituality for such a long time has affected what I perceive in texts
I read, conversations I hear, and experiences I have. I am much more aware
now of the layers that lie within texts and the high degree to which adequate
interpretation depends on a deep background in the subject. I think it is no
accident that, for centuries, philosophical and spiritual wisdom has mostly
been the province of people with a lot of life experience with the subject.

the pl an of the book

The Introduction provides an overview of the book and some orienting dis-
cussion of the concepts and language that are used to describe and discuss
spirituality.
Part One consists of three chapters that provide basic frames of reference
for our examination of spirituality and aging. Chapter 1 deals with the nature
of spirituality, from its beginnings in pure being and transcendence, to the
various avenues through which spiritual being manifests itself, to qualities
that typify spiritual experiences, to how spirituality influences experience in
many aspects of life. Chapter 2 looks at spiritual development as an evolution-
ary process that can occur both naturally and consciously. It considers spiri-
tual development in the context of adult development generally and looks
at ways in which spiritual development illustrates the higher possibilities of
adult development. Chapter 3 focuses on spiritual identity and on the spiritual
self and how it differs from the objective self, which comprises self-concept,
self-ideal, and self-esteem.
Part Two focuses on two dimensions of spirituality that are especially likely
to emerge and ripen in later life: becoming a sage and serving from spirit.
Becoming a sage is about the development of a capacity to bring spiritual
 pr e fa c e xiii

perspective to everyday issues. Chapter 4 considers ways in which people

consciously and nonconsciously evolve into a type of transpersonal psychol-
ogy that makes wisdom possible. Chapter 5 looks at how aging and spiritual
development intersect to create opportunities for a different kind of service,
a service rooted in spiritual being. It also describes how organizations might
operate from principles of transpersonal sociology to match the transper-
sonal psychology of the organization’s members.
Part Three consists of three chapters that illustrate how spirituality and
spiritual development interact with other specific aspects of life. Chapter 6
looks at how continuity theory and conceptions of spiritual development can
be combined to better understand how people cope with opportunities and
constraints that arise in later life. Chapter 7 takes on a relatively specific topic:
how spiritual beliefs and practices influence age changes in the experience of
time. Chapter 8 looks at how spirituality and aging influence the experience
of dying and death.
In the Conclusion, I look back over the examination of spirituality and
aging, summarize and reflect on what we have discovered, and draw implica-
tions for future study, education, and practice within the field of aging.
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 Acknowledgments

My recent books have begun with a nudge from my wife and colleague, Sheila
Atchley. Sheila is more familiar than anyone with what I am thinking about
and studying, and at some point in my process Sheila will say, “I think you
need to write a book about that.” So it was with spirituality and aging. The
positive value of Sheila’s steady appreciation of my work is immeasurable.
Susan McFadden has encouraged my work on spirituality and aging since
the early 1990s. She is an astute sounding board and skilled critic who ap-
preciates what I have to say and unerringly helps me say it better. She cre-
ated several opportunities for me to participate in conferences and write book
chapters that prodded me into thinking more clearly about spirituality and
aging. For this book, she gave me a great deal of specific feedback that helped
me flesh out and organize my ideas and examples.
Harry “Rick” Moody has also been supportive. Beginning with our time
together on the Omega Institute’s “Conscious Aging Think Tank” in the mid-
1990s, Rick and I have traveled parallel paths in the area of spirituality and
aging, although we look at different scenery at times. Rick has been generous
in creating opportunities for me to participate in a variety of conferences and
projects in which I have learned a great deal about the subject of this book.
Rick wrote a detailed critique of this book manuscript, one that challenged
and helped me to clarify points and make it more accessible.
Wendy Harris, at the Johns Hopkins University Press, listened with en-
couragement and interest to several iterations of my ideas about a book on
spirituality and aging. She has a knack for raising the right questions and
issues to expand or clarify my thinking. She was helpful in organizing the
book.
I also want to acknowledge and thank the many people who participated
in my research studies and in several study groups I observed over the years. I
thank those who attended my presentations and asked good questions, those
 xvi acknowledgments

who challenged my ideas (of these there were many), and those who allowed
me into their lives for a little while so that I could ground my ideas in some
semblance of reality. Without these hundreds of people, I would not have
experienced directly the diversity and richness that is the field of spirituality
and aging.
I have learned much from my twelve years of participation in Quaker Meet-
ings, first in Oxford, Ohio, and later in Boulder, Colorado. The Quaker culture
of inner discovery, spiritual seeking in community, and transpersonal group
process has informed important aspects of my understanding of spirituality
and aging. Also, wise and spiritual elders are prevalent in these communities,
and they helped me identify what to look for in people who exemplify the
higher stages of spiritual development.
Spirituality and Aging
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Introduction
Setting the Stage

This book considers fundamental questions about the meaning of being and
how it is shaped by the experience of aging. The following general questions
guided my study of spirituality and aging:

— What is spirituality?
— What makes an experience “spiritual”?
— What does it mean to grow spiritually?
— How does spirituality affect identity and self?
— What is the nature of a spiritual journey?
— How does confidence and trust in a spiritual process develop?
— How does spirituality manifest itself in everyday life?
— What does it mean to build a life around spiritual concerns?
— How are these questions shaped by and how do they influence the experi-
ence of aging?

First and foremost, spirituality is a region of human experience. Without

our own inner experience of the spiritual region of life, talk about spirituality
is akin to science fiction. We can imagine what spiritual experience might be
like, but that is by no means the same as having the experience. Later on, we
will see that spiritual experiences have qualities that set them apart from other
experiences, qualities such as wonder, compassion, or clarity. Spiritual experi-
ences occur through a variety of avenues, such as our senses, consciousness/
awareness, or thought. The spiritual region of human experience is valuable
in its own right to most people, and it can also influence other aspects of life,
such as human development, personal history, and personal goals.
As a viewpoint or vantage point, spirituality can take three basic forms:
  spirit ualit y and aging

intense awareness of the present, transcendence of the personal self, or a feel-

ing of connection with all of life, the universe, a supreme being, or a great web
of being. Most people grow into these perspectives in a succession or upward
spiral of increasing understanding we call spiritual development or spiritual
growth. Many come to recognize that these vantage points are interrelated
and can reside in awareness simultaneously.
As a topic of discussion, the inner experience I am calling spirituality was
called “private religion” in the early twentieth century (James 1905), and it was
assumed that religion offered the major, if not the only, pathway to this type
of experience. But during the 1950s it became increasingly clear that many
people had spiritual experiences without benefit of religion, so calling these
experiences “religious” did not make much sense. There was also a trend
at this time toward mistrust of institutional religion, which discounted reli-
gion’s authority in the area of inner experience. “You may well tell me what I
ought to think, but you can’t tell me what I do think.”
At about that same time, there was a revival of the ancient idea that we all
have an innate potential for spiritual experience that can be developed into a
capacity. This idea, combined with the idea that we exert influence over our
own development, fueled an interest in spiritual development as a personal
goal. Thus, people began to speak about their “spiritual journey” as an inten-
tional direction for spiritual development and to express a preference for a
lifestyle that supports such a journey.
The concept of a spiritual journey refers to an individual’s personal nar-
rative about her or his spiritual life and its development, including its ups
and downs. This narrative usually includes a history of experiences, actions,
and insights connected with a search for spiritual meaning. Underlying the
spiritual journey is an intentional process of seeking spiritual experiences,
using spiritual values and insights to inform life choices, and learning from
experience with this process. The spiritual journey for most people involves
bringing spirituality ever more completely into consciousness and learning to
be consciously aware of the spiritual aspects of most human experiences.
Spiritual journeys also involve learning to persist and be content on a jour-
ney into imperfectly known territory, where insights are always limited, no
matter how profound they may seem at the time. People who have been on a
spiritual journey for decades usually have developed a sense of humor about
the contradictions and paradoxes they encounter, even as they use these enig-
mas as food for contemplation. People also learn not to force the issue. Wait-
ing is an important spiritual practice—not “waiting for” but just waiting. In
 introduction 

the space created by patient waiting, connection with the sacred, or “ground
of being,” is more likely.
Most spiritual journeys also involve elements of commitment, self-disci-
pline, and regular spiritual practice. I will discuss these elements in detail
later, but I mention them to round out the picture of spiritual journeys.
In his insightful review of social change in spiritual thought and behav-
ior in the last half of the twentieth century, Robert Wuthnow (1998) argues
that spirituality in America shifted from a religion-centered “spirituality of
dwelling” toward a person-centered “spirituality of seeking” and later toward
a personal “spirituality of practice.” Spirituality of dwelling “emphasizes hab-
itation: God occupies a definite place in the universe and creates a sacred
space in which humans too can dwell; to inhabit sacred space is to know its
territory and to feel secure” (3–4). A spirituality of dwelling emphasizes the
security available from firm adherence to doctrine and worship primarily in
awe-inspiring edifices and rituals. A spirituality of dwelling also emphasizes
unchanging doctrine, ritual, and organizational structure. Comfort, security,
and answers come from predictability.
By contrast, a spirituality of seeking emphasizes journeying and negotia-
tion. On a journey, we never know exactly what we will confront, but we have
to remain aware of our needs and pay attention to opportunities to make
effective decisions. Spiritual journeying requires that an individual learn to
negotiate a landscape filled with “complex and confusing meanings of spiri-
tuality” (ibid., 4). On the spiritual journey, we never have perfect maps, so we
need an enduring set of questions that will allow us to discover the ground of
being in that time and place. We try to “live the questions” (Rilke 2002, 21).
Wuthnow (1998) says that a spirituality of seeking is especially likely to
emerge in unsettled times, and this may explain why people who came of
age in the late 1950s and thereafter tended to be more receptive to and inter-
ested in a spirituality of seeking. The environment of seeking occurs in mind-
boggling diversity, ranging from sparkling new megachurches, to revitalized
traditional congregations, to informal Sunday-morning meetings in unused
bars, to solitary journeys made mostly in silence. People seek in the kind of
environment in which they feel nurtured and nourished, and most people
seek the company of kindred spirits.
Wuthnow (1998) argues that most people live a life that balances dwelling
and seeking. They like both the security of dwelling and the openness of seek-
ing. He also sees an emerging practice-oriented spirituality that emphasizes a
practice-oriented life, which, come what may, provides an ongoing, constant
  spirit ualit y and aging

commitment to doing the hard work of nurturing spirituality. Thus, we be-

come what we do, and returning to spiritual practice over and over again cre-
ates habits of mind and habits of being that come to seem natural. But because
these spiritual practices are most often part of an open context of spiritual
seeking rather than a closed system of doctrine and ritual, these habits can
become enlivening instead of stifling. Spiritual practices are things we do on
a regular basis to celebrate, appreciate, nurture, and act on our experiences
of presence, transcending the personal self, and connecting directly with the
sacred. Many types of meditation and prayer, devotional rituals and music,
inspirational reading and reflection, and movement-oriented spiritual disci-
plines, such as labyrinth walking, yoga, and tai chi, can be mixed and matched
to support a contemplative, practice-oriented spirituality.
There are many spiritual traditions, each of which has its own unique lan-
guage and concepts concerning the nature of the ultimate, the path that must
be followed to experience the ultimate, how spiritual realizations are con-
firmed, the nature of spiritual enlightenment, and the implications of spiri-
tual understanding for ordinary human life. Although it would be a mistake
to gloss over the importance of the differences this variety produces, each
of the major faith groups—Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, Taoism,
Hinduism—is rooted in the profound, direct, authentic mystical experiences
of its founder(s). Moses, Jesus, Buddha, and Muhammad all are reported to
have attained their spiritual messages at least initially through a profound
mystical experience that happened in solitude. The contemporary surge in
inner exploration may in many cases be an attempt by individuals to experi-
ence those insights for themselves, to move beyond a second-hand notion of
spirituality as something that must be channeled by the clergy or other spiri-
tual authority figures toward authentic, independent, and direct experiences
of spirituality. In meditation and prayer, learning to dwell in silence can play
an important part in creating an inner opening for spiritual experience. Such
inner explorations can take place in the context of traditional religious groups
or alternative groups that take a more universalistic view of the spiritual jour-
ney. Some make their spiritual journey alone, following the inner light.
There is considerable evidence that spiritual concerns, experience, and de-
velopment become increasingly important for many people in middle and
later life. This evidence can be found in the narratives of individuals as well
as in social science surveys (Atchley and Barusch 2004). Beginning around
age 35 or 40, as age increases, so does the proportion of people who are con-
 introduction 

sciously involved in an inner exploration of the meaning of their existence and

their relation to the universe. Albert Winseman (2003) reported that adults
age 65 or older were more than twice as likely to see themselves as spiritu-
ally committed than were adults age 45–54. Spiritually committed people are
often engaged in spiritual practices that heighten the possibility of noume-
nous, mystical experience. In addition, those who experience transcendent,
nonpersonal levels of consciousness often feel called to serve, and spiritually
rooted service takes many forms.
The study of aging developed at a time when our cultural conceptions
about the spiritual region of life were shifting from a religion-oriented con-
cept rooted in scripture and traditional rituals to a personal responsibility
concept based in experience, choice, and personal discipline. Most of the re-
search on spirituality and aging has been conducted from a religion-oriented
conception of spirituality. But the population of elders is increasingly made
up of individuals who see themselves as having been on a personal spiritual
journey of many years’ duration. It is time to devise a viable framework for
studying spirituality that reflects the concepts about spirituality that are being
used by the people we study. I hope in this book to provide the beginnings of
such a framework.
Spirituality is a popular topic in the United States at present. For exam-
ple, in November 2007 the online bookseller Amazon.com listed more than
130,000 book titles having to do with spirituality. Although most authors
seem comfortable writing about spirituality, only a few attempt to define it
specifically.
That so many writers “talk around” the topic of spirituality rather than
meet it head-on is, I think, a reflection of the nature of the spiritual region
of life. Many years ago the sociologist Herbert Blumer made a useful distinc-
tion between denotative and sensitizing concepts. Denotative concepts refer
to an observable part of life. For example, church attendance is a denotative
concept; it has a concrete referent. Sensitizing concepts, on the other hand,
do not point to something specific or concrete but instead deal with qualities
to be sensitive to if we want to observe or communicate about a general field
or region. In my view, spirituality is a concept that sensitizes us to a region of
human experience and tells us generally what to look for in that region, but
no concept can tell us what specific combination of qualities and avenues of
spiritual experience will be present in any given spiritual experience.
Sensitizing concepts can be discussed with our usual discursive language,
  spirit ualit y and aging

but the metaphors of parables or poetic thought are often more effective,
because metaphors suggest rather than direct what is to be seen. Take, for
example, this poem by Rumi (Barks 1995, 36):

Out beyond ideas . . . there is a field. I’ll meet you there.

When the soul lies down in that grass, the world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase each other doesn’t make any sense.

Where is this field beyond thought? Whom will we meet there? If each other
doesn’t make any sense, what does? This poetic statement engages and chal-
lenges and opens us differently than analytic thought does.
Compare Rumi’s poem with this discursive statement by Roger Walsh
(1999, 3): “Spirituality . . . refers to direct experience of the sacred.” Walsh’s
statement is meaningful, provided we know what the sacred is, but in my
opinion it does not invite the experience it defines to the same extent that
Rumi’s poem does. I have found that poetry and metaphorical stories are of-
ten more effective than discursive text as stimuli for discussions of spirituality,
perhaps because poetry and metaphors invite deeper unstated feelings and
needs into the conversation.
If we are to see spirituality as a holistic region of human experience, then
we need to employ many more methods than usual. Our empirical, concep-
tual, and analytical capacities must be augmented by humanistic capacities
such as contemplation, rumination, imagination, and intuition.
Nevertheless, we still need some basic vocabulary to begin with, and dic-
tionary definitions are a good place to start. For example, in the American
Heritage Dictionary (2006), spirituality is defined as “the state, quality, or
fact of being spiritual.” Spiritual is defined as “of, relating to, or consisting of,
or having the nature of spirit.” Spirit is defined as “one’s unseen, intangible
being.” Being is defined as “existence.” Thus, spirituality is rooted in our pur-
est experience of existence, the “I Am” without words, just awareness. As
experience, pure being does not require an object (I am this or I am that),
and it exists prior to, and as a prerequisite for, all other experiences, including
time and space. As such, spirituality in its purest form is an inner, subjective
experience. Pure, nonverbal experience of being is the spiritual field within
which occur the mindfulness and present-moment awareness of Buddhists,
the Christ-consciousness of Christians, the witness-consciousness of Hindus,
the awe so prized by Jews, and the ecstatic consciousness of Muslims.
As experience, spirituality as being may or may not be related to experi-
ence of a higher or greater or deeper power. George Gallup (2003) reported
 introduction 

that almost a third of a national sample of adults defined spirituality without

reference to a higher power. Most people consider spirituality to be related
to a big picture because of the common experience that one’s own being is
linked to a larger web of being, an experience that one is not alone but is part
of something much greater than individual existence. This experience is usu-
ally based in an intuitive form of knowing. This is where Walsh’s concept of
spirituality as direct experience of the sacred comes in, if sacred is defined as
that which is considered holy, given reverence, respect, and wonder, and is
derived from a divine source (adapted from the American Heritage Dictionary
2006). Cultural differences lead this experienced linkage between the “I Am”
and the great web of being to be described or articulated in many different
ways, based on language and history.
When an individual makes a shift from experiencing personal existence
as a solitary being to experiencing existence as part of a larger being or web
of being, then transcendence can be said to have occurred. Not all forms of
transport are transcendence. For example, it is quite possible for awareness
to increase markedly in intensity without making the profound shift in level
of consciousness that occurs when one touches or merges with what Aldous
Huxley (1944, viii) called the “immanent and transcendent Ground of all be-
ing.” (Paul Tillich [1967] can be credited with introducing American culture
to the concept “ground of being” as a way of conceiving of God that goes be-
yond the personified conceptions of God prevalent in American religion and
popular culture at the time.)
We usually experience spirituality not in an inner vacuum of pure exis-
tence but in the context of acting in some way, even if that action is deep
contemplation while sitting relatively still. Undoubtedly, pure being is present
underneath everything we do. If we are not experiencing being, how can we
experience anything else?
The spiritual journey can be seen as a quest for balance between being and
doing. In the process of learning to function in the social worlds into which
we are born—family, work, community, society, and so on—many people be-
come overly focused on acting within the context of socially defined positions
and roles, their attention is absorbed by this social world, and they lose sight
of the liberating “qualities of being” that are there also. We learn to identify
with our niches, actions, and lifestyles rather than with our more fundamental
being. The spiritual journey is often about learning to bring being back into
our consciousness. People are often motivated toward this sort of journey by
their feeling that something is missing from their conventional role-centered
  spirit ualit y and aging

lives. For many people, learning to bring being back into consciousness in-
troduces a healthy distance from, and perspective on, social roles and also a
needed element of creativity and spontaneity to one’s lived experience.
As we try to understand the interaction between spirituality and other as-
pects of life, we discover that these relationships are at least as complicated
as everything else in our lives and may involve even more levels of conscious-
ness and awareness than we are accustomed to dealing with. Spirituality is a
difficult and complex topic only because we yearn to integrate it into how we
see our lives. If we were comfortable just letting spirituality run in the sub-
conscious background, we would not have much to do. But if our experience
tells us that being consciously in touch with pure being, self-transcendence,
and the ground of being enhances the quality of our life, and if we want to
understand why this is so, then we are drawn to develop the concepts and
theoretical linkages needed to think and study and communicate about this
important topic. Also, if we want to understand how the spiritual region of life
interacts with aging, we need a good map of the spiritual region.
A major goal of this book is to provide a conceptual and theoretical picture
of spirituality that is much broader, deeper, higher, more interrelated, sym-
phonic, full-spectrum, and panoramic than the narrow views used in much of
the current work on spirituality and aging. It is also important to emphasize
that this book looks at spirituality as a topic separate from religion. Although
many people find that their religious beliefs provide an important and per-
haps exclusive context for experiencing spirituality, as age increases so does
the proportion of people who see spirituality in a broader context than formal
or organized religion (Roof 1999; Zinnbauer et al. 1997). The difference is that,
while many studies emphasize religion with a nod toward spirituality, here I
emphasize spirituality with a nod toward religion. But because most religions
contain language and practices intended to facilitate experiences of pure being
and connection, there will inevitably be points where religion and spirituality
overlap. In everyday life it may not be necessary to disentangle the two, but if
we want to understand spirituality well enough to study it adequately, include
it in our ideas about appropriate practice and service to elders, and avoid un-
necessarily joining it and religion, we need to keep our focus on spirituality
and not on religion. This is in no way a negative statement about religion, but
simply a desire to stick to the subject.
I also avoid religious language as much as possible because I have found
that, although it may be helpful for the in-group, it often activates a sense of
intergroup division and difference. Religious language also usually implies a
 introduction 

specific theological interpretation of spirituality. If we can find ways to base

our dialogues on our experiences of being, self-transcendence, and the ground
of being, stated in language that does not invoke religious concepts, we may
be able to have conversations about spiritual experiences we share instead of
about our different religious concepts.
I must also acknowledge that the words spiritual and spirituality are often
met with open hostility. Interestingly, many people who are hostile toward
the terms are quite able to discuss their experiences of this region of life,
which suggests that their hostility is a response to specific language and the
“baggage” it carries and not to the reality the language was developed to de-
scribe. Unfortunately, I have tried many alternative terms and none escapes
this problem.
Finally, this book is also about how experiences of spirituality interact
with experiences of adult development and aging. This begs the question of
when aging begins. For our purposes, aging is assumed to begin for most
people when they are in their forties. In my longitudinal study of aging and
adaptation (Atchley 1999), a large majority of people said that by age 70 their
inner life had increased in importance compared with when they were 50.
Many people considered spirituality to be a capacity that continues to develop
within a person no matter what happens with aging. Also, spirituality was
cited by many as an important resource for coping with the challenges of ag-
ing. A big portion of this book concerns the evolutionary processes through
which people develop spiritually.
My goal is to provide a systematic treatment of spirituality as a subject in
its own right and to expand the view of spirituality to match the richness and
complexity that it has in the everyday worlds of many middle-aged and older
people.
With this overview of the approach used in this book, we can proceed now
to Part I, which explores the nature of spirituality, how spirituality develops,
and the inter-relationship of spirituality with identity and self.
This page intentionally left blank
 part i

Basic Frames of Reference

   
This page intentionally left blank
 chapter one
   
The Nature of Spiritual Experience

There is no doubt that many people have experiences they label spiritual.
Spirituality can be seen as the capacity to perceive experiences as spiritual. But
what qualifies an experience to be called spiritual? What criteria do people
use? Is spiritual experience something separate from “ordinary” experience
or does spiritual refer to a quality that can accompany many types of experi-
ences? This chapter develops a framework for addressing these questions.
Serious discussion of spirituality as an important aspect of human nature,
the identification of pathways for inner spiritual growth and development,
and reports of direct spiritual experiences have been part of the written cul-
tural legacy of humanity for at least five thousand years (Radhakrishnan 1989).
As mentioned earlier, I am using spirituality to refer to an inner, experiential
region of human life. Spiritual experience can occur at many levels: physical,
emotional, cognitive, and transcendent. Spirituality is a quality that can in-
fuse experience in a wide variety of settings. Spiritual experience can be both
transcendent and immanent: It can be both an experience of transcending
worldly concerns as well as an intense present-moment perception that the
ground of all being permeates things. The essence of fully developed spiritual-
ity is an intense aliveness and deep sense of understanding that one intuitively
comprehends as having come from a direct, internal link with that mysterious
principle that connects all aspects of the universe. As fully awakened spiritual
beings, we feel our interconnectedness.
In most spiritual traditions, mysticism lies at the heart of spirituality. Mys-
ticism refers to transcendent, contemplative experiences that enhance spiri-
tual understanding. Mystical experiences can occur during intentional prac-
tices designed to create conditions conducive to transcendent experiences,
such as Zen meditation, Christian centering prayer, or Sufi dance. Mystical
  basic frames of reference

experiences can also occur in the process of living a lifestyle that is conducive
to transcendent experiences, as in contemplative gardening. In either case,
contemplative or transcendent knowing may be associated with spiritual ex-
perience.
Transcendence refers to contemplative knowing that occurs outside the
boundaries of verbal thought (Wilber 2001). Although transcendence can
refer to increasingly abstract thought (Pascual-Leone 1990), contemplative
transcendence involves transcending thought itself. Mystical experiences
of transcendence can be brought into thought, but they do not originate in
thought or sensory perception.
Organized religions are social groups or social institutions that have both
theological and behavioral doctrines, ministerial or clerical authority, and rit-
ualized social worship. The size, scope, and history of religious organizations
varies enormously. Of course, individual members can and do internalize
both the theological beliefs and behavioral prescriptions and proscriptions
associated with their organized religion. Individuals often find their deepest
spiritual experiences in the context of their religion. But individuals also often
have their own unique interpretations of the tenets of their religion.
The relation of religion and spirituality is in the eye of the beholder. Many
people use religion and spirituality as synonyms and see no difference be-
tween the two terms. Others use religion to refer to a sociocultural program
for developing spiritually and for bringing spiritual realizations into everyday
life, and they use spirituality to refer to the inner experiences that arise from
trying to put such programs into practice. Most people see spirituality as the
broader term, one that includes a greater variety of experiences than they
would include in the term religion. Some people attach little or no impor-
tance to organized religion but at the same time see themselves as spiritual
persons.
Brian Zinnbauer and colleagues (1997) surveyed 346 men and women from
diverse groups, ranging from mental health workers to traditional religious
denomination members to conservative Christians, concerning their inter-
pretation of the terms spirituality and religiousness. Concerning which was
the broader term, 38.8 percent saw spirituality as broader and 10.2 percent
saw religiousness as broader (table 1).
A large majority (74) saw themselves as both spiritual and religious, and
19 percent saw themselves as spiritual but not religious. Only 4 percent saw
themselves as religious but not spiritual, and 3 percent saw themselves as nei-
 t h e n at u r e o f spi r i t ua l e x pe r i e n c e 

table 1
The Relation of Spirituality and Religiousness
Response Percentage
Spirituality and religiousness overlap but are not the same concept .
Spirituality is the broader term .
Religiousness is the broader term .
Spirituality and religiousness do not overlap .
Spirituality and religiousness overlap completely .
Source: Adapted from Zinnbauer et al., 1997.
Note: N = 346

ther. Another way of expressing these findings is that 93 percent saw them-
selves as spiritual and 78 percent saw themselves as religious (table 2).
George Gallup (2003) reported that 75 percent of respondents to a 1999
Gallup Poll saw spirituality as “personal and individual” rather than as involv-
ing “organized religion and church doctrine.”
These findings support the separation of spirituality and religiousness
within the study of subjective aspects of the region of life involving percep-
tions and expressions of the sacred.
As a topic in the study of aging, spirituality has mostly been seen as a part
of religion, despite many surveys showing that many people consider them-
selves to be spiritual but not religious. Harold Koenig (2001, 505), after his
thorough review of the literature on spirituality, wrote that “spirituality is a
broader, more inclusive term than religiosity. Many measures of spirituality
that exist today, however, measure simply religiosity.”
As Robert Wuthnow (1998) pointed out, since the 1950s there has been a
growing tendency to use spiritual to refer to inner experiences and religious
to refer to external experiences connected with organized religion. Many au-
thors who grew up with a religion-centered approach to inner spiritual ex-
periences prefer to use religious to refer to both types of experience (Parga-
ment 1997; Roof 1999; Smith 2001). They try to reduce spirituality to religion
by assuming that any inner experience of the ground of being is religious,
even if the person having the experience is unchurched or lacking in reli-
gious background. Reporting on Gallup Polls conducted annually from 1978
to 1998, Michael Lindsay (2000) found that the percentage of adult Americans
identified as “unchurched”—no membership in a religious community and no
church attendance in the past six months—remained steady at 41–44 percent
throughout the twenty-year period. More to the point, I think, is that words
  basic frames of reference

table 2
Identification with Spirituality and Religiousness
Response Percentage
I am spiritual and religious 
I am spiritual but not religious 
I am religious but not spiritual 
I am neither spiritual nor religious 
Source: Adapted from Zinnbauer et al., 1997.
Note: N = 346

mean what a person takes them to mean, not what authority figures want
them to mean. In today’s world, spiritual is seen by a majority of people to be
a broader term than religious and to refer to an inside-out personal learning
process rather than an outside-in socialization process (Roof 1999).
To begin to grasp the diversity of experiences that qualify as spiritual, I
began about ten years ago to ask people to describe an experience that they
would label spiritual. I have asked this question of hundreds of people, mostly
middle-aged and older. Here is a sampling of responses, selected for their
diversity.
Some people provided an overview.

As I tried to think about your question, I began to wonder if any experi-

ences are not spiritual. If being spiritual is part of our nature, maybe
even the central part, which I believe it is, then as long as we are being,
there is a spiritual element. Whether we are aware of it is another thing.
Man, age 92

I wouldn’t describe any experience as spiritual. That word has never had
much personal meaning for me. I have had experiences that were inspir-
ing, even transcendent, and I don’t know what to call them as a category.
Man, age 80

Life is more and more spiritual all the time. I have an ongoing experience
of being part of a network. It is the backdrop to everything. Sometimes it
is faint, almost not there, when I deal with the logistics of everything that
I am part of and that is part of me. This “tuning in” has become easier
since I moved out of the city. Woman, age 52
 t h e n at u r e o f spi r i t ua l e x pe r i e n c e 

Some found spiritual experiences in religious contexts.

I went with some friends to a revival meeting to hear a well-known

preacher. He was a plain little man who didn’t look well. He greeted each
of us at the door, and I could smell his bad breath. A few minutes later he
stepped up onto a small stage and began to speak about the Holy Spirit.
His air of frailty was gone and he seemed strong and energetic. The ca-
dence of his gravelly voice was hypnotic, like he was inviting the Holy
Spirit. Suddenly, I felt myself expand inside and that expanse was filled
with the warmth and love of the Holy Spirit. Woman, age 46

Others found spiritual experience in nature.

Last year my husband and I traveled to the Grand Canyon for the first
time. As I stood on the South Rim and looked into the great expanse
of the canyon, I was overcome by the massive stillness of the giant rock
formations bearing scars from thousands of years of wind and water. Just
resting with the canyon for a few minutes evoked that stillness in me. It
was a tremendous sense of peace and release. Just thinking about it now
brings that feeling back. Woman, age 67

Some found spiritual experience in relating with others.

When I’m with a group of friends, catching up on each other’s lives, I

often am aware that we are connected by something holy and that holy
connection is what we are really celebrating through all our energetic
talking. Woman, age 49

Others found spiritual experience in doing service.

Periodically I go with a group of friends to our local shelter for the home-
less to prepare the evening meal. The people who come through the food
line are an amazing mixture. Most are in their 30s and 40s and many have
obvious mental problems of one kind or another. Most show the wear
and tear of living on the streets. When I first started doing this, I found it
difficult to be around that much suffering all in one place. The discomfort
I felt made me want to close down, to harden my heart. But I knew some-
how that I needed to do just the opposite, to summon all the reserves
of love I could find and stand there with a heart open to the suffering.
Through this I was able to gently connect spiritually with the people be-
ing served and realize that we are all being served. Woman, age 43
  basic frames of reference

For some, spiritual experience was primarily sensory.

Feeling the hot water on my hands, hearing the sounds of sloshing water,
and seeing the light reflected off the wet dishes are spiritual to me.
Woman, age 80

Others found spiritual experience as part of their work.

I work as a massage therapist, and I often work with people who are vul-
nerable. I was trained to approach my clients with nonjudgmental accep-
tance and attentiveness. It feels to me that when people are on my mas-
sage table, they are exposing themselves in more ways than one, in that
they are trusting me with their self-conscious and imperfect selves, not
just bodily. As I am touching these people, I am often meeting them at a
much deeper level than their skin. I experience more than just meeting
spirit to spirit or soul to soul; the experience feels more like I am, in fact,
not separate from this person but that we are part of a whole.
Woman, age 66

From the diversity of these responses, we can see that spiritual experi-
ence is a big category indeed. Spiritual experience can occur in many differ-
ent types of environment and under a wide variety of circumstances. Even
within the same person, there are usually many avenues for having experi-
ences labeled spiritual. Imagine what would happen if I asked about spiritual
history, spiritual capacity, spiritual states, spiritual practice, spiritual identity,
and spiritual growth. We could expect highly individualized answers to these
questions as well. Quickly we can begin to understand why in-depth study of
the spiritual region of life has seldom been attempted, especially in combina-
tion with other topics, such as aging and adult development.

qualities present in spiritual experiences

Let us now consider in detail some important aspects of spiritual experience,

again using respondents’ accounts to illustrate. First, what are the qualities
that differentiate spiritual experiences from other experiences? Here are some
examples, which by no means exhaust all the possibilities.

Deep inner silence, stillness, peace—pure being

I recently attended a workshop on walking the labyrinth. The leader had
laid out a canvas replica of the labyrinth from Chartres cathedral. Grego-
 t h e n at u r e o f spi r i t ua l e x pe r i e n c e 

rian chants were playing softly in the background. There was a faint smell
of incense mixed with fresh flowers. As I began to walk the labyrinth, I
was aware that I had to pay attention to the path painted on the canvas
and that I was uncomfortable with the sharp turns, but soon I got used to
it and just slowly walked. Then I sort of “zoned out” for a time and when
I came out of it I was in the center of the labyrinth. I sat cross-legged on
the floor for a long time and was filled with a comforting sense that I was
“home.” Woman, age 64

Mental clarity: seeing, interpreting, and discerning meaning

In an airport bookstore in Anaheim, California, I picked up a little book
called The Impersonal Life, a transcript of a divine message received by
a man named Joseph Benner. I had never heard of him, but the book
looked interesting. On the plane, I read: “Be still—and know—i am—
god.” I had read the words “Be still and know that I am God” many times
in the Bible, but the cadence and emphasis here was different. It sug-
gested that if I could be still within myself and focus on the “I Am” part of
my experience, then I might directly experience God, and that would lead
me to know God. That phrase has remained with me to this day. I have
found it to be true, and trying to pay attention to the “I Am” is central to
my spiritual life. Man, age 60

Insight: sudden flashes of knowledge

In the fall of 1991 my grandmother died at age 88. About three months
later, I had a dream that I was a little boy sitting on her lap. I was aware
that I was no longer a little boy and that she was no longer living. As she
stroked my shoulder, as she often did, she said, “There is love, there is for-
giveness, and then there is peace.” I woke up with a feeling that my grand-
mother had given me an incredible blessing. Those words have stuck with
me, and I have made them into a personal mantra. Man, age 42

Compassion: universal love in the face of suffering

My best friend was dying, and she was in a great deal of physical pain. I
visited her each day, and to be present with her, instead of distancing my-
self from her pain by daydreaming, I had to muster all of the love I could
find. Only limitless love allowed me to be present for that amount of pain.
My friend and I met in that love each day. Man, age 52
  basic frames of reference

Connection with the ground of being 

I was driving down a country road on a sunny day, actually not thinking
but just seeing the passing scenery. Gradually I became aware that the
trees, the grass, the wildflowers, the sky, the road, and the car all began to
shimmer with light. It was as if there was so much light within everything
that it couldn’t be contained, and the vividness of it was exhilarating. I
realized that I, and everything around me, was completely permeated by
God. Man, age 67

Transcendence of personal self

I had inadvertently said something in a meeting that made my boss really
mad. At the end of the meeting he said through clenched teeth, “I need
to chat with you in my office now!” Unexpectedly, I felt a lack of fear. It
was as if I was outside myself watching. In his office, he threw a major
tantrum. I sat there calmly and quietly and did not respond in my usual
defensive way. When he finally ran out of steam, I said, “I understand
that you are angry about what happened, and I will not do that again.” He
said, “Well, OK.” By my being able to stand outside my own feelings about
what had happened, a situation that could have been ugly was neutral-
ized. Man, age 46

Nature is a fantastic teacher for me, and hiking is my religion. Leaving
our fast-paced world behind, I walk in nature, overwhelmed by its maj-
esty, and I just stop. Nature takes me outside myself and my personal
concerns to focus on something much, much bigger and grander.
Man, age 58

Wonder
When I was eight, I spent the summer on a cousin’s remote farm in the
mountains of middle Tennessee. One of my chores was to shoo the cow
and a couple of mules from the barnyard down a steep path to a spring
about a quarter of a mile away. I did this twice each day. The morning
run usually started at first light, just before sunrise. I would get up when
I heard the birds, and by the time I dressed, ate a cold biscuit, and got to
the barn there was plenty of light. Our little caravan usually moved pretty
slowly over the side of the steep mountain and would get to the spring
just about sunrise. I would sit on a stump while the animals drank and
 t h e n at u r e o f spi r i t ua l e x pe r i e n c e 

look at the sun coming through hundred-foot-high oak trees and be com-
pletely awestruck by the grandeur of nature. Man, age 72

Inexpressibility
I look at my face in the mirror and see the ravages of time and gravity, the
tracks of much laughter and some sadness, and the twinkle of the infinite
in the eyes. I wink and smile. Man, age 73

Mystery
When I first began to lose my hearing, I was frustrated that I could no
longer effortlessly participate in things. I often didn’t know what was go-
ing on because I couldn’t hear the discussion or directions or whatever. I
tried reading lips but never really got the hang of it. Then I began trying
to simply “be” with the people—to merely be there with them, to look
gently into their eyes, to sense their energy. It was an amazingly pleasant
experience, and I would often smile a little, which seemed to make people
relax. My world is mostly silent now, and I have lots of friends to guide
me through it safely. Man, age 85

Paradox
When I finally let go of my strong attachment to growing spiritually, I
grew much faster than I had before. Woman, age 48

Immateriality and intangibility

I was hiking alone in the mountains, going up a winding trail that steadily
rose up the north side of a steep wooded slope. I came to a switchback
in the trail that crossed a rocky creek bed. The creek was running full
and I stooped to feel the ice-cold water from the spring melting of the
snow pack. I sat on a large rock and listened to the soothing sound of the
rushing water, the chirping of birds, and the wind in the trees. The creek
banks were teeming with mosses and wildflowers of many colors. I sat
there for several minutes taking it all in. Then it dawned on me, “This is a
holy place.” It was holy because it drew from me feelings of deep tender-
ness, awe, and warm appreciation. I sat there for twenty minutes or so,
then with a feeling of deep fulfillment, I happily walked back the way I
had come. Woman, age 68
  basic frames of reference

Motivation to focus on one’s spiritual journey

A few years ago I attended a meditation retreat in Indianapolis. After
some brief instructions, we spent three hours sitting on the floor, each of
us silently repeating a personal mantra. During this time, I struggled to
concentrate, and when my mind would wander, it was an effort to gently
bring my attention back to the mantra. The morning session was followed
by about twenty minutes of chanting. The afternoon meditation session
was to be another three hours. About a half-hour into the afternoon ses-
sion, I felt my awareness leaving the mantra, but the mind was nowhere
to be seen. I was awake and alert but there were no body sensations or
thoughts. This was a blissful experience, relaxed and peaceful. I remained
in this state for most of the afternoon session. I have experienced this
many times since, but that was my first time. Woman, age 52

Transformation
After I finished my first yoga class, I got into my car and had a strong
impression that something big was happening to me. The rest of that day
I was aware of what was happening in each moment in a way that I had
never been before. I was intensely aware—of the scents in the building,
the skin of my fingers on my computer keyboard, the amazing sound of
my breathing. It was incredible to recognize and be present to everything
that was happening and most of all to realize that everything had an im-
pact on me. Woman, age 36

To be defined as spiritual, experiences do not necessarily have to have all

of the qualities illustrated above. Some spiritual experiences consist mainly of
wonder and feelings of connection, others are primarily experiences of com-
passion, and others are mainly of silence, space, and intangibility.

avenues of spiritual experience

So where do we look in our being for these qualities? There are many avenues
or channels through which we receive spiritual experiences. Here are some
avenues and typical spiritual experiences we might have through those av-
enues, again illustrated by examples from my respondents.
 t h e n at u r e o f spi r i t ua l e x pe r i e n c e 

Physical: deep peace, quietude, and stillness; goose bumps

When I was nine, I usually went to church alone. My mother’s only day
off work was Sunday, and my grandmother was in ill health. I would get
to church an hour or more before anything started so that I could be
alone in the big sanctuary, with its smells of old hymnals, candles, and
wood polish. The early-morning sun through the stained-glass windows
cast beautiful patterns on the walls, and there was real stillness there.
Man, age 69

Sensory: esthetic wonder (art, music, nature)

A friend of mine died, and I attended his funeral, which was held in a
Methodist church. I had attended church regularly as a teenager and had
sung in the church choir, so I knew many hymns. As we rose and began
to sing a familiar hymn, I became so choked up I could barely continue to
sing. I felt a great opening of spirit. I don’t think it was the words of the
hymn that brought on this experience so much as the resonance and har-
mony of all the voices that drew me to a sacred space within myself.
Woman, age 64

I was playing my guitar, trying out a new chord progression, when the
sound and rhythm clicked my mind into a new gear and my awareness
into another type of consciousness in which I was just playing and was
with that song and only that song. Man, age 32

Consciousness/Awareness: intense presence and

transcendent spaciousness
The degree to which I am present, whether it is in gardening, giving
a hug, dancing, communing with nature, or making love, determines
whether the experience is “spiritual” or not. All experiences are spiritual
if that is one’s orientation! Woman, age 47

The summer after first grade, I attended a vacation Bible school, and at
the conclusion of the week the kids put on a program for parents. I was
an enthusiastic singer (read loud), and I was given a solo to sing, This Lit-
tle Light of Mine. As I sang I realized that I was singing about something
that was actually within me. I could feel it. Seventy years later, that feeling
is still there. Man, age 76
  basic frames of reference

Thought: integrative, holistic 

When I was a boy, I attended a boarding school where we spent great en-
ergy memorizing psalms. Now I am old, hard of hearing, and blind, and I
find great pleasure in being able to recall these psalms from my memory.
I sometimes feel moved to recite a psalm for friends, and I am so at home
with the text that I feel I can go beyond the text to touch the source from
which the psalm came. Man, age 89

Relational: social access to feelings of spiritual connection

My mother and I had had an uneasy relationship for most of my life. On
the one hand, I felt much loved by her, but on the other hand, no one,
including me, ever eluded her critical eye. One day we were having one of
our “knock-down, drag-out” exchanges when suddenly we stopped talk-
ing, looked at each other for a long moment, and simultaneously broke
into raucous laughter. We realized how wonderfully connected we were
at a deep, deep level that was completely untouched by the melodrama
we created. Our disagreements were never the same after that. They had
a new underlying gentleness and much less edge. Man, age 40

A few weeks ago, I was contemplating the energy of all the generations
of mothers in my family that had gone before me, from my great-grand-
mother to my grandmothers, to my mother. In the midst of this I got a
clear message from my mother, who died ten years ago. We’d never had a
good relationship, and there was no great emotional tie—at least, I didn’t
think so, but I got the message from her, “Everything I did was out of love
for you. I was afraid for you.” I knew then that she loved me and that love
is stronger than death. Woman, age 67

Intuitive/Mystical: contemplative knowing, waiting

Today is my birthday. Last night I started thinking about my life so far.
I realized that I have been consciously present for twenty-seven years.
One day I will not have this body. I knew this, but right now I feel it. My
daughter will most likely outlive me. There will be a time when I am not
here with her. I do believe that I will “be” even after death, but not like
this. It’s amazing to feel and share this. I will not always be me in this
shape. Woman, age 27
 t h e n at u r e o f spi r i t ua l e x pe r i e n c e 

Unitive: complete transcendence—absence of “other”

There are times when I look into the eyes of my 2-year-old granddaughter
and am instantly transported into a feeling of being part of everything,
as if all the mysteries of the universe and my place in it are of no conse-
quence at all. Man, age 57

Thus, there are many avenues through which we may experience the spiri-
tual qualities of life. As we look at the qualities and avenues of spiritual ex-
perience depicted in tables 3 and 4, we can see that spiritual experience is
enormously multifaceted.
The word spiritual can also be used as an adjective to modify a large num-
ber of aspects of life. Table 5 lists some examples with brief definitions. These
terms and definitions sketch out conceptual, linguistic territory relating to the
spiritual region of life and can be used to have conversations, share experi-
ences, and conduct research on spirituality as a topic in its own right. If we
want to know the extent to which spiritual concerns permeate a person’s life,
we need to ask about many of the items on this list, which does not provide
answers so much as give us a way to identify and frame questions. Certainly all
these aspects of spirituality are salient for understanding the relation between
spirituality and aging.
Given the robust public interest in spirituality, the conceptual narrowness
of current discussions about spirituality and aging within the field of aging
itself is difficult to understand. Certainly spirituality is a central source of
life satisfaction for a large proportion of aging and older people. Why have
gerontologists lagged so far behind the public in developing a language of
spirituality?

table 3
Qualities of Spiritual Experience
Pure being: deep inner space, silence, stillness, peace, equanimity
Discernment: clarity of seeing, interpreting, and meaning
Compassion: universal love in the face of suffering
Connection with the ground of being, direct and conscious
Transcending the personal self, “witness” consciousness
Wonder and inexpressibility, comfort with mystery and paradox
Immateriality and intangibility
Confidence and trust in spiritual process
Earnestness and motivation for a spiritual journey
Transformation
  basic frames of reference

table 4
Avenues and Types of Spiritual Experience
Physical: deep peace, quietude, and stillness
Sensory: esthetic wonder
Consciousness/Awareness: many levels and stages
Thought
Intuitive/Mystical: contemplative knowing, waiting
Unitive: complete transcendence, absence of “other”

First, the conflation of religion and spirituality has inhibited scholars from
pursuing the emerging interest in spirituality as a topic of its own. Our scien-
tific world has been so bent on protecting itself from religion that it has cre-
ated blinders that prevent us from understanding spirituality. We do not have
to become a rock to study rocks, but we do have to understand the nature of
“rockness.” Likewise, to understand spirituality we have to at least make an
attempt to understand how those who have come into direct contact with the
essence of spirituality experience their inner world.
Second, gerontologists tend to be uninformed about the existing literature
on spirituality. Much of this literature was written many years ago and tends
not to show up in literature searches that are limited to academic articles
published over the past ten years. To begin to understand the complex nature
of the inner spiritual life, we do not have to begin from scratch. There are use-
ful anthologies that bring together wisdom from the sages of many spiritual
traditions (Hixon 1978; Huxley 1944; James 1905 [2005]; Mitchell 1989, 1991;
Vardey 1995). These texts help us understand various concepts surrounding
spirituality by triangulation. Spirituality is by definition a sensitizing concept
that refers to a conceptual and experiential inner region. To get at the essence
of such concepts, it helps to have access to several statements from different
scholars. As we read many expressions of the same issue, we are more likely
to find the essence of the issue. This process is essential background for study-
ing spirituality and aging, and the anthologies listed above are a good place to
start.

conclusion

Spirituality is a broad term rooted in inner experience. A large majority of

adults report having experiences they deem spiritual. Spiritual experiences
are interpreted through three types of consciousness: intense awareness of
 table 5
Aspects of Spiritual Experience
Spiritual experience: spiritual qualities and avenues directly observed and lived
through
Spiritual states: ways or forms of being that reflect spiritual qualities and may occur
through various spiritual avenues. Sometimes spiritual states appear to progress
through stages or levels
Spiritual capacity: the potentiality, capability, or practical ability to be aware of
spiritual qualities and avenues
Spiritual history: spiritual experiences and learning that are consciously or
nonconsciously remembered, interpreted, and integrated into a personal spiritual
narrative
Spiritual concepts and language: ideas and language used to describe, interpret, and
motivate spiritual experience
Spiritual connection: a subjective perception of physical, mental, and mystical
connection with the ground of being arising through various avenues of spiritual
experience
Spiritual practice: actions intended to acknowledge, celebrate, or encourage the
experience of spiritual qualities and avenues. Examples include meditation, prayer,
contemplation, and habits such as mindfulness, waiting, and letting go
Spiritual knowledge: a person’s experience-based spiritual awareness and
understanding, including integrated memories, comprehension, discernment, and
clear grasp of spiritual meaning
Spiritual process: a person’s way of observing, interpreting, and integrating experiences
of spiritual qualities and avenues, learned through life experience
Spiritual persistence: the extent to which a person is repeatedly motivated and drawn
to focus attention on spiritual avenues and qualities
Spiritual mystery: the ineffable nature of the ground of being and the pure beingness
within our experience
Spiritual piety: spiritual experience related to religion; devotion, righteousness, or
otherworldliness
Spiritual being: an experience of pure presence, both immanent and transcendent
Spiritual energy: physical and psychic energy arising from the experience of spiritual
qualities
Spiritual growth: developing or evolving greater spiritual capacity or a more effective
spiritual process
Spiritual breakthrough: pushing through a spiritual difficulty or obstacle, thereby
making further spiritual progress possible
Spiritual transmission: sending spiritual knowledge, practice, or understanding from
one person to another
Spiritual transformation: a marked change that transcends a previous form of spiritual
capacity or integration, at times leading to or following from religious conversion
Spiritual community: a group centered on spiritual pursuits and spiritual being, within
which members can meet many of their needs for meaning, belonging, constructive
feedback, aid, comfort, guidance, and opportunities to serve
  basic frames of reference

the present; “witness” consciousness, which transcends the personal self;

and transcendent awareness, which is open to the presence of the sacred. For
many people, these types of consciousness, although distinctive, can reside in
a person’s being simultaneously.
In this chapter, spiritual experiences were described by many individuals,
each in his or her unique language and conceptual framework. Spiritual ex-
perience can be found in many different contexts, including life experiences
wherever they happen, religious services and environments, nature, relat-
ing with others, community service, and work. Qualities that characterize
spiritual experiences include inner stillness, mental clarity, insight, compas-
sion, connection with the ground of being, wonder, inexpressibility, mystery,
paradox, personal transformation, and motivation to continue a spiritual
journey. Spiritual experiences come through a variety of channels or avenues
within consciousness: physical or sensory events, nonverbal awareness, ver-
bal thought, relational awareness, mystical states, or unitive states, in which
the individual merges for a time with the ground of being. When people use
spiritual as an adjective to modify various aspects of life, such as personal his-
tory or aspirations, they may become aware of many venues in which to look
for experiences that could be called spiritual or spiritually conditioned.
At this point, it should be obvious that the nature of spiritual experience
is complex and does not lend itself to simplistic concepts or measures. Now I
will add even more complexity by putting all this in motion in a discussion of
spiritual development.
 chapter two
   
Spiritual Development

The previous chapter described a spiritual region of human experience char-

acterized by identifiable qualities, occurring through several avenues of expe-
rience and accompanying many aspects of life. Awareness of this region and
experience with it vary greatly among people and also evolve over time for
most. Questions that guide this chapter include: What does it mean to grow
spiritually? Is spiritual development influenced by personal spiritual aspira-
tions? Does spiritual evolution occur in stages or is it continuous or is it both?
Does the capacity for spiritual experience evolve?
Just as we can study a person’s physical, psychological, or social develop-
ment, we can also study her or his spiritual development. And just as physi-
cal, psychological, and social development are complex topics, so is spiritual
development. We begin this chapter with a brief discussion of various ways
to conceptualize that development. We then consider how these various con-
ceptions play out when applied to spiritual development.

background

Historically, ideas about development have been rooted in the physical life
cycle of living organisms. Plants and animals have genetically programmed
life spans in which they grow to maturity, enjoy some period of full matu-
rity, and then begin to decline physically and eventually die. This is called the
maturation-maturity-aging model. Does development occur during all three
stages or just during the stage leading up to full maturity? Early conceptions
of development held that once child and adolescent development were com-
pleted, development was over, and life was simply a playing out of early des-
  basic frames of reference

tiny. There was little conception that development could continue into later
adulthood.
In the 1970s, research on middle-aged and older adults began to show
that previously unused physical and mental capabilities could be awakened
and developed in adults of any age (Riley and Foner 1968), that numerous
psychological traits continued to evolve and improve well into old age (Salt-
house 1982), and that social environments made a big difference by demand-
ing, encouraging, or discouraging continued development in midlife and later
(Cohen 2000). Scholars began to look not just at deficits of aging but also at
undeveloped potentials for development in later life.
Interestingly, recorded history contains many illustrations of middle-aged
and older adults having the capacity to continue to develop spiritually. Late-
life spiritual development is present in historical records from a wide vari-
ety of cultures and historical eras. However, this information came from the
humanities—history, anthropology, religious studies, and philosophy—and
was largely ignored by scholars in the social sciences as they developed social
gerontology.
In the early days of the twentieth century, most people thought spiritual
development was the province of religion, not science. For example, William
James’s (1905[2005]) classic treatise on subjective spirituality was titled The
Varieties of Religious Experience. Spirituality was not a word in common use
then. The beginnings of gerontology were mostly silent on the subject. For
example, there was no material on spirituality in the Handbook of Social Ger-
ontology (Tibbitts 1960), only a chapter on organized religion, and the Hand-
book of Aging and the Individual (Birren 1959), which dealt with psychology,
contained no mention of either spirituality or religion.
By the 1950s, much of science was antagonistic toward subjective inner
development, stressing conformity instead. A “secular humanist” view sup-
ported an image of principled science that did not depend on religion, which
was seen as opposed to the flexibility of thought needed for science. Religions’
theological definitions of reality were seen as conflicting with empiricism.
The doctrine of separation of church and state was used to justify exclusion
of religion from publicly funded education and research. Spirituality was seen
in that era as an offshoot of religion, which caused spirituality also to be dis-
valued as a subject of study.
The “human potential movement” of the 1960s challenged this view by
claiming that human beings had many untapped capabilities and that taking
responsibility for our own development was the key to discovering and de-
 spirit ual de vel opment 

veloping our potentials. This movement gave rise to an enormous “self-help”

culture, which encouraged adults to exert influence on their own develop-
ment. Spirituality was a major area of untapped potential identified by work-
ers in the self-help field. Unfortunately, scientific research has contributed
little to the conversation about what spiritual development is and how it can
be nurtured or hindered.
Despite a negative climate for the study of spirituality and spiritual devel-
opment, several developmental perspectives were created that can serve as
orienting frameworks for inquiry about spiritual development and how it re-
lates to aging. Some are offshoots of general theories of human development;
others were created primarily to explain development in later adulthood.

erik h. erikson

In 1955, psychologist Erik Erikson published Childhood and Society, which

was mainly about child development but also contained brief discussions of
developmental issues of young adulthood, middle adulthood, and old age. Er-
ikson’s ideas on this subject evolved considerably over the years, with major
revisions to his “life stages of psychosocial development” published in 1963,
1986, and 1997. Erikson’s theory has had considerable influence as an over-
view, and the later revisions of the theory reflect an increasing emphasis on
spirituality as a developmental theme in the later stages of life.
In Erikson’s framework, development focused on doing what was psycho-
logically needed to arrive at an identity of oneself as loving, competent, and
good in the social context of successive age-appropriate life stages. Movement
from one life stage to another was contingent on resolving the “psychosocial
crisis” inherent in a given life stage in order to move on to the next. Each
succeeding life stage often also involved review and reconsideration of the
resolutions of earlier life stages. This was especially likely in the old age life
stage (Erikson, Erikson, and Kivnick 1986).
Table 6 shows the 1986 version of Erikson’s life stages, with the main de-
velopmental issue and typical resolution for each stage. Note that Erikson
never attached chronological age definitions to these life stages. At the heart
of this formulation is the idea that as we grow, achieve maturity, and age, we
are confronted with a predictable set of dilemmas associated with each life
stage. These dilemmas arise from having to adapt inwardly to changes that
come with moving from one culturally defined life stage to another. Resolv-
ing these dilemmas does not involve choosing one side of the dilemma and
  basic frames of reference

table 6
Erikson’s Life Stage Theory of Psychosocial Development
Life Stage Psychosocial Tension Balancing Resolution
Old age Integrity versus despair Wisdom
Adulthood Generativity versus self-absorption Care
Young adulthood Intimacy versus isolation Love
Adolescence Identity versus confusion Fidelity (to worldview)
School age Industry versus inferiority Competence
Play age Initiative versus guilt Purpose
Early childhood Autonomy versus shame and doubt Will
Infancy Basic trust versus basic mistrust Hope
Source: Adapted from Erikson, Erikson, and Kivnick (1986, 36).

expunging the other. “Successful” resolution involves creating a balance that

acknowledges the reality of both sides of the dilemma. So, for example, in
infancy “trust is mandatory: but . . . it can exist positively only in juxtaposi-
tion with a ‘sensible’ mistrust—also necessary for existence” (ibid., 38). Each
developmental dilemma involves creating ways that we can acknowledge and
accept both positive and negative experiences of ourselves.
Spirituality finds its way into Erikson’s framework through the gradual
emergence of a type of consciousness that Erikson says comes increasingly
into play in “vital involvement,” which results in a “heightened awareness that
can by no means necessarily be claimed by the usual ‘ego’ ” (ibid., 51). Erikson
defined this consciousness as a special kind of “I,” a basic awareness of exis-
tence. This is the “I am” of which I wrote earlier.
Using Erikson’s framework, we can see the young adult’s quest for inti-
macy, the adult’s concern for generativity, and the older person’s transcendent
wisdom as involving successive increases in capacity to stand outside one’s
own self-centered agendas and feel connection and concern for things larger
than oneself. This capacity is rooted in existential spirituality. The “sense of ‘I’,
in old age, still has a once-for-all chance of transcending time-bound identi-
ties and sensing, if only in the simplest terms, an all-human and existential
identity which world religions have attempted to create” (ibid., 53).
The developmental issue of young adulthood, according the Erikson, is in-
timacy versus isolation. To avoid a life of isolation, adults must develop the
capacity for eventual commitment to lasting friendships, companionship, and
sexual mutuality. This requires the capacity to stand outside ourselves and
empathize with another.
In midlife, the issue is generativity versus self-absorption. Generativity is
 spirit ual de vel opment 

taking care of what has been and is being “procreated, produced, and created.”
To develop this capacity, we must be able to see our needs in a context that
includes the needs of others and be able to put others’ needs ahead of ours
when appropriate. Thus, generativity extends the circle of empathy developed
in young adulthood to adjacent generations in the family, at work, and in the
community. At the center of this capacity is a growing strength of nonper-
sonal consciousness.
In old age, the issue is integrity versus despair. Integrity is being able to
stand back from the mosaic of one’s multitude of characteristics and life expe-
riences, both positive and negative, and see this mosaic as an interconnected
whole. To do this, we have to be able to look directly at our negative qualities
and life experiences, accept them, and move on into being who we are. If we
can’t do this, then negative personal qualities and experiences can drag us into
despair. Having practice focusing on the “I am” of pure being gives us a place
to reside in our awareness where we can look at all aspects of ourselves with
compassion. It is a place from which we can forgive our past and clearly see
hope in the way forward. Integrity is not denial; it is acceptance and compas-
sion for the being that is.

l ars tornstam

In The Life Cycle Completed, published following Erik Erikson’s death, Joan
Erikson (1997) cited Lars Tornstam’s theory of gerotranscendence as a ninth
stage of development that could also occur in old age. Gerotranscendence
theory asserts that spiritual development gradually and steadily increases
from middle age onward and results in a shift from a materialistic, role-ori-
ented life philosophy to a transcendent, spiritual perspective in late old age
(Tornstam 2005). Gerotranscendence is present to some extent in most ag-
ing adults, according to the theory, but becomes a prevalent metaperspective
mainly in adults over 70. Gerotranscendence theory presumes that spiritual
development is intrinsic, but the exact source of this development is unspec-
ified. Nevertheless, this development can be promoted or stifled by social
factors such as language and normative constraints, opportunity structures,
social class, and education. Thus, the degree of gerotranscendence varies even
within the very old population.
The broadened spiritual perspective that typifies mature gerotranscen-
dence is indicated by three dimensions. In the cosmic dimension, concepts
such as life, death, space, and time are seen as involving an element of mystery
  basic frames of reference

and are seen against a backdrop of infinity. In the self-transcendent dimension,

the personal self is no longer the center of attention, and there is increased
honesty and acceptance about the personal self. In the social selectivity di-
mension, relationships focus mainly on close friends and family, and much
less energy is spent relating to casual acquaintances and strangers, with a con-
sequent increase in solitude and less emphasis on pro forma role playing. At-
titudes toward material possessions shift from acquisition to maintaining the
bare essentials for a comfortable life. Social selectivity leads to a much more
thoughtful, contemplative stance toward relationships, activities, and life-
styles. Gerotranscendence results in less concern with social conformity for
conformity’s sake. Mature gerotranscendence may make for a different type of
effective participation in the community rather than for disengagement.
Historically, the role of elder in the community was assumed to have a
spiritual element. Elders were seen not only as keepers of spiritual traditions
but also as human beings who had benefited from decades of spiritual devel-
opment. While most communities no longer assume that spiritual develop-
ment is connected with lengthy life experience and do not ascribe the role of
elder to all older people, there are important vestiges of the functional role of
spiritual elders, especially in families but also in friendship networks and in
spiritual communities.
Sages are people who can manifest wisdom and retain a strong spiritual
connection in the face of life’s trials. Most sages are old people. In the stages
and processes through which aging people develop into sages we get a glim-
mer of the internal processes that complement the theory of gerotranscen-
dence (Atchley 2003).
Erikson’s and Tornstam’s perspectives on spiritual development both echo
the ancient Hindu Vedas, dating back at least four thousand years, which de-
scribe various stages of spiritual development tied to stages of life. The Vedas
state that when a householder experiences the birth of the first grandchild, it
is time to begin a process of turning away from material and political concerns
and toward spiritual concerns. Note that the triggering event for beginning
this shift is familial, not chronological. In the era in which the Vedas were
written, grandparenthood often first occurred when parents were in their late
30s or early 40s. Thus, the idea of people turning to spiritual concerns in
midlife and later has been around a long time.
The link with grandparenthood is interesting. Many grandparents experi-
ence grandparenthood as a shift away from the responsibility and account-
ability associated with child rearing toward a purely generative relationship
 spirit ual de vel opment 

with their grandchildren. For many grandparents, the role emphasizes an ex-
istential quality of relationship rather than a functional quality of mere care-
taking.
In present-day society, retirement may represent a similar opportunity to
turn toward spiritual concerns. Indeed, retirees form a sizable share of the
market for workshops and retreats that focus on spiritual growth and devel-
opment.

harry r. moody and david a . carroll

In The Five Stages of the Soul, Harry R. “Rick” Moody and David Carroll (1997)
present a different kind of stage theory of spiritual development. Erikson’s
theory of spiritual development is driven primarily by an “outside-in” pro-
cess of adapting to stimuli from the external demands of integrating oneself
with a sociocultural life course. Moody and Carroll’s theory takes a deeper,
“inside-out” approach, in which development is driven not so much by ex-
ternal processes as by internal ones. Although hypothetically a person could
begin this process at any age, most of the life histories the authors cite were
from middle-aged and older adults. Moody and Carroll envision spiritual de-
velopment as a continuous series of small, often gradual and subtle changes
that take place in the context of a profound shift in perspective, involving a
strong sense of spiritual connection and enlightenment. At the heart of the
theory is the assumption that the soul—human spiritual capacity—is real and
in most people has been covered over by language and social conditioning.
The stages of the soul are about a process of reconnecting with one’s spiritual
nature and integrating that spiritual nature into one’s physical, psychological,
and social nature.
Moody and Carroll’s stages of the soul—the shift from an unconscious
spiritual life to a conscious spiritual life—are as follows:

— The Call: The person has experiences that indicate a deeper aspect of hu-
man existence than previously known. He or she feels drawn to explore this
“hidden-in-plain-sight” field of possibility and is attracted, led, or drawn
back to this aspect over and over again.
— The Search: The person searches inwardly for signs of spiritual experience
and also searches for teachers, texts, experiences, and practices that can
help her or him glimpse spiritual nature. There is a thirst for dwelling in this
particular mystery.
  basic frames of reference

— The Struggle: The person struggles with letting go of old ways of seeing and
behaving, facing doubts and fears of failure, and developing routine prac-
tices that create openings for experiences of spiritual connection and tran-
scendence. Spiritual community is often a particularly important support
during this stage.
— The Breakthrough: The person emerges from the struggle into stunning
clarity of spiritual perception and purpose. The person breaks through
into new qualities of experience: timelessness and immense space, more
accurate perception of “reality,” “lightness of being”—liberation, deep inner
silence, stillness and peace, loss of fears about death, a sense of new begin-
ning, feelings of universal love and compassion, and a profound sense that
what has happened cannot be captured in words.
— The Return: The person who experiences a breakthrough then experiences
that life goes on. The new way of being needs to be integrated into daily life,
and the person feels a responsibility to give back in return for the amazing
gift received. There is no standard form to the return; returns are shaped by
personality, circumstances, and culture. Many if not most returns are invis-
ible except to the persons experiencing them.

In The Five Stages of the Soul, this framework is fleshed out with dozens
of examples taken from Moody’s interviews. This approach allows us to hear
these abstract stages expressed in the words of people going through them.
Moody and Carroll’s framework is an extraordinary resource for research-
ers and practitioners who wish to include spirituality as a topic in research and
practice. It is also well received by students and general readers interested in
a spiritual journey. However, Ruth Ray and Susan McFadden (2001) criticized
this framework as being too linear, too stylized, and a recreation of Joseph
Campbell’s Hero with a Thousand Faces (1972). Ray and McFadden’s alterna-
tive perspective on spiritual development is discussed later in this chapter.
Moody used a feedback-systems approach in developing the conceptual
framework. He drew ideas skillfully from a broad sweep of writings on spiri-
tuality in philosophy, literature, poetry, and religion from many times and
places. Then he used his tentative framework to structure in-depth interviews
with more than a hundred knowledgeable informants, people with experience
of the spiritual journey. He allowed his ideas to be shaped and disciplined by
his respondents. He also took the ideas out into the community in the form of
workshops. The feedback from participants refined his ideas. Moody himself
has been on a conscious spiritual journey for many years, and that experience
 spirit ual de vel opment 

gave him an important ability to see patterns within what he was reading and
hearing from respondents. Moody’s experience illustrates well the power of
combining interpretive and storytelling methods from the humanities with
data-gathering approaches common in the social sciences. The result is richer
and deeper than the usual scholarly study.
I use a framework similar to Moody’s to describe more modest, ongoing
cycles of spiritual development. To avoid confusion of terminology, I use dif-
ferent labels for phases of short-term spiritual development. Table 7 shows
a comparison of Moody’s big-picture labels with the labels I use for shorter
cycles of spiritual development.

— Awakening Interest: Something happens to heighten awareness of the possi-

bility of further spiritual growth. Many people on a spiritual journey read and
attend study groups, discussion groups, and educational programs at least
partly to heighten their chance of discovering new spiritual possibilities.
— Inquiry: Following curiosity about a possibility by pursuing study, discus-
sion, reflection, or contemplation and being open to discovery.
— Endeavor: Developing new practices, creating new routines, being patient
and waiting in the face of frustration. Dealing with discomfort, confusion,
uncertainty, loss of inspiration, ambivalence, or disheartenment.
— Integration: New pieces combine with old pieces to form a new big picture.
— Intention: Forming a new or renewed sense of spiritual direction.

table 7
Phases in a Cycle of Spiritual Development
Phase Label
Moody and
Carroll Atchley What Happens
Call Awakening interest Opening, attraction, something missing,
yearning
Search Inquiry Study, discussion, contemplation, scanning
Struggle Endeavor Establishing practices; creating a groove;
dealing with discomfort, confusion,
uncertainty, loss of inspiration,
ambivalence, or disheartenment
Breakthrough Integration Pieces fall together to form a big picture
Return Intention Newly developed or renewed sense of
spiritual direction
Source: Adapted from Moody and Carroll (1997); labels for short-term development by the
author.
  basic frames of reference

For many people, this process is experienced as an upward spiral of in-

creasing scope and clarity. Even while a person may be in one of Moody and
Carroll’s stages of the soul, such as struggle, there may be within that stage
several cycles of increasing understanding before the person experiences a
breakthrough. However, this idea of upward spiral is just a description of what
seems to happen; it should not be taken as deterministic or inevitable.

ken wilber

In Integral Spirituality (Wilber 2006), Ken Wilber summarizes more than

twenty years’ work in organizing and presenting his thoughts on spiritual de-
velopment. The major strength of this work is its panoramic scope, including
perspectives from a wide variety of bodies of thought. Wilber is a master at
providing diagrams that help the reader visualize relationships and patterns
within a large number of abstract concepts. Here are some quotes that give a
hint of the richness of Wilber’s work as a source of concepts and hypotheses
about spiritual development:

Your consciousness is struggling to move not only horizontally through

[various] states but vertically through stages. (2006, 138)

[Verticality] is consciousness per se. Thus, “degree of consciousness” is itself
altitude: the more consciousness, the higher the altitude (subconscious to
self-conscious to superconscious). In this view, all the developmental lines
move through the same altitude gradient. (2006, 65)

There is not one line of development that the dozens of [developmental
theories] are giving different maps of; rather, there are at least a dozen dif-
ferent developmental lines—cognitive, moral, interpersonal, emotional,
psychosexual, kinesthetic, self, values, needs, and so on. (2002, 58)

All of [these] lines can then be aligned . . . , moving through the same alti-
tude gradient (as well as moving through their own specific structures or
stages). (2006, 65)

Sometimes people speak of something like “spiritual intelligence,” which
not only is available at the highest levels in any of the [developmental] lines,
but is its own developmental line. . . . “Spiritual” is not something that refers
 spirit ual de vel opment 

only to the highest, transpersonal, and transrational levels in various devel-

opmental lines, but is something that has its own first, second, and third
tiers (or structure-stages). (2006, 101)

Integral Spirituality packs 300 pages with dense, abstract, conceptual prose
that requires of the reader a considerable background in psychology, sociol-
ogy, philosophy, comparative religion, and many other subjects. Nevertheless,
it is a treasure trove of ideas about spirituality and spiritual development.
From our point of view, a major weakness of the work is that Wilber does
not see aging or life stages as important factors in the process of spiritual de-
velopment. It would take a major endeavor to integrate Wilber’s perspective
with our knowledge base about how physical, psychological, and social aging
interacts with human development.

james fowler

Fowler (1981) described stages of faith development. He defined faith as “the

dynamic patterns by which we find life’s meaning.” Fowler’s (1981, 1991) theory
conceives of faith development in adulthood as having three stages: individ-
uative-reflective faith, which could begin in the early twenties, in which the
self begins to turn away from external sources of spiritual authority toward
the development of an internal moral and spiritual orientation that has mean-
ing for the individual; conjunctive faith, beginning in midlife or later and in-
volving acceptance of paradox and ambiguity, a deepening sense of under-
standing, disillusionment with the over-reliance on logic and rational thought
that is typical in the individuative-reflective stage, and a more open attitude
toward religious traditions other than one’s own; and finally, universalizing
faith, occurring late in life and involving a rare willingness to give up one’s life
to make values a reality on earth. Fowler’s exemplars of people who achieved
the last stage include Mahatma Gandhi, Thomas Merton, and Mother Teresa.
Fowler felt that most adults probably never progress beyond the individua-
tive-reflective faith, even in very old age. Fowler’s theory has been criticized
for relying too much on cognitive concepts of spirituality (Koenig 1995a).

ruth r ay and susan mcfadden

Ruth Ray and Susan McFadden (2001) offer two metaphors—the web and
the quilt—as alternatives to the “hero’s journey” metaphor of spiritual de-
velopment offered by Moody and Carroll (1997). They begin with a critique
  basic frames of reference

based on the limitations of stage models in capturing the meandering quality

of many spiritual journeys. In particular, they criticize Moody and Carroll
for over-reaching assertions, such as “a clear pattern of spiritual stages does
exist” and it “runs deep in our blood” (9). Ray and McFadden also point out
that many accounts of spiritual development, particularly those of women
and minorities, do not interpret spiritual growth in terms of the “solo quest
narrative” (202). They emphasize the interpersonal context in which many if
not most spiritual journeys occur. A big part of the creation of personal mean-
ing, including spiritual meaning, occurs in the exchange of ideas with other
people. (Kahn and Antonucci [1981] referred to this as the “convoy of social
support,” another metaphor I like.)
As metaphor, the web concept implies a loosely woven yet strong struc-
ture. Part of a web can be destroyed without compromising the functioning
of the overall structure. A web has a large number of interconnections. The
network concept is a similar idea. The Internet is a vast network, a sea of
relational possibilities that is enormously flexible in its capacity to respond
to individual needs. Personal networks are also effective in supporting both
the development and the maintenance of networks and meeting the needs
of their individual members. Spiritual webs or networks are a group context
within which individuals can develop spiritual capacity and spiritual identity.
I have no doubt that networks of spiritual friends and spiritual teachers are
hugely important influences on the spiritual journeys of most people, but this
will remain a hypothesis until it is studied. Exactly how webs support the
spiritual journey remains to be discovered.

A quilt has multiple layers and is crafted over time. Like the individual dif-
ferences found in ways of being spiritual, some people’s quilts have an orga-
nizing structure immediately apparent to all; others’ are of the “crazy-quilt”
variety that, when viewed partially may make little sense, but can be quite
beautiful when seen as a whole. Quilts, like spirituality, may have different
functions at different points in the life span. . . A very important aspect of
quilt making is that although parts of the quilt (its “blocks”) may be crafted
individually, the whole quilt is traditionally the outcome of people gathering
to stitch it together. . . As spirituality is nurtured across the life span through
relationships with others, the ‘stitches’ of those relational encounters may
be quite hard to distinguish when viewed in the context of the whole pattern
of life. Nevertheless, without them, there could be no holistic, integrated
sense of spirituality. (Ray and McFadden 2001, 205).
 spirit ual de vel opment 

This perspective argues strongly for balancing individualism with relational

aspects as we attempt to understand spiritual development.
Ray and McFadden cite an example of three women who went on a spiri-
tual retreat together—just the three of them. “We had grown stronger spiri-
tually. We knew we were three small miracles in the universe, three women
trying to fit into Nature, three women feeling connected to all people because
all of us are born in the same womb. Each of us, to herself, made a promise to
grow stronger still in the months and years ahead by seeking spiritually and
expressing spirituality in relationships with others” (Wade-Gayles and Finch
1995, 84). In this context of mutual support, these women had made commit-
ments to their future spiritual development.

spiritual development and the loss of

cognitive abilit y

It is true that being able to conceptualize and recall one’s spiritual journey
depends on retaining the ability to use language and to access one’s spiritual
experiences, ideas, and history from memory. But what happens for those
who experience dementia? Does dementia mean the gradual loss of person-
hood, including spiritual capacity and identity? There has been little research
on this subject, but I can sketch out some ideas that might serve as useful
orientation on this question. Short-term memory is usually one of the first
functions affected by dementia. People who experience memory impairment
may not be able to remember well what happened to them yesterday, so their
recent recall of spiritual experiences may be limited, but their ability to recall
various elements of their spiritual history throughout adulthood may remain
remarkably intact. Mrs. E is a good example:

Mrs. E cannot tell you what she had for lunch or what activities she en-
gaged in yesterday, and she cannot remember the names of any of her
caregivers in the nursing home. But she can remember in vivid detail the
church services she attended with her children when they were “little,”
the words of hymns they sang, and aspects of the church building she
found beautiful. She recalls that the church was just across the street
from her grandmother’s house. More than that, she can tell you what she
learned in that church and how her life experiences dovetailed with the
Christian social teachings of the “Golden Rule,” kindness toward strang-
ers and the poor, the importance of peace among men, and leading an
  basic frames of reference

upright life. She recalls many stories from her family history that clearly
illustrate the morals of various Bible stories through both positive and
negative examples. Even though she cannot track her current life experi-
ences well, she still has a strong sense of personal spiritual identity and
spiritually based morality. Her gregarious personality is still very much
intact.

People in more advanced stages of dementia may lose much of their abil-
ity to recall even distant memories, yet in most cases they still have a strong
connection with the present. Many people with advanced dementia may not
be able to tell you much about who or where they are or who the people
around them are, but they still exhibit many of the traits we prize most in
personhood—kindness toward others, listening to the life stories of others,
and caring for one another. Frances Hellebrandt (1978) presented an early
useful portrait of this aspect of dementia. Based on long-term observations
of residents of a locked dementia ward, Hellebrandt, herself 76, described the
daily existence of sixteen residents.

They move about freely, often in pairs, showing evidence of concern for one
another even though they never address each other by name and cannot
identify the person with whom they are walking. . . . They are clean, neat,
and groomed appropriately, for the most part. On occasion they may wear
two or three dresses at once. . . . The casual observer would find the group
deceptively normal.
All residents in the locked ward are completely disoriented as to place,
time, day, date, year, seasons, or holidays. They have a poor memory for
ongoing events. . . None knows that their behavior is in any way aberrant.
Neither do they realize they live in an institution. Yet much of what we
consider positive human qualities remain alive in these people—concern
for others, friendliness, and optimism (68).

We could make the argument, based on our definition of basic spirituality

as beingness, that as long as there is being there is the possibility of spirituality,
and as long as there is spirituality, there is a right to be considered a person.
In fact, the experience of beingness may be the last experience to be lost to
dementia.
 spirit ual de vel opment 

the social context of spiritual development

Spiritual development can occur spontaneously and without group support.

However, most people use group connections with friends, coworkers, family
members, or members of their spiritual or religious community to support
them at each stage or throughout the process of spiritual evolution.
Buddhists speak of the “three jewels” of Buddhism: the Buddha, the
Dharma, and the Sangha. The Buddha symbolizes the possibility of enlight-
enment in this lifetime. The Dharma refers to a principled way of life that
is continuously revealed to those who lead a contemplative life. The Sangha
is the contemplative spiritual community that can serve as protection for
each member against the possibility that spiritual realizations will be taken
over by the ego and made into an ego agenda. Spiritual community can also
support individuals through times of difficulty, confusion, or loss of resolve.
Although expressed with different language across spiritual traditions, these
three themes of the possibility of enlightenment, harmonious living revealed
through contemplation in community, and contemplative spiritual commu-
nity as material aid and as protection against contamination by self-centered
motives, are present in most widespread religious traditions that have stood
the test of time.

life stages and spiritual development

Although some early theories linked spiritual development to the demands

of sociocultural life stages, life stages evolve, and the number of life stages,
especially in later life, has increased in recent years. In the 1950s, when Er-
ikson was developing his theory, the dominant view was that after age 65
people experienced just one life stage—old age. In the late 1960s, Bernice
Neugarten began to write about the young-old (65–74) and the old-old (75
and older). By the early 1970s, gerontologists were talking about the young-
old (65–74), middle-old (75–84), and old-old (85 and older). In 2004, I was
writing about the nearly-old (55–64), young-old (65–74), middle-old (75–84),
older-old (85–94), and oldest-old (95 and older). By 2015, I suspect that I will
be splitting those 95 and older into the oldest-old (95–104) and the hyper-old
(105 and older). The point here is that the population of interest in research
on aging contains a span of more than fifty years in terms of chronological
age. Breaking this population into ten-year categories gives us the ability to
  basic frames of reference

compare people approaching or at the beginning of later life with people who
are farther along in the age range.
Richard Settersten (2003) drew attention to a growing gap between the
concept of a culturally given set of life stages and the concept of the human life
course as an individual life path conditioned by decisions and circumstances
in response not only to life stage but also to current events, personal prefer-
ences, subcultural worldviews, and a host of other factors. Indeed, there is a
great deal of support for the existence of abstract notions of life stages, such
as middle age and old age (Atchley and Barusch 2004), but when researchers
tried to ascertain details of these conceptions, such as when life stage transi-
tions begin or end, or how social expectations change from one life stage to
another, or even how many life stages there are, they came away confused
(Settersten 1999). This suggests that, like spirituality, life stage is a sensitizing
concept that takes you only to a general area of interest, one with only general
dimensions. The particulars have to be investigated for each emerging life
stage.
For our present purposes, is there spiritual development unique to those
who live to advanced old age, say those over 100? I would expect so, but so
far there has been little study of this aspect of centenarians. If we think about
these admittedly arbitrary lifestage divisions of the age range in later life, do
people in these various life stages expect different things of themselves in
terms of spirituality? Does the community expect different things from them
in terms of qualities such as spiritual wisdom? How might these differing ex-
pectations influence the experience of spiritual development? These are just a
few of the possible research questions as we chart the new territory of having
large numbers of people survive to very advanced old age. The difficulty of
addressing these questions is compounded by our cultural inability to agree
about labels and definitions of the life stages past age 80.

conclusion

This chapter begins with a history of the study of spiritual development since
the 1950s and presents several different approaches to understanding how
spiritual capacity in an individual evolves over time, what stimulates spiritual
development, and how spiritual development interacts with other aspects of
adult development.
Erikson’s theory presumes that spiritual development is built on a resolu-
tion of the successive developmental challenges associated with each stage of
 spirit ual de vel opment 

life before middle age. For Erikson, spiritual development begins in middle age
with a development of generativity—a concern for the well-being of younger
generations—and in later adulthood grows to include wisdom and gerotrans-
cendence. To Erikson, changes in social expectations associated with later life
stages couple nicely with inner predispositions toward a spiritual rather than
a personal “I” and a metaperspective called gerotranscendence. For Tornstam,
gerotranscendence is an intrinsic process that social circumstances can only
hinder. Tornstam sees gerotranscendence as being present to some extent in
all aging people and as having cosmic, self-transcendent, and social selectivity
elements.
Moody and Carroll present a linear theory of spiritual development as a
progression through five stages: call, search, struggle, breakthrough, and re-
turn. Moody and Carroll use these stages mainly to describe large changes in
engagement with one’s spirituality over an extended period of time. I use a
similar series of phases to describe smaller, short-term cycles of spiritual de-
velopment: awakening interest, inquiry, endeavor, integration, and intention.
Wilber developed what is probably the most ambitious and complex the-
ory of spiritual development to date. He sees spiritual development evolving
along multiple lines and through several levels of consciousness. Unfortu-
nately, his theory has not been applied to the issues of adult development and
aging.
Ray and McFadden see spiritual development as involving a necessary ele-
ment of human relationship. Their concept of development is not so much a
linear or even cyclic process. They prefer the web and the quilt as metaphors
for the mysterious interactive processes by which disparate spiritual experi-
ences result in a meaningful spiritual whole.
These examples of conceptualizing and theorizing about spiritual develop-
ment by no means exhaust the possibilities, but they amply illustrate that each
perspective contains valuable insights. There is no need to pick one as “truth”
and junk the rest. Rather, it is possible to integrate all these perspectives into a
more complete understanding of spiritual development as an important pos-
sibility in later adulthood.
Now, let us turn to the relation among spirituality, spiritual development,
and identity and the self.
 chapter three
   
Spirituality, Spiritual Self, and
Spiritual Identity

What is my spiritual nature? How do I develop spiritually? These were the

basic questions addressed in the two previous chapters. The basic question
for this chapter is, How does spirituality influence identity and self, and vice
versa? How do I experience myself, conceive of myself, and aspire for myself,
and how does spiritual experience interact with these elements? Where does
spirituality reside in my holistic conception of self?
To deal with these issues, we must first have a good sense of what we mean
by the terms identity and self. Then we can look at how these concepts re-
late to spiritual experience and ideas. We also look at continuity theory as a
framework for understanding how spiritual identity and self are developed
and adapted to a constantly changing personal and social environment.

concepts about the self and identit y

The self has two different aspects. The first is self as experiencer, which consists
of awareness of being and witness of self as actor—self as the doer, the feeler
of emotions, and the feeler of motivation. Both awareness of being and per-
ception of acting can happen without reflective thought and without words.
But as soon as we begin to think about the content of various dimensions
of self—to conceptualize, categorize, and interpret them—a second aspect
of self arises—the reflective self. The noted sociologist G. H. Mead referred
to the first self as the “I” and the second as the “Me.” The I consists of bare
experience of being: “I am,” which we earlier equated with basic spirituality,
and experience of self as the center of action: “I do,” “I feel,” “I want.” The Me
is a much more complicated system of thoughts about oneself, which come
 s p i r i t u a l i t y , s p i r i t u a l s e l f, a n d s p i r i t u a l i d e n t i t y 

both from the person’s own perceptions of self (what C. H. Cooley called the
“looking-glass self ”) and from messages about the self that come from others,
called “reflected appraisals” based on how we perceive others’ reactions to us
and our behavior.
Thoughts about the self can be divided into self-concept (what I think I am
actually like), ideal self (what I think I should be like), feared self (the self I
am afraid I might become), self-evaluation (my assessment of the fit between
actual and ideal self ), and self-esteem (how much I like or dislike myself, often
based on my self-evaluation). Self-concept can be further differentiated into
more detailed concepts, such as self-confidence, or willingness to act, which
incorporates an element of agency into the self. Another term for agency is
self-efficacy, an expectation that my efforts will be successful. Self-acceptance
is a process that can involve increasing acceptance of the actual self by letting
go of a perfectionistic ideal self in favor or a more realistic ideal, thereby in-
creasing self-esteem. In all this, the I as actor takes an active part in construct-
ing and maintaining the self system, even when the result is a confused self-
concept, unclear ideal self, negative self-evaluation, and poor self-esteem.
The self system is a dynamic collection of self-referential ideas and a pro-
cess for creating and maintaining the system through feedback from life ex-
perience. By observing the self in action, people develop self-schemas such
as “I am a spiritual person,” “I am an honest person,” “I am a loner,” “I am a
good guitar player,” “I am a frail old man,” “I have a mean streak,” or “I work
well with people.” “The domains of individuals’ self-schemas reflect what they
think about, what they care about, and what they spend their time and energy
on” (Markus and Herzog 1991, 113). Self-schemas serve as benchmarks for
evaluating and refining the self in the context of current life experience. In
addition, people have scenarios about “possible selves” they could become. In
actively constructing an ideal self of the future, people use their ideas about
hoped-for or feared possible selves (Markus and Nurius 1986).
In psychoanalytic terms, the psyche includes a self that has both conscious
and unconscious or nonconscious elements. Carl Jung’s analytical psychology
emphasizes, among many other things, the importance of bringing aspects
of the self that exist in the unconscious into consciousness.  This cannot be
done directly, says Jung, but it can be done through the use of metaphors
and myths, through interpretation of dreams, and through art (Jung and Jaffe
1962). The art people make is an important research tool in accessing their un-
derstandings about the self that reside outside their verbal, conceptual mind.
Moody (unpublished) recounts the following dream:
  basic frames of reference

I dreamed that I was in a subway station, on the platform. Built into the
wall were bookcases filled with books, very impressive looking (gilded,
antique, heavily bound). But when I examined some of the books, per-
haps to buy them, I discovered that the pages were empty, that the books
were high-class trash, [empty pages] dressed up to look good. Then I was
sitting in a row of spiritual seekers on one side of the platform. I recog-
nized two friends among them. Across the tracks, alone on the other side,
sitting on a kind of throne was a great spiritual master. He answered a
question from one of my friends, and his answer made it clear that the
Way did not mean getting rid of anything with intellectual value; that is,
we should not be anti-intellectual. I felt this was somehow a message
for me.

Moody goes on to interpret this dream.

The “subway station” here is a place below ground, a path for traveling
into the Underworld, or the depths of the self. The opening imagery of
the dream is of bookcases filled with marvelous books. As an academic,
I would naturally be attracted by such beautiful books displayed down
in this lower world. But in this dream I discover that the books are all
empty, suggesting that purely intellectual knowledge has nothing [to
offer the spiritual struggle]. As a wise man once remarked to me while I
sat carefully reading the menu at a restaurant, “You could read this menu
all night and you would still be hungry.” Yet the message of this dream is
not entirely a repudiation of the intellect, as if intelligence were an evil to
be overcome, as certain religious traditions suggest; for example, when
faith is opposed to reason. Instead, the dreamer hears a message from a
spiritual master who helps him overcome any dualism.

Moody’s dream exposed the dilemma of his shadow anti-intellectual self and
his academic self and showed a way to integrate them.
To Jung, the “shadow self ” is an unconscious aspect of self comprising sup-
pressed aspects of self. The shadow self can be destructive or constructive.
The destructive shadow is made up of negative self-referential observations
that the individual actively disowns or does not want to acknowledge. None
of us likes to admit negative qualities such as unkindness, dishonesty, cru-
elty, and the like. On the other hand, the constructive shadow is made up of
potentially positive attributes of self that go unacknowledged for a variety of
 s p i r i t u a l i t y , s p i r i t u a l s e l f, a n d s p i r i t u a l i d e n t i t y 

reasons. For instance, many people have spiritual experiences but deny them
because of their belief that spirituality does not exist.
Both Erikson and Jung agree that healthy development requires that we
face our “negative” or disvalued qualities and learn to accept them. Erikson
called this kind of self-acceptance integrity and saw it as a central develop-
mental task of old age. Likewise, if spiritual growth is to be a possibility, the
individual must be open to that aspect of self.
It is often said that the complexity of language about a subject is a clue to its
importance. Webster’s Dictionary (Agnes 2002) listed more than a hundred
words describing different aspects of the personal self. The scores of terms
and concepts for various aspects of self show that the self is of great interest
to most people, and most of us spend a lot of time thinking and talking about
ourselves.
Because the self-system in most people is open to change stimulated by
life experience, spiritual experiences—especially if they are cumulative—can
have profound effects on all the elements of self described thus far. Spiritual
experiences and development can be a major force in the shift from a con-
crete, mechanistic view of self to a more dynamic, open approach. In The
Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, Erving Goffman (1959) popularized the
notion that, because reflected appraisals from others are so important, we
spend a great deal of energy trying to manipulate others’ appraisals of us by
tweaking our presentation of self. Like stage actors, we take on costumes and
personas to created illusions that we think will be attractive to others. This
perspective may well be important for explaining motives and behavior of
adolescents and young adults, but by middle age, most people’s life experience
has suggested that such manipulation is not an effective route to acceptance
by others of the actual self and that presenting an inauthentic self is a trap
that one can become caught in. Likewise, many changes associated with ag-
ing require some modification if the self is to remain relevant and adaptive to
current life circumstances. For example, taking advantage of the opportunity
for a more humane pace of life in retirement often requires letting go of the
“productive” ideal self, with its perfectionism and potential inappropriateness
to the spiritual goals of later adulthood.

continuit y theory and the self

Continuity theory (Atchley 1999) is a useful framework for exploring the

interchange between spirituality and self and identity over the life course.
  basic frames of reference

Continuity theory was created to explain evolutionary human development.

It is an open-feedback-systems theory, which means that it starts from the as-
sumption that systems are created to meet needs and are modified to take into
account feedback from the results of using the systems. In this chapter, the
self system is the system of primary interest.Why do we need a self system?
If we look at life as improvisational theater, then the satisfaction we can get
from our social performance may depend on knowing what character we are
playing. How do we know our character?
Identity is the unique set of characteristics and qualities considered collec-
tively and regarded as essential to a person’s self-awareness. In other words,
identity is a holistic self-concept, a sort of metaconception of self created by
synthesizing multitudes of specific attributes, capabilities, life experiences,
motives, habits, and preferences. James Hillman (1999) uses the word charac-
ter to refer to an individual’s creative description of self. To Hillman, character
stresses the uniqueness and singularity of each person. A dramaturgical meta-
phor is again helpful: much can happen to a character in a play, but through-
out the play that character is still identifiably different from other characters.
This illustrates the holistic quality of character and identity and the impor-
tance of continuity for a subjective sense of being “in character.”
According to Hillman, character is a celebration of the unique psychoso-
matic being we call a person. Character is descriptive detail. Character is not
unified into a closely integrated whole but instead looks like a loosely wound
core with lots of loose ends. Character reveals itself not in the morality of
behavior but in its style. Character is an imaginative description, and the self
perceives its character in a context involving other characters in a setting.
Character gives sense and purpose to the changes of aging, according to Hill-
man.
A major question for us is how spirituality manifests itself in character.
Character development involves making decisions that stress certain attri-
butes and capacities and downplay or ignore other attributes or capacities. So
where does spirituality fit into character in young adulthood compared with
middle age and later adulthood? What aspirations or fears lead to deepening
the spiritual aspects of character or to suppressing them?
Abraham Maslow (1968) considered self-actualization to be the highest
human need. Once basic physiological, safety, belonging, and esteem needs
have been met, an individual can be motivated toward “growth” needs such
as spirituality, creativity, and transcendence. Malsow’s theory of human self-
motivation, with its assumption that, once free of the grind of basic needs,
 s p i r i t u a l i t y , s p i r i t u a l s e l f, a n d s p i r i t u a l i d e n t i t y 

people strive to make the most of their capacities and be the best they can be,
was a lynchpin of the human potential movement. Maslow’s theory presumes
that character is already there in the bud, just waiting to bloom. Hillman says
that the freedom from social constraints that often comes with aging creates
conditions for increasingly becoming who you already are. Implicit in Hill-
man’s conception of self-actualization is increasing self-acceptance—a will-
ingness to make friends with one’s disvalued as well as valued character, one’s
feared as well as hoped-for character. For many people, spirituality is an in-
creasingly important aspect of character that is both realized and hoped for.
Development of the self is continuous, and evolution of the self occurs
mainly through small, incremental changes rather than through cataclysmic
crises. By the time most people are in their 40s, they have a well-developed
and highly refined self system that has been tested thousands of times. A large
majority of middle-aged and older people have a self system that provides
positive life satisfaction and self-esteem, but those who have created, or had
imposed on them, a system that provides poor life satisfaction and low self-
esteem have a heavy weight to lift if they wish to change. One way to lift such
a burden is through religious conversion, which, if genuine, suddenly makes
major changes in all of the elements of the self—self-concept, ideal self, self-
evaluation, and self-esteem.

continuit y of one’s self system

Consider the following story.

At age 6, Jenny enjoys the experience of singing—she loves the sound

she makes and the feeling of vibration in her chest when she sings. She is
told by many people that she has a nice voice. She chooses singing every
chance she gets. In middle school, she sings in the school choir and in
the youth choir at her church. She takes voice lessons an hour each week.
When Jenny sings, especially in the church choir, she often has an expe-
rience of being in an altered, expanded state. She “loses herself ” in the
music.
By high school, Jenny has a solid and well-confirmed concept of her-
self as a good singer. She not only sings in various choirs and in amateur
stage productions, she has learned to play the guitar and is learning to
write her own songs, mostly about everyday experiences. In college, she
no longer has the time to sing in multiple choirs and does not attend
  basic frames of reference

church anymore, but she continues to perform her songs in coffee houses
and local bars, partly for the joy of performing, partly for the money,
and partly for the applause and recognition. She records an album of
her songs that enjoys good sales locally. Jenny dreams of being a famous
singer. After college, she tries to make a career of singing and songwrit-
ing, but it is a difficult life with lots of rejections and financial difficulty.
She goes back to school to get a master’s degree in social work. She works
with girls who are first-time offenders in the juvenile justice system. She
continues to sing in various local venues, usually once a week.
At 28, Jenny marries and continues to work. She cuts her performing
back to once a month. By 34, she has two children, and soon she is teach-
ing her two girls to make up songs with titles like “Sharon wears purple
shoes.” When she performs now, her husband and kids are usually in the
audience, which means she only does coffee houses that have an early
show and sings more songs that kids might enjoy. Turns out most adults
enjoy those songs too. Jenny records an album of her own songs for chil-
dren.
When Jenny is 45, the kids are “doing their own thing” and Jenny has
been promoted to director of her program. Her husband travels a lot in
his work, but they enjoy long family vacations about three times a year.
She always takes her guitar on their vacations and there is much group
singing. She also sings a lot as she drives alone from this to that. She still
performs occasionally but not often enough to maintain a local following.
At 57, Jenny has kids in college. Her agency “reorganizes” to eliminate
the program she directs and she faces a reassignment that essentially
means starting over. She is eligible to retire, so she does. Almost im-
mediately, Jenny begins writing songs again and performing more often.
Within a year she begins volunteering twice a week teaching music in an
after-school program for middle school students. She joins a local choir
that sings mostly classical religious music and she rediscovers the classi-
cal voice she worked so hard to create in high school. She also rediscovers
the feeling of transcendence that can come to her while singing. Jenny
also joins a group of mostly older folk singers who get together for a
once-a-month sing-along.
Jenny says that she only recently consciously realized that music is her
spiritual path. She does not consider herself religious but considers her-
self a spiritual person.
 s p i r i t u a l i t y , s p i r i t u a l s e l f, a n d s p i r i t u a l i d e n t i t y 

Jenny’s story is an abbreviated version of one thread in her rich life, the inter-
play between her experience of music—the satisfaction, spiritual experience,
and social recognition music brings, and how this aspect of her self has been
involved in her decision making thus far in her life. Would we expect music to
play a role in Jenny’s life when she’s in her 70s? Yes. Why? Continuity theory.
Continuity theory holds that people develop mental frameworks based on
life experience (Jenny’s early perceptions that music brought her many satis-
factions), make decisions based on them (Jenny’s continuing to choose music
over other possible activities), observe the results and modify the frameworks
to improve them (Jenny’s dropping the idea of music as a way of earning a
living), and continue to make decisions and adapt their frameworks (Jenny’s
adapting her music to fit the circumstances of her life at each stage). Creat-
ing a self system constitutes a substantial investment of time and energy that
people become increasingly reluctant to abandon as they age. This reluctance
is usually not based in fear but in the potential for joy and satisfaction that
continuity represents to the person. Continuity theory offers clues about why
people take specific directions and how they adapt to life events. It is also a
model of how people learn from their life experience.
How people process feedback is at the heart of continuity theory. Psy-
chologist George Kelly (1955) created personal construct psychology based on
his observation that people do not share exactly the same meanings for the
language they use in thinking. Each word we use has our own unique set of
images, feelings, and life experiences attached to it. This is especially true
of the abstract language we use in analytical thought. This means that each
person has a unique, personal language he or she uses to organize, categorize,
analyze, and summarize perceptions, including perceptions of spirituality,
identity, and self.
Other important elements of processing feedback include attentional and
observational skills. By paying attention and observing skillfully, we obtain
better information to feed back into the personal construct system we have
created concerning the self. Each choice we make has results that, if we are
paying attention and carefully observing, we can use to refine our ideas about
the self to make them more useful and, with age, usually more realistic.
Continuity theory has two important implications for research. First, there
is no standard “template” for the self systems people create; each system is
based on the individual’s life experiences, awareness skills, and personal con-
structs. Research must therefore begin by investigating the individual’s vocab-
ulary about the self. Second, to understand the evolution of identity and self
  basic frames of reference

requires longitudinal information. To understand how a person’s self system

evolves, we must observe it at different points in time, because retrospective
reports are notoriously revisionist (Greenwald 1980). What people revise is
important information about the self they want to construct. In a research
world heavily committed to standardized survey language, continuity theory
requires that researchers acknowledge and accommodate individual language
and life experience, which increases the complexity and expense of research.
Now let us consider how spiritual experience, including thoughts about
spiritual aspects of life, influences various aspects of self and identity, and
vice versa. Given what I discussed about spiritual development in the previ-
ous chapter, it is important to consider spirituality as a possible influence in
development from early in life.

spiritual self-schemas and spiritual identit y

Observing how individuals respond to the following self-referential state-

ments is an effective way to ascertain an individual’s spiritual self-schemas
and identity. Each statement asserts a relation between spirituality and self
or identity.

I am a person who has spiritual experiences.

Individuals who agree with this statement are acknowledging that spiritual
experiences are possible and that they have spiritual experiences. This is the
most basic form of incorporating spirituality into the self concept. Spiritual
experiences can be at the being level and at the perceiving level. For example,
“I was aware of enormous space within me” or “I looked into his eyes and saw
a being just like me.”
Personal constructs are used to define experiences as spiritual. Say I have
an experience of being pleasantly detached from my physical body. How do
I interpret this experience? Is it evidence of mental illness? Is it a reflection
of the existence of a spiritual level of consciousness beyond what I am nor-
mally aware of? Is it just a temporary aberration with no meaning? What I
am predisposed to think about such experiences profoundly influences how I
interpret them. What I am predisposed to think about spiritual experiences is
deeply conditioned by the concepts, language, and customs I learned through
socialization to a specific ethnic and social class culture, which also includes
several specific religious cultures. But the influence of culture is also mediated
by my personal worldview, my central personal constructs.
 s p i r i t u a l i t y , s p i r i t u a l s e l f, a n d s p i r i t u a l i d e n t i t y 

When spiritual experiences are converted into thoughts about the Me,
they become part of the objectified self. For most people, it is difficult to have
an experience without thinking at some level “This is happening to me.” As we
saw earlier, many different types of experience can be classified as spiritual,
and by the time people reach adulthood most have a substantial number of
spiritual experiences tucked away in memory.
Spiritual teachings and teachers point the way and also provide mental,
linguistic frameworks for organizing our spiritual experiences. Rick Moody
relates the story of his interview with Jeffrey:

One day Jeffrey met a Sufi teacher at a friend’s apartment. At the time, he
explained, Islam conjured up the usual stereotypes of sword-wielding Arabs
and terrorists at the airport. Meeting this elderly Sufi changed all that.
“I sort of had . . . well, when I first met him my heart exploded in me. I felt
like I’d always known this man; always wanted to be with him. Something
like that—it’s hard to describe these things.”
At the request of his teacher, Jeffrey converted to Islam. “I didn’t know
anything about Islam, but one passage of the Koran got me: “Wheresoever
you look, there is the face of God.”
Moody pressed Jeffrey for guidance that might lead Moody to have a
similar experience.
“You know, seeing God isn’t for everyone,” Jeffrey said. “In Sufism we talk
about a person’s heart being open. People assume that this is the goal, that
all of us have to get to this place. But it isn’t true.
“The reason for being on a path is not always to have ‘experiences.’ You
struggle spiritually because that’s what you’re put on earth to do. It’s your job
as a human being. Whether or not you get to the light is not what matters. If
you do, great. If you don’t, great. We can’t really understand how it works. It
just happens to some people and not to others. That’s another reason why
it’s better not to talk about it—it makes people feel badly that they haven’t
experienced what you’ve experienced. Better to just keep it to yourself.”
Jeffrey’s statement reminded [Moody] of a Sufi saying: “The more one
talks about their vision of God, the faster you should run away.”
Jeffrey went on, “If your heart opens and you see light or angels, or what-
ever, afterward when it’s over you feel small and invisible. You realize you
didn’t do anything; you didn’t really make the thing happen. It was given to
you, and that’s all you can say about it.”
When asked “What should one do, then?” Jeffrey said, “Small things.
Start with small things. Efforts that are within your power. Everyday efforts
  basic frames of reference

to be nice to somebody, to be patient. Try to see the matter from the other
guy’s point of view. Try to understand that maybe this person is having a
bad day. Be generous. Give away something you like to someone who needs
it. Be cheerful when you’re not feeling so good. . . . Try not to make things
into tragedies if you can help it. Little things.
“Let me say something else. Most of us are easily distracted. We’re pulled
along by the current of things. But, you know, if you want to become an
accountant you don’t study law one year, art the next, medicine the next.
You’d never make it that way. You have to make a commitment. Choose
something and stay with it. It’s the same with spiritual things. . . . A person has
to go at this with deep sincerity. . . . The commitment is what’s important. Let
the rest take care of itself.” (Adapted from Moody and Carroll, 1997: 304–8)

Moody’s experience of Jeffrey reveals important elements about spiritual

teachers. First, Jeffrey provided a conceptual overview of the nature of the
spiritual journey and language that Moody could use to interpret his own
spiritual experiences. Second, there was something about Jeffrey that led
Moody to perceive what Jeffrey was saying as authentic. Jeffrey himself em-
bodied for Moody what Jeffrey was teaching.

I feel separated or alienated from my spiritual self.

In his book, A Hidden Wholeness, Parker Palmer (2004) describes a self
divided from soul: “We lose touch with our souls—the core of pure being that
children are so intimate with—and disappear into our roles” (15). The result
is a compartmentalized life in which the core self is somewhat alienated from
each of the compartmentalized selves because each compartment requires
that we deny other parts of the self. Palmer feels that “a divided life may be
endemic, but wholeness is always a choice” (17).
Palmer believes that the “true self ” is powerful, real, and spiritual, but shy.

Just like a wild animal . . . [the true self ] seeks safety in the dense under-
brush, especially when other people are around. If we want to see a wild
animal, we know that the last thing we should do is go crashing through the
woods yelling for it to come out. But if we will walk quietly into the woods,
sit patiently at the base of a tree, breathe with the earth, and fade into our
surroundings, the wild creature we seek might put in an appearance. We
may see it only briefly and only out of the corner of an eye—but the sight is
a gift we will always treasure as an end in itself. (58–59)
For Palmer, the spiritual journey is a journey of reuniting soul and role.
 s p i r i t u a l i t y , s p i r i t u a l s e l f, a n d s p i r i t u a l i d e n t i t y 

In Zen Buddhism, the spiritual quest is sometimes depicted as “the search

for an elusive Ox that roams wild in the rain forest. The Ox symbolizes the
intrinsic nature of consciousness, the mystery of what we are” (Hixon 1978,
77). Having turned his back on his true nature, the man cannot see the Ox.
He has lost sight of it but still he feels a need to search. The progression of the
spiritual journey is shown in a series of ten “Zen Ox-herding pictures”: seek-
ing the Ox, finding the tracks, first glimpse of the Ox, catching the Ox, taming
the Ox, riding the Ox home, Ox forgotten-self alone, both Ox and self forgot-
ten, return to the source, and entering the marketplace with helping hands
(figures 1–10). Note that once more metaphor points the way to realities that
are difficult to express in discursive language.
Rick Moody tells the following story about himself.

I am not one person inside, but two. The first is a highly social being who sits
in an office in Manhattan all day, talks on the phone to colleagues around
the country, writes scholarly papers, delivers lectures, directs workshops,
jokes, argues, gives orders and advice, and at home kicks the soccer ball
around with his son. A pillar of the community. That’s the visible [Rick]
Moody in the external world.
Beneath this outer mask, however, lives an entirely different being with
roots deeply sunk into the invisible. This second being is a rather gentle,
passive soul, a good deal quieter than the erudite professor who goes to
the office every day, and a good deal closer to the center of reality. I have
caught phantom glimpses of him through the years, sometimes in the midst
of ordinary activities, most often during meditation. . . . This self remains
so remote and silent that at times I wonder why it’s there at all. If the soul
doesn’t play a part in everyday life, what part does it play? Surely this soul
has important lessons to contribute. . . . Why then does it sit so passively
in the shadows of our consciousness, often unheard and unacknowledged
throughout out lives?
The answer is that it is not sitting there passively. It is actually calling to
us all the time, sending us message after message. . . . But it is doing so in
its own secret language, the language of spiritual communication—symbol,
contemplation, art, ceremony, and especially our dreams. (adapted from
Moody and Carroll 1997, 51–52)

This applies mainly to self as experiencer, the “I am.” Moody is in direct

contact with his spiritual self and has integrated that self with his conven-
tional social self.
Figure 1. Seeking the ox. “The Ox has really never gone astray. Our True
Nature is never lost and therefore can never be found” (Hixon 1978, 88).
Figure 2. Finding the tracks. “These tracks are the wisdom teaching that
all phenomena are the light of Original Mind. Even the deepest gorges
or the topmost mountains cannot hide this Ox’s nose, which reaches
right to Heaven” (Hixon 1978, 89).
Figure 3. First glimpse of the ox. “This encounter with the Ox does not
come through hearing esoteric teaching but through direct experience”
(Hixon 1978, 90).
Figure 4. Catching the ox. “We must now hold and embrace the Ox,
sustain our perception of True Nature with such disciplines as total
compassion, perfect nonviolence, unwavering truthfulness” (Hixon
1978, 91).
Figure 5. Taming the ox. “An effortless intimacy or friendship with the
Ox is being established. The Ox becomes a free companion, not a tool
for plowing the field of Enlightenment” (Hixon 1978, 92).
Figure 6. Riding the ox home. “The advanced practitioner now becomes
the illumined sage. The struggle is over. The sage begins spontaneously
to radiate enlightenment” (Hixon 1978, 93).
Figure 7. Ox forgotten, self alone. “The sage finally regards [him/her]
self as the full expression of True Nature. All spiritual practices and
concepts are idle. The contemplative way has become indistinguishable
from daily life” (Hixon 1978, 94).
Figure 8. Both ox and self forgotten. “There is only awakened
Enlightenment: no contemplator and no contemplation, no serenity and
no disturbance. There is no one, not even the sage” (Hixon 1978, 95).
Figure 9. Return to the source. “Formless awareness is growing back
into form again without losing its formless, or perfectly unitary, nature.
Enlightenment simply is the blue lake and the green mountain” (Hixon
1978, 96).
Figure 10. Entering the marketplace with helping hands. “The cheerful
one who fully manifests Enlightenment follows no path” (Hixon
1978, 97). He or she sees the world as it is and understands what
compassionate action or inaction is appropriate to each moment.
 s p i r i t u a l i t y , s p i r i t u a l s e l f, a n d s p i r i t u a l i d e n t i t y 

William James wrote,

One may say truly, I think, that personal religious experience has its roots
and center in mystical states of consciousness. . . . Our normal waking con-
sciousness, rational consciousness we call it, is but one special type of con-
sciousness, while all about it, parted from it by the filmiest of screens, there
lie potential forms of consciousness entirely different. We may go through
life without suspecting their existence; but apply the requisite stimulus, and
at a touch they are there in all their completeness . . . No account of the
universe in its totality can be final which leaves these other forms of con-
sciousness quite disregarded. How to regard them is the question. (James
[1905] 2005, 313)

The literature on spirituality contains many and varied accounts of a true

or core spiritual self from which humans tend to become separated. The ac-
counts above give some sense of the range of language, concepts, and images
that have been used to address this issue.

I am a spiritual person.
Spirituality shifts from being a category of ordinary experiences to being a
self-defining category, part of identity. In my longitudinal study of people who
were age 70 or older in 1996 (Atchley 1999) only about 30 percent saw them-
selves as spiritual persons. In Wade Roof ’s (1999) study of individuals who
were in their 40s in 1988, a large majority saw themselves as spiritual, and this
proportion increased over time, to 73 percent in 1998. Zinnbauer et al. (1997)
reported that 93 percent of their respondents rated themselves as spiritual
persons. George Gallup (2003) reported that in 2002, 47 percent of a national
sample “strongly agreed” with the statement “I am a person who is spiritually
committed,” and the proportion with spiritual commitment increased with age.
These findings suggest that the growing use of the term spiritual to describe in-
ner experiences of being and transcendence took hold more for those who had
come of age in the 1950s and that for many there was also a developmental
shift toward seeing oneself as a spiritual person as one aged.
What are the implications of spirituality becoming part of identity? It
seems reasonable to suspect that it becomes harder to relegate spirituality to
one or two compartments of lifestyle and that spirituality identity might be
expected to influence how a person approaches life in many more contexts.
  basic frames of reference

I feel attracted, drawn, or called to a spiritual journey.

Something happens to create an opening, an invitation that may come in
many forms: an experience that suggests we are not who we thought we were,
feeling homesick for a place we don’t recall being before, or an experience of
an alternative universe in our consciousness. Ron’s story illustrates how our
perspective can suddenly be shifted by a single life experience.

Ron attended a leadership training workshop for student affairs workers

from many colleges. He knew only a couple of the 150 people there, and
none of them was in his small group. On the beginning evening of the
workshop, each small group of 10 people was given the task of doing a
group painting. It was a pleasant enough task, but Ron felt that he didn’t
know much more about the people in his group when the task was com-
pleted than he had before, which was nothing.
The next morning, the small groups were asked to fill out a form for
each person in their small group, rating them on a series of personal
qualities, both positive and negative. Then the group was to pick a person
to start with, discuss that person’s qualities and come to consensus about
them, and then move on to the next person until everyone had been dis-
cussed. The person being discussed was to remain in the room but could
not speak while he or she was being discussed.
The group selected Ron as the first focus person, and for the entire
three hours allotted to this task, Ron listened in growing amazement as
this group of people with little experience of Ron argued about what Ron
was like. At first, Ron was disturbed by the vehemence of the negative
comments, but the longer the polarized discussion went on, the more
detached he felt. At some point he had a deep realization: “What these
strangers see when they look at me has little to do with me, what I think
or do, my personal qualities, nothing. I am like an empty screen and they
are quite willing to project their own preconceptions onto it.” Ron felt
liberated by this discussion, liberated from what he had seen as a need to
conform to his “role.” He began to look into himself to see what he was
really like, to reconcile the inner man with the outer, to be more authen-
tic in an existential, real sense. Ron sees this experience as the beginning
of his spiritual journey.

Until this point, Ron had focused his self system on the feedback he re-
ceived from others and had paid less attention to his own inner voice. After
 s p i r i t u a l i t y , s p i r i t u a l s e l f, a n d s p i r i t u a l i d e n t i t y 

this experience, he saw firsthand the limitations and unreliability of others’

appraisals as a guide for his development and for his own clarity of self-aware-
ness. He became motivated to more consciously examine his inner self, the
“I am.”
One of the great mysteries is why some people see such experiences as an
invitation to a spiritual journey and others do not. My impression is that this
probably relates to what the person is paying attention to and how open he or
she is to the possibility of a spiritual journey.

I am a person on a spiritual journey. I am a spiritual seeker.

A spiritual journey is an exploration—“evolving, open-ended, and revis-
able” (Roof 1999, 78). Wade Roof followed a panel of several hundred re-
spondents through the early part of middle age and found that “there was a
remarkable degree of clarity about themselves as [being] engaged in a pro-
cess-oriented spirituality and what that engagement may involve for them.
Reflexive spirituality is not haphazard or left to chance; it seeks self-under-
standing and self-management” (102). Saying that one is on a spiritual journey
is a statement of commitment. As mentioned earlier, Gallup (2003) found
that 47 percent of a national sample of adults saw themselves as “spiritually
committed.” Roof ’s respondents who were on a spiritual journey were likely to
stick with it. The journey usually starts with mysterious inner forces, but the
individual makes the decisions about which forks in the road to take and how
to monitor results, although others may attempt to influence these decisions.
Along the way, most people make choices that balance the need for open-
ness and the need for group support and security. Most people on a spiritual
journey create a narrative about it. “This story provides a way for them to un-
derstand their origins, how they have changed, and the role that crisis events
or significant others have played in their lives, and where they think they are
headed” (Wuthnow 1998, 186). Robert Wuthnow adds that the self-directed
spiritual journey is both liberating and scary because it requires “people to do
more of the work needed to understand spirituality and to put it into practice”
(13–14). Roof (1999) reported that the 60 percent of his respondents who saw
themselves as being on a spiritual journey came from every sort of religious
background, including evangelical and conservative Christian.
There are three major patterns of spiritual journey (Roof 1999). The first
pattern involves assimilating and conforming to a religious culture and gradu-
ally integrating this culture into one’s own personal constructs. Individuals
who choose this pattern enjoy the security of knowing what to expect and
  basic frames of reference

tolerate well the constraints their religion requires. Even in this pattern, how-
ever, individuals usually see themselves as responsible for the specific ele-
ments of the journey. The second pattern is an individualized journey within a
religious context. It often involves clergy as personal counselors who help the
individual integrate religious beliefs and practices with personal constructs of
meaning and purpose. The third pattern is the self-directed spiritual journey.
Individuals following this pattern may use free-lance “spiritual directors” to
help them gain the self-awareness and make the decisions needed to fashion,
maintain, and revise their spiritual journey. Others are comfortable being on
their own in searching, selecting, and processing feedback from experience
on the spiritual journey.
Seeing oneself as a seeker, a person who is actively pursuing and cultivating
spiritual experience and integrating those experiences into her or his life, is
not a concept that all people on a spiritual journey would apply to themselves.
Seekers are more actively searching and choosing and learning and applying.
In Moody and Carroll’s (1996) terms, we would expect seeking to be an early
phase of spiritual development, followed by settling into a meaningful spiri-
tual routine.

I am a person on a particular spiritual path.

In Hinduism, people speak of many yogas, or ways, of spiritual knowing:
understanding, good works, devotion, body movement, and breathing. Study,
contemplation, devotional practice, and service to others are main ways the
self can manifest spirituality in the world in most major spiritual traditions.
But in our postmodern world, the multiplicity of pathways can be daunting.
Within each spiritual tradition, there are numerous combinations of injunc-
tion and technique, and individuals can get stuck at the point of making a
commitment about which paths to try. A person who needs to look at all the
shoes in the store before trying on a pair may never get to the point of try-
ing on any. Roof (1999) found that most respondents who were on a spiritual
journey had settled into a routine practice by the ten-year follow-up. I have
found that descriptions of the spiritual path are highly individualistic, tailored
to fit the personal constructs, life opportunities, and background of the per-
son. The highly individualized nature of spiritual paths is also evident in the
many case studies reported by Moody and Carroll (1996), Wuthnow (1998),
and Roof (1999).
 s p i r i t u a l i t y , s p i r i t u a l s e l f, a n d s p i r i t u a l i d e n t i t y 

I have had an experience of spiritual transformation.

People who agree with this statement have personal experiences of being
transformed spiritually from one state or level to another. A 2002 Gallup Poll
found that 41 percent of adults said the statement “I have had a profound
awakening that changed the direction of my life” applied to them completely
(Gallup 2003).
To Ken Wilber (2006), transformation occurs when we leave behind an old
structure and embrace a new one. So when we leave behind an old spiritual
worldview and adopt a new one, we have been transformed. Spiritual trans-
formations sometimes occur in response to a dramatic experience: a near-
death experience, the collapse of the previous worldview in the face of feed-
back, a response to the charisma of a teacher or teaching, a sudden religious
conversion. Transformation is not just an incremental improvement or rear-
rangement of ideas but a fundamental restructuring of the way we see things.
Wilber says that transformation involves transcending a previous structure,
but including it. The previous self does not disappear; it is included as a set of
resources the new self has available. So when we are transformed, we do not
forget how to love our children, drive a car, or do our income taxes. We may
leave behind old habits, but we still know we had them in the past. We simply
see all that has gone before in an entirely different context. The “include” part
of Wilber’s “transcend and include” framework is important because if we
deny or repress our past, it remains as a shadow self, not open to reflection.
Including all of one’s previous stages in one’s self system is essential to what
Wilber calls “integral spirituality.”
Moody and Carroll (1997, 272–73) list several attributes of transformational
experiences, which they call “breakthroughs”: a perception of timelessness
and “placelessness”—a person feels as if the ordinary world with its boundar-
ies and limitations is dissolved or at least deeply altered; a conviction that the
breakthrough experience reveals a world much closer to “reality” than was
possible in one’s previous state of consciousness; a new sense of liberation,
freedom, and lightness—the weight of the world becomes easier to bear; per-
ceptions of light, serenity, and universal love; loss of fears about death; feel-
ings of renewal and new beginnings—some speak of “rebirth”; and a clear per-
ception that this transformation experience cannot be “adequately expressed
in ordinary language.” Many people use the expression “coming home” to
describe their spiritual transformation. Many people I’ve interviewed report
that after experiencing a spiritual transformation, events and lessons that
  basic frames of reference

in the past seemed confusing or unclear become clear. Many people react
with amusement at their previous “denseness.” Moody and Carroll (1997, 273)
write, “Breakthroughs may seem to occur suddenly and seemingly out of the
blue. In reality, these moments usually come after many years of daily struggle
and time spent in care of the soul.”
Many people feel that because they have been transformed, their troubles
ought to be over. A transformed perspective can certainly provide greater
detachment from the personality and its foibles, but the personality does not
disappear. Thus, spiritual practice in a post-transformation period may in-
volve constructing a new “transformed” self that does not deny elements of
the previous self that remain.

I experience some degree of detachment from worldly joys and sorrows.

For many people, detachment is a measure of spiritual transformation.
Transformation signifies greater present-moment awareness and greater
transcendence. From this new vantage point worldly happenings may be
seen in a context of expanded time and may seem to occur on a much bigger
stage. Commitment to focusing attention on the present—what Eckhart Tolle
(1999) calls “the Now”—instead of dwelling on the past or future reduces the
potential for a sense of urgency, which is a strong form of attachment. The
universal love associated with spiritual transformation enables compassion,
a deep empathy with the inevitable discomfort of being human, and humil-
ity in the face of trying to do anything about our own and others’ suffering.
Detachment does not mean that one no longer cares about what is happening
to self and others.
I lead a spiritually centered life.
Spirituality shifts from being one among the many self-schemas that form
identity to being a central or even the central schema. Marina’s story illus-
trates this process well.

Marina is in her early 60s and has been on an intentional spiritual jour-
ney most of her adult life. She knew at an early age that she was called
to a spiritually centered life, and she tried various paths. She entered a
convent for a time but found that this life did not suit her. She studied
comparative religion, thinking that this might be a way to unite work and
spiritual journey. What she found was academic rivalry and discourse
that trivialized spiritual experience. Throughout much of her young and
middle adulthood, Marina struggled mightily with the whipsaw effects
 s p i r i t u a l i t y , s p i r i t u a l s e l f, a n d s p i r i t u a l i d e n t i t y 

of wanting to conform to the “social program” appropriate to her social

class and gender while at the same time trying to lead a spiritually cen-
tered life. The empty nest and retirement freed Marina to better integrate
her lifestyle and her spiritual life. Her life now revolves around nourish-
ing her inner life and the spiritual lives of others in her spiritual com-
munity, as well as serving her community and society by being a quiet
but persistent advocate for peace. She is also a mainstay of her spiritual
community in terms of willingness to do the instrumental tasks needed
to keep the group going.
Marina’s lifestyle does not look much like the stereotypical American
middle-class picture. She lives in a small but comfortable home, and
her love for gardening as a contemplative practice is evident in the well
cared-for flower beds surrounding the house. She does not own a televi-
sion. Marina spends time each day in contemplative prayer, and she also
enjoys reading new ideas about various topics concerning spirituality.
She teaches classes about different aspects of spirituality, especially the
history of mysticism, and takes classes too. She is part of two spiritual
discussion groups that meet regularly to share their experiences on the
spiritual journey, support one another through difficult times, celebrate
life’s joys, have fun, and ponder deep questions. Each week, she attends a
contemplative gathering of her spiritual community, which has about 125
regular attenders. She also stands at a silent peace vigil each Sunday.
Marina’s life looks pretty simple from the outside, but when I listened to
all the things she is doing, it brought home vividly Wuthnow’s (1998) point
that being in charge of one’s own spiritual life involves a lot of work. Marina’s
life is one of deep meaning, incredible joy, the bittersweetness of compassion,
strong and enduring relationships, and a persistent tug of work that needs to
be done.

I am a spiritual being and not simply a person. I am a spiritual being

on a human journey.
Spirituality shifts from being a personal character dimension or focus to
being a source of transcendent identity. The personal identity is less impor-
tant than the transcendent nonpersonal identity. In Hindu philosophy, this
is called realization, the realization that people have an immortal spiritual
aspect that is much deeper than just being a transitory individual. In this
philosophy, the supreme being is not an entity but rather an “infinite sea of
being.” Infinity is difficult to grasp because it is not merely big but is actually
  basic frames of reference

limitless—infinitely bigger than big. The Quakers speak of “that of God within
everyone.” Whatever we conceive God or a supreme being to be, there is a bit
of that in us, and we can identify ourselves with it. This idea was also at the
root of The Perennial Philosophy (Huxley 1944) and Paul Tillich’s (1967) idea
of a God that served as Ground of God—a God beyond God.

conclusion

There is little question that for many people spirituality is a central element
of identity and self. We have looked at a variety of concepts that can be used
to detail this relationship. It is also likely that these people navigate the so-
cial world in ways that are different from those of people who do not see
themselves as spiritual, but much research remains to be done to understand
this possibility. My guess is that there is great diversity in the composition of
spiritual identity and self and in the ways spiritual identity and self influence
lifestyles and life courses. We can also divide those who see themselves as
spiritual into those for whom spiritual identity is an ego enhancer and those
for whom spiritual identity is a way to transcend ego.
Does our discussion of spirituality, identity, and self imply that incorporat-
ing spirituality into identity and self is better than not seeing oneself as spiri-
tual? No. People who see spirituality in their experience are responding to
their experience, and people who do not see spirituality in their experiences
are also responding to their experience. No implication should be drawn that
seeing oneself as spiritual is “better” than not seeing oneself this way. My aim
is simply to provide concepts, definitions, and theoretical frameworks that
can be used to study spirituality, and these ideas have application mainly for
the large proportion of the population who do see spirituality in their world.
This chapter illustrates the difficulty of trying to capture a sense of a per-
son’s spiritual identity and self through one-shot survey questions such as
“To what extent do you consider yourself a spiritual person?” Narratives of
the spiritual journey are particularly informative precisely because they are
usually condensed versions of origins, changes, and directions that reflect the
underlying values and experiences that shape a specific journey tailored to
the needs of a specific person. The many concepts and approaches to looking
at spiritual identity and self presented in this chapter are valuable for getting
a sense of the important questions to ask, not so much for providing pat an-
swers. They also provide a rich vocabulary that can be used to discuss these
important topics.
 part ii

Spiritual Journeying
   
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 chapter four
   
Becoming a Sage and a Spiritual Elder
Transpersonal Psychology

This chapter is about experiences people have in the process of becoming

sages and spiritual elders. To become a sage is to manifest wisdom and calm
judgment. To become a spiritual elder is to be a sage in the role of elder—in
the family, community, or society. A spiritual centeredness is involved in being
a sage and in being a spiritual elder. To fully open opportunities for individuals
to serve as sages requires a sense that sage is a position in the community for
which people can be recruited and supported—that sages serve an important
function for communities.
I use the word becoming to suggest that being a sage is not a destination
at which we arrive but, rather, a capacity that we can bring into being in any
moment. Becoming a sage in the present moment is the culmination of what
has come before in terms of individual spiritual growth and capacity to under-
stand and see clearly the demands of a specific situation. Like a kaleidoscope,
the capacity to be a sage is a moving mosaic that requires the ability to be
intensely present and at the same time to transcend purely personal perspec-
tives, all the while remaining in touch with a big picture, which moves to bring
changing circumstances into focus. Becoming a spiritual elder is also an evo-
lution that couples being and transcendence with action in social roles.
The chapter begins with a consideration of wisdom—what it is and how it
develops—because wisdom is the defining capacity of the sage. Next I look at
some of the personal, cultural, and social obstacles that prospective spiritual
elders must often overcome and the skillful means they might use in mani-
festing themselves as sages in the community. I then present three types of
sage associated with later stages of the life course: sage-in-training, actualized
sage, and transcendent sage.
  spirit ual journe ying

spiritual development and wisdom

Like spirituality, wisdom is a sensitizing concept that does not have a con-
crete referent, so there are many definitions of wisdom. For Paul Baltes and
colleagues (Baltes and Smith 1990; Baltes 1993; Baltes and Staudinger 2000),
for example, wisdom is merely an advanced form of cognition. In this view,
wisdom is a practical skill involving rich factual and procedural knowledge,
applied in a context that includes the entire human life course and a multicul-
tural vantage point. As Monika Ardelt (2003) pointed out, this is a Western,
instrumental view. For others (Achenbaum 1997; Ardelt 2003; Atchley 1993),
an Eastern view, which looks at wisdom as a metaperspective rooted in spiri-
tual development, is necessary if we are to include faculties such as empathy
and compassion in the concept of wisdom.
Andrew Achenbaum and Lucinda Orwoll (1991) place growing ability to
transcend at the center of their concept of wisdom (see table 8). Their concept
of wisdom starts with the spiritual process of transcending at the intraper-
sonal level of the personal self, and this transcendence leads to an expanded,
transcendent concept of the self as more than a personal self, a less distorted
self-concept, and less self-centered motives for action. When transcendence
includes the interpersonal level, capacities such as empathy, understanding,
and compassion come into play in relationships with others. When transcen-
dence expands to a universal level, to include all of life, then self-transcen-
dence is complete and the being recognizes the limits of human knowledge
and understanding and is ready to make lasting spiritual commitments. One
of Achenbaum and Orwoll’s main contributions to the conceptualization of
wisdom is including an element of motivation in their definition, the urge to
bring spiritual insights to bear on oneself, in one’s relationships, and in one’s
wider world.
table 8
Dimensions of Wisdom: Achenbaum and Orwoll
Intrapersonal Interpersonal Universal
Personality Self-development Empathy Self-transcendence
Cognition Self-knowledge Understanding Recognizing limits of
knowledge
Conation Integrity Compassion Philosophical/spiritual
commitments
Source: Adapted from Achenbaum and Orwoll (1991).
 be c oming a sage and a spirit ual elder 

Ardelt (2003) saw wisdom as an integration of three types of perspective:

affective or emotional, cognitive, and reflective or contemplative (see table
9). In the affective region, wisdom involves experiences such as compassion,
a positive stance toward self and others, and the absence of negative emo-
tions and behavior directed at self or others. In the cognitive region, wisdom
involves understanding how life works—especially its deeper meaning, hu-
man nature, the limits of knowledge, and the fact of uncertainty as part of
life. In the reflective region, wisdom involves the ability to see what is with
undistorted perception, to see issues from multiple perspectives, to perceive
with less self-centeredness and more self-awareness and insight. To Ardelt, all
three of these regions are necessary for fully developed spiritual wisdom.
In the vocabulary we have been using to discuss spirituality, the spiritual
qualities of being, transcending the personal self, and direct connection with
the sacred are easily integrated into the frameworks developed by Achen-
baum and Orwoll (1991) and Ardelt (2003).
Underlying the spiritually focused wisdom frameworks is the notion of a
psychology that transcends the personal self and allows for union with the
sacred. The term transpersonal first came into use to describe an approach to
psychology that acknowledges and incorporates the transcendent or spiritual
aspects of the human mind that can be joined with cognitive and develop-
mental psychology to create a more holistic approach (Walsh and Vaughn
1993; Wilber 2000). Transpersonal consciousness transcends personal aware-
ness, permitting the experience of a nonpersonal realm within awareness.
Transpersonal psychology acknowledges that there are multiple states and
levels of consciousness, that psychological development tends toward higher
or ultimate human potential, that higher levels of consciousness are nonper-
sonal or transpersonal in that they are beyond ego-centered consciousness,
and that higher levels of consciousness are transcendent and spiritual.

table 9
Dimensions of Wisdom: Ardelt
Affective Compassion, positive stance toward self and others, absence of negative
emotion and behavior toward others
Cognitive Understanding life’s deeper meaning, understanding limits of knowledge
and human nature, accepting uncertainty
Reflective Undistorted vision, multiple perspectives lead to self-awareness, insight,
diminished self-centeredness
Source: Adapted from Ardelt (2003).
  spirit ual journe ying

being a sage or a spiritual elder

What does it mean to be a sage? A sage is one who has done the inner work
necessary to act in the world with pure being, transcendence of the personal
self, and direct connection with the sacred. Sages also manifest cognitive,
emotional, and contemplative wisdom. They first must come into deep and
enduring contact with their spiritual nature; then they can bring that nature
to whatever roles they play in society. In this sense, being a sage modifies how
one plays many types of social role, but being a sage is often invisible because
it is not based on what we do but who we see ourselves to be as we do it.
For every obviously sagely act, the sage performs hundreds of unobtrusively
sagely acts. This concept of the sage is flexible enough to accommodate the
realities of our postmodern world because it does not center being a sage
within a specific role or religious context. However, the spiritual elder can
also be a role in itself in contexts that are explicitly spiritual or religious. Spiri-
tual elders are mentors and wisdom keepers, but spiritual elders do not see
wisdom as a commodity to possess; they see it is a process that depends on
connection to the sacred.
The process of becoming a sage can “transform the downward arc of aging
into the upward arc of expanded consciousness” by focusing on the possibility
that later life can be a time of unparalleled inner growth (Schachter-Shalomi
and Miller 1995, 5–7).
One can be a sage without knowing how to bring this way of being into
action. The process of becoming a sage involves an interplay between contem-
plation and action. Without contemplation, the capacity for action as a sage is
not there. For instance, I once attended a meeting at which a venerated Bud-
dhist roshi was present. He sat quietly with great stillness, and at one point the
moderator turned to him and said, “Do you have anything to add, Roshi?” The
roshi obviously considered the question deeply, and after a long pause said,
“No.” This no carried much more weight than a casual or offhand no would
have. In this case, the action was an obvious act of deeply considering the
question and it was rooted in deep contemplation. But without action, there
is no sage in the family or community. One may experience enlightenment
alone, but for that enlightenment to have effect in the world the enlightened
one must continue to participate in the world. When people are recognized
as sages—venerated for their experience, judgment, and wisdom and encour-
aged to play the role of sage—they have become actualized.
 be c oming a sage and a spirit ual elder 

obstacles

The cultural concept of life stages and postmodernism constitute important

obstacles to becoming a sage. The cultural concept of life stages essentially
ignores the potential for spiritual growth, focusing instead on the physical
and psychological aspects of maturation and aging, their effects on psycho-
biological functioning, and changing social roles. Midlife is seen as being
dominated by power and responsibility. Later maturity and old age are seen
as life stages permeated by loss, and many people’s reaction to this image is
denial and avoidance. They avoid aging and older people and deny their own
aging. Herein lies another paradox: To become sages, we must embrace all life
stages, including later adulthood; but to embrace later life we need positive
visions of what it can bring. However, to have positive visions of what later
life can bring, we need images of sages. A key to overcoming this obstacle is
to recognize that sages are not rare but abundant, if we only know how to
look for them.
Postmodernism gives rise to a subjective worldview in which everyone’s
individual reality is treated as having validity. “My truth” is taken to be each
person’s ultimate truth. This viewpoint is often used to justify self-indulgence,
but it also recognizes a fundamental aspect of human existence: we all have
our own personal constructs of goodness, truth, and beauty, which we use to
make sense out of life and make decisions about it. This is an important start-
ing point. But instead of taking these personal constructs as ultimate truth, we
might consider them as working hypotheses that we are skeptical about, have
doubts about, or are willing to subject to the test of dialogue and experience.
This last perspective creates experiences of humility in the face of a search for
truth. A key is to retain the openness of postmodernism without succumbing
to its potential for nihilism.
Fear is probably the major personal obstacle to becoming a sage. We spend
many years of our lives learning to function as social beings, and it takes cour-
age to distance ourselves from this type of functioning for a time to learn
to function as spiritual beings. Many spiritual seekers find that nourishing
spirituality requires a period of intense focus on the spiritual region of expe-
rience. A key to letting go of our fear about what may happen to our social
functioning as we focus on spiritual development is to recognize that spiritual
development does not require that we abandon our lives as social beings. In
fact, retaining our capacity as social beings is essential to becoming actualized
  spirit ual journe ying

as a sage. For example, to survive in any social world, one must have a basic
understanding of how it functions, including basic ideas about the part we are
expected to play. What spiritual development offers is a capacity to see the
social world and its demands with more clarity.
We also tend to fear letting go of our social roles. But if we have done our
inner work, we can shift our perspective to the spiritual level of conscious-
ness while we continue to function in many of the same social roles. However,
we need to have the capacity to remain centered spiritually in order not to
be drawn into the materialistic mindset of others we encounter in various
everyday venues in which we play our social roles. Many spiritual traditions
teach that this learning to be “in the world but not of it” is best begun quietly.
Remember, becoming a sage is foremost a way of being and not a set of items
on a résumé.
Fear of silence and inactivity is another major obstacle to knowing our
spiritual self. In New York, London, or Tokyo, it seems as though most people
walking down the street are talking on cell phones. Many people seek to fill
every potentially quiet moment with sights and sounds. To those unaccus-
tomed to it, five minutes of silence can seem like an eternity. Those unfamiliar
with stillness find it difficult to just sit quietly. Their bodies want to fidget and
move. They feel a need to be doing something all the time.
For many people, spiritual development provides an increased capacity
to experience silence, stillness, and peace in any moment. One day, as I was
rushing to my next meeting, I became aware of how harried I felt. This was a
purely “in my head” experience and I was also aware that I was missing out on
a beautiful sunny fall day. I shifted my internal focus and began to walk at an
amble and to enjoy my surroundings. Instead of arriving at my destination all
wound up, I arrived refreshed. Now, I often enjoy the opportunity for stillness
and peace that comes with waiting in line. This creates a feeling of the enor-
mity of space and time. In this context, the calm required of a sage is easier to
manifest.
Clear seeing also requires that we not turn away from unpleasant truths.
Ram Dass (2000, 54) wrote that “in the process of learning to become mind-
ful, and to age in a conscious way, fearlessness is an essential ingredient. This
fearlessness involves the willingness to tell the truth, to ourselves and others,
and to confront the contents of our minds. We must be willing to look at
everything—our own suffering as well as the suffering around us—without
averting our gaze, and allow it to be in the present moment.”
 be c oming a sage and a spirit ual elder 

skillful me ans

Contemplative practice, spiritual teachings and teachers, and spiritual com-

munity are important supports for becoming a sage. Contemplative practices
teach us patience. The paradox of contemplative practices is that they are
intended to lead us to spiritual experience, yet the harder we try the less likely
it is that we will have a spiritual experience. Contemplative practice requires
faith because the results of practice are not predictable. By engaging in con-
templative practice, we can reduce the clutter in our consciousness and create
space within which spiritual experience may occur.
Contemplative practices come in enormous variety, ranging from medita-
tion and contemplative prayer to devotional prayer to rumination on sacred
texts to contemplative movement disciplines such as walking meditation and
tai chi. All these practices hold the potential to connect us with what Al-
dous Huxley (1944) and Paul Tillich (1967) termed “the ground of being.” The
ground of being can be experienced as both immanent and transcendent. It is
immanent in that it permeates everything. It is transcendent in that it is expe-
rienced as an infinite sea of being. This concept was probably first articulated
in Western thought by Meister Eckhart (c. 1260–c. 1327), who said that we
need a concept of God as the ground of being against which our more limited
personified concept of God can serve as figure. Eckhart Tolle’s (1999) concept
of the Now is akin to the concept of the ground of being. Countless people
have reported that the inner experience of the sacred ground of being is one of
deep silence, stillness, well-being, and peace. Once this connection has been
experienced, the experiencer is motivated to experience it again. Although
contemplative practices cannot guarantee a recreation of the immediate ex-
perience of the ground of being, they represent a good strategy. Not only that,
but once we get used to the silence and stillness of contemplation, spiritual
practice usually becomes a pleasant experience in itself.
Spiritual teachings and teachers can accelerate our spiritual development,
but they can also get in the way—yet another paradox. Authentic spiritual
teachings about the nature of the spiritually centered life are often attempts
to put into words the processes and circumstances associated with an experi-
ence of the ground of being. Such teachings come through human vehicles,
located in a cultural and historical time and place. Another paradox is that to
understand teachings fully, we need to have had our own direct experience
of the ground of being. Otherwise the teachings are just thinking. Whether
  spirit ual journe ying

teachings ring true to a person depends on how the teachings resonate with
that person’s spiritual experiences and the language that seems to him or her
to be an authentic way to talk about those experiences. Some people are for-
tunate to grow up in a spiritual tradition with concepts and language that
continue to resonate well with their experiences as they evolve spiritually.
Others find that the concepts and language of their religion of origin gradu-
ally lose the capacity to describe their spiritual experiences. Often, spiritual
seekers remain on the lookout for teachings that express well what they have
experienced. It is not that they are necessarily looking for a different truth;
they may simply be looking for more or better ways to express what they have
already experienced.
Teachers can be invaluable bridges between teachings and experience.
Some teachers are good at leading people to a direct experience of the ground
of being. Others are good at leading people to ways of expressing those expe-
riences. Some teachers model bringing wisdom into everyday life. Still others
are good at many of these things. Not all teachers are gurus. As Ram Dass
(1988) said in an audio presentation, “The teacher points the way; the guru is
the way.” Gurus are the embodiment of the teaching in all its aspects. In this
respect, the fully realized sage is a guru, although there is no such recognized
position in Western societies.
Spiritual communities are a valuable support for the spiritual journey.
Some spiritual communities function within the context of traditional reli-
gions; others are nondenominational collaborations. Spiritual communities
provide guidance, structure, and encouragement. Many people find that be-
ing part of a spiritual community makes it easier to sustain their commit-
ment to the spiritual journey. Of course, spiritual communities come in many
varieties. Some are loosely organized and democratic in process. Others are
hierarchical and doctrinaire. Most are probably somewhere in between these
two extremes. Little systematic study has been made of how these variations
among spiritual communities influence the nature of spiritual experience or
development.
Spiritual communities also serve as a check on the ego’s tendency to trans-
form spiritual insights into ego agendas. For example, the Quakers have a
process called the “clearness committee,” which calls together a small group
within the community to help a seeker explore the extent to which a motive is
spiritually rooted. Clearness committees are especially likely to be called for
those who are considering membership or marriage, but other types of action
can also benefit from this process. Clearness committees create a supportive
 be c oming a sage and a spirit ual elder 

space in which people can, in the company of spiritual peers, explore fully their
motives and intentions. Clearness committees are intended not to put a stamp
of approval on any particular way of thinking or acting but instead to open
an opportunity for the seeker to arrive at greater clarity about the matter.
Being part of a spiritual community also allows a person to explore the
language and concepts of spirituality in the company of others who are also
confronting issues of spiritually connecting with inner being and transcen-
dence, expressing that connection, and contemplating the implications of that
connection for everyday life.
Becoming a sage thus occurs in the context of spiritual development. But it
also occurs in a context that includes cultural and personal obstacles both to
believing that spiritual growth is the purpose of life and to recovering a role
for sages as exemplars of spiritually awakened living. Contemplative practice,
spiritual teachings and teachers, and spiritual communities are important
supports on the journey to becoming a sage. Becoming a sage is a capacity
that usually takes many years to develop.
I have encountered three distinct categories of people who are involved in
becoming sages: sages-in-training, actualized sages, and transcendent sages.

sages-in-tr aining

When a person realizes that becoming a sage is a real possibility, she or he can
become a sage-in-training. (Of course, most people who are doing the work
to develop spiritual capacities do not see themselves as sages-in-training; that
would seem pretentious.) Sages-in-training take on sages as their reference
group, people who represent their aspirations. But how do people come to
this realization? A fortunate few experience a rite of passage that recognizes
their entry into sagehood, but most of us must rely on more subtle messages
that we are entering a new stage. Here is my own experience of initiation:

In 1999, I attended an acknowledgment ceremony for elders at Naropa

University. The Naropa Elders serve as interview subjects for students,
attend classes such as contemplative caregiving or the psychology of ag-
ing, and often become mentors for students and faculty. The ceremony
was conducted by Subonfu Some, a West African tribal spiritual teacher.
In her culture, it is assumed that all elders have done the preparation
needed to function as a sage. She began by gathering the elders into a
seated circle facing outward. I was surprised when Subonfu took me by
  spirit ual journe ying

the hand and seated me in the circle. Although I was 60, I did not see
myself as yet being an elder, and I was easily ten years younger than the
others included as elders. There were about fifteen elders in the circle.
About seventy-five other attendees (students and faculty) walked around
the circle for ten minutes or so singing a lilting song of appreciation to
the elders. Then Subonfu instructed the attendees to go to the elders for
blessings. I had never in my life given anyone a blessing and had no idea
how to do so. A psychology faculty member whom I knew only casually
approached me, knelt on the floor in front of my chair, and asked for my
blessing. After a brief feeling of being at a loss, I went in my conscious-
ness to that place that is beyond my personal concerns and found its
stillness. I then lightly placed my hand behind her head and drew her
forehead to mine and said, “Be peace.” Tears welled in her eyes and she
smiled. She then bowed two or three times to me, rose, and stood quietly
a moment before moving on. I looked around the room, and the other el-
ders were involved in the same unpretentious ritual. I gave different bless-
ings to ten or twelve people that day. It seemed that the process of blessing
and being blessed was much more important than the specific words. This
was my initiation into becoming a sage in the present moment.

Unfortunately, such initiations into sagehood seldom occur in our society.

We do not have formal rites of passage that clearly mark entry into elderhood.
Instead, if we are lucky we experience subtle messages that people are inter-
ested in what we have to offer, especially in situations that involve articulating
a big picture. These experiences are openings to practice becoming a sage. Of
course, the demands of speaking for the long view, what Ronald Manheimer
(1999) called “the work of generations,” can also spark an interest in learning
more about the role of spiritual elder. But the sagely response in many situa-
tions is to sit quietly and wait for a spiritually inspired perspective to appear,
and waiting is often not welcome in our fast-paced, multitasking society.
There are a few “schools” where people can learn about being a sage. For
example, the Sage-ing Guild is a national network of persons trained to of-
fer introductory workshops and several advanced workshops on becoming
a sage. The guild workshops support both the inner work that is required to
become a sage and the skills and knowledge required to bring that perspective
into various roles in the community.
Mentors and role models are also helpful in learning what it means to be a
sage. As mentioned earlier, sages are common, but we may need to hone our
 be c oming a sage and a spirit ual elder 

perception to allow us to see them. In my experience, sages often have notable

characteristics in addition to many years of life experience: clarity, patience,
an air of quietude, good listening skills, a nurturing attitude toward others,
and a lack of anxiety even in the face of distressing circumstances. They may
or may not be verbally articulate or interested in social action. By spending
time with sages and noticing how they combine their inner work with their
capacity to benefit the world, sages-in-training can see that sages come in
many varieties and develop a better sense of what it would take to become
a sage themselves. Actualized sages are often willing to serve as mentors to
sages-in-training.
Inspirational discourse, mentors, and role models are helpful, but the
sage-in-training must eventually face alone the inner tasks of spiritual de-
velopment. These tasks involve cultivating spiritual disciplines, doing philo-
sophical homework, reflecting and integrating, letting go of earlier concerns,
practicing forgiveness and gratitude, and making peace with death (Schachter-
Shalomi and Miller 1995). These tasks engender a rich inner frame of reference
that nurtures the capacity to stay spiritually centered amid the complexities
of daily life. They lay the foundation for being able to become a sage in the
present moment.
As mentioned, spiritual practices come in many varieties, and to facilitate
a steady awareness of spiritual connection with the ground of being, practices
are best done regularly. At first, contemplative practices such as prayer or
meditation can be difficult. They require being still and quiet as much as pos-
sible. The practitioner must learn to push through the urge to abandon prac-
tice when the body aches or the mind is filled with cascading thoughts. But
the more often the practitioner is able to just sit in awareness of the body and
mind, whatever their current state, practice becomes easier. And developing
the habit of practice creates a commitment that can carry the practitioner
through times when the mind does not want to practice. Developing a mature
spiritual practice takes time—years rather than weeks or months.
Practitioners often report feeling that they have gained the ultimate insight
only to find that there is more to learn. And much of this learning occurs at
an intuitive rather than a verbal or an intellectual level. When this happens
over and over again, it instills an attitude of humility, especially because it is
so difficult to communicate what one has learned.
What Zalman Schachter-Shalomi and Ronald Miller (1995) call philosoph-
ical homework involves contemplating deep questions about where we come
  spirit ual journe ying

from and where we go. They quote Robert de Ropp: “The contemplation of
an individual life against the background of time brings inevitably deeper in-
sights into the nature of being and becoming. How vast a time passed before I
existed and how vast a time will be after I cease to exist! But what is I? What is
this self whose days and adventures are drawing to a close? An isolated spark
briefly lit, destined to fade forever into darkness? A fragment of a greater con-
sciousness that will return to the place from which it came? A spirit temporar-
ily imprisoned in flesh? A traveler far from his true home and now about to
return?” (124). Who am I? Why am I here? What is my place in the universe?
Is there a God? What is God? Can I know God? What is my relation to God?
Rumination on these types of questions makes later life a philosophical life
stage (Manheimer 1999).
Erik Erikson initially thought that the major psychological task of old age
was to develop ego integrity and thus avoid despair in the face of aging and
death (Erikson 1955). But in his eighties, Erikson changed his mind. Wisdom
was the culminating development of old age, and wisdom was reached by un-
derstanding that integrity and despair coexist (Erikson, Erikson, and Kivnick
1986). The wise individual understands that integrity balances despair and
that despair tempers integrity. Wisdom thus transcends both integrity and
despair. This type of transcendent perspective grows out of years of contem-
plating deep questions.
To move forward into these deep questions, the sage-in-training must also
overcome inertia and let go of earlier concerns. Feeling that one has been
wronged or deprived in the past is a major attachment to the past. To move
forward, being able to forgive ourselves and those others we hold responsible
for past circumstances that distress us is usually helpful. The Buddhist practice
of Tonglen (Wegela 1996) is an example of a spiritual practice that can change
perceptions of the past and help us develop the compassion that enables for-
giveness. The practitioner begins with an attitude of openness, awareness,
and compassion. Then he or she focuses for a few moments on the breath,
breathing in dark feelings of confusion or pain and breathing out light, bright
feelings of relief. Then he or she focuses for a few minutes on a particular situ-
ation that causes pain and breathes in those feelings and breathes them back
out into the entire universe. Then he or she focuses for a time on all people
who experience similar pain, breathing in their pain and then breathing it
out into the universe. This last phase leads the practitioner to experience that
she or he is not alone in experiencing pain and to experience the relief that
accompanies releasing the pain into the vastness of the universe. The result is
 be c oming a sage and a spirit ual elder 

a feeling of connection and relaxation. From this state, forgiveness and grati-
tude are much more possible.
Buddhists believe that the reality of death, if unexamined, is like a mill-
stone hanging around the neck. Denying death does not really work. To be
free, we must face death and accept it (Becker 1973). To die with awareness,
we must be willing to contemplate and ruminate on death until we reach an
understanding of it. This is another part of the philosophical homework, deal-
ing with questions such as, How will I deal with the process of dying? What
happens to me at the moment of death and after I have died?
Sages-in-training are just getting started on a set of tasks that are rarely
fully completed in a lifetime. Just when we think our work is done, life sends
us another invitation for further learning.

ac tualized sages

Mature adults who have done the inner work that allows them to experience
ongoing present-moment awareness and transcendence are able to move
about in the world as actualized sages. Generativity and wisdom are the hall-
marks of this type of sage.
Generativity involves nurturing and guiding those who will succeed us in
the flow of generations (Erikson, Erikson, and Kivnick 1986). It is most often
expressed in mentoring relationships. Mentoring is a type of caring relation-
ship; it focuses on accompanying a developing person and providing loving
support. Support may involve giving information about a sphere of life, espe-
cially an overview, but its ultimate aim is to foster the capacity of the mentee
to function on his or her own. Schachter-Shalomi and Miller (1995, 189) as-
sert that “mentors do not impose doctrines and values on their mentees in
an attempt to clone themselves. Rather, they evoke the individuality of their
apprentices, applauding them as they struggle to clarify their values and dis-
cover their authentic life paths.” Mentoring is a skill that takes practice, and
therefore time, to develop.
Schachter-Shalomi and Miller (1995, 200–202) suggest several guidelines
for recognizing the mentoring skills of an actualized sage. First, the sage lis-
tens with great spaciousness to the mentee’s concerns before attempting to
share his or her wisdom. The sage does not expect to transfer great insights
unsolicited but instead offers wisdom in small increments in response to
questions. Second, the sage uses Socratic questioning methods to evoke the
mentee’s innate knowing rather than imposing knowledge in an authorita-
  spirit ual journe ying

tive fashion. Third, the sage does not try to impress the mentee by claiming
to be perfect, but instead is an authentic human self—seeking, tentative, and
vulnerable. Fourth, the sage works with the mentee’s unique human potential,
not with some idealization of what everyone should be like. As James Hillman
(1999) pointed out, character development is what later life is all about, and
character is highly individuated. Fifth, the sage recognizes that the mentor-
ing relationship has phases. In the beginning, there is a gradual development
of spiritual intimacy that allows for a genuine relationship. Then there may
develop a frequency of interaction that allows the relationship to meet the
mentor’s need to be of real service and the mentee’s need to have someone
really understand what she or he is experiencing. The deep trust that this
process occasions allows the transmission of wisdom to occur. Finally, the
mentee becomes a peer and no longer needs to be under the mentor’s wing.
The mentoring relationship comes to an end. Both mentor and mentee then
need be willing to move forward into a new peer-to-peer relationship.
Mentoring relationships can occur in many different contexts. Parents of-
ten mentor their children. Grandparents often mentor their grandchildren.
In the workplace, elders can be mentors for those who are at earlier stages in
their careers. In community organizations, elders can mentor those who are
at an earlier stage of their experience in public service. In almost any intergen-
erational context, elders can mentor the young. But in our society, too many
contexts are age segregated, and the natural tendency of the young to seek
mentors among their elders is stifled.
In my course on the psychology of aging, I asked each student to visit an
elder who had many years experience on a spiritual path. I had a pool of about
thirty such elders who volunteered to be interviewed. Students met with their
elder weekly throughout the semester and wrote a ten-page life history of that
elder. In the process, more than a quarter of the students became mentees of
their elder, and their interactions continued long after the course had ended.
Many of these students indicated that had they not been required to meet, they
would not have sought out a spiritual elder. In our society, intergenerational
contact does not occur naturally, except perhaps in families. Accordingly, for
actualized sages to serve as mentors requires that we develop mechanisms to
facilitate intergenerational connections. The good news is that intergenera-
tional programming is one of the latest growth areas within gerontology.
As mentioned earlier, wisdom is a quality that sages bring to their own
lives and to the social worlds in which they participate. Wisdom is not a com-
modity that a person can possess. Instead, it is a process that requires skill to
 be c oming a sage and a spirit ual elder 

enact. In my opinion, the essence of wisdom begins with the capacity to see
the world from outside one’s own personal agenda. This allows the observer
to see various sides of an issue. A person at a transcendent level of conscious-
ness also experiences time in a more expansive way, which creates a more
relaxed and less frenzied stance toward decision making. “Being while doing”
is a learned capacity that opens opportunities for the quality we call wisdom
to enter our world.
To practice bringing wisdom into the world requires developing the habit
of being still and patiently awaiting a moment that demands the special gift
of nonpersonal perspective that we call wisdom. But, as one sage put it, “In
order to bring your special gifts as an elder, you have to be there. You have to
resist the temptation to withdraw to the comfort of your own solitude or your
small circle of friends. You have to continue to show up in those groups you
care about.”
Actualized sages, those who are recognized as having the capacity to be a
sage in the present moment, generally recognize each other as such and enjoy
one another’s company. When they get together, there are often periods of
comfortable silence. They share their experiences of joy as well as doubt and
uncertainty. And there is almost always a sense of the humor that accompa-
nies the human predicament. Rick Moody tells the story of his attending a
seminar with the Tibetan Buddhist sage Trungpa Rinpoche in which Moody
asked Trungpa, “But doesn’t this spiritual practice stuff get boring?” At that
point Trungpa took out a water pistol and shot Moody in the face! We have
a tendency in our culture to treat spiritual matters seriously, but sages know
that there is also great humor in our fumbling attempts to understand the
ground of being, connect with that ground, and live from that connection. As
Manheimer (1999) pointed out, humor can be an expression of wisdom, the
result of a heightened state of consciousness and a philosophical outlook.
Part of wisdom is understanding that we cannot act on every impulse we
have to care for others. We have to have as much compassion for ourselves
as for those we serve. Actualized sages know that to be able to serve over
the long haul requires attention to pacing, establishing a humane life routine.
These sages do not try to do everything. They have learned that they must
choose wisely how to spend their precious energies.
Actualized sages are “fully operational” but still developing. Moody and
Carroll (1997) described a circular process of spiritual growth that begins with
a leading, a sense that there is more to be discovered. This creates an open-
ing, during which the spiritual seeker looks around for new opportunities for
  spirit ual journe ying

growth. There is often a struggle as the person attempts to understand and to in-
tegrate new understanding with old. Then the individual often breaks through
to a new level of integrated understanding. Finally, she or he focuses on how
to bring that new insight back into the world. Actualized sages know that they
may go through many more cycles of spiritual development. It is a territory
that is incompletely mapped, yet actualized sages have faith in the process.

tr anscendent sages

Transcendent sages have developed the capacity to abide in the highest levels
of spiritual consciousness. They tend to be quiet and to speak only when they
have something they feel compelled to say. They are holders of the spiritual
field within which others struggle to become and act as sages. They are deeply
in touch with a panoramic experience of time.
Ken Wilber (2001) describes the higher levels of consciousness as a “sagely
region” that includes a subtle level, which is transindividual and intuitive; a
causal level, which is experienced as formless radiance and transcendence;
and an ultimate level, in which there is only undifferentiated, infinite con-
sciousness and no separate experiencer. The subtle level of consciousness is
the source of the capacities of generativity and wisdom that are the corner-
stone of being an actualized spiritual elder.
The causal level of consciousness, which manifests itself as radiance and
deep silence and stillness, is the source of the capacity to be a transcendent
sage. At this level, there is little that one feels compelled to say, so there is
much quietude. Yet there can be great joy in continuing to participate in the
routine activities that constitute life, including routine religious and spiritual
activities and quiet participation in community.
By abiding at a level of consciousness close to the source of spirit, transcen-
dent sages “hold the field.” That is, their presence and quality of being consis-
tently remind more active participants why they are interested in the process
of becoming sages. Transcendent sages attract our attention through their
manifest connection with the ground of all being. It is not what they do, but
how they are that is their contribution to the group. Consider two examples.

In his mid-80s, William projects an air of robust good health. He attends

a worship group regularly, but rarely speaks. Yet he constantly serves as
a living example of what it means to be radiantly at peace. He is comfort-
able with his spiritual nature, and it shows in his clear, soft voice, bright
 be c oming a sage and a spirit ual elder 

gray eyes, and ready smile. There is a serenity about William’s being that
many people in the group have remarked on. There is also a sense that
the group is missing an important presence when William is not there.

James attends the same worship group. He is in his early 90s and has
numerous chronic conditions that cause him to move about slowly. He
is nearly blind and in a great deal of chronic pain. When asked, he ac-
knowledges that his physical existence is not very enjoyable at his stage of
frailty. Yet in the worship group, James will occasionally stand and ecstat-
ically recite a psalm from memory. At these times he is completely trans-
ported by the Source of the Psalms, and the renderings invariably leave
the group uplifted and in awe of this gentle man’s connection with God.

Neither William nor James takes a lead in the operation of the group. Focused
more on just being present, they leave the logistics to the “youngsters,” many
of whom are in their 60s and 70s.
Schachter-Shalomi and Miller (1995) assert that sages have a panoramic
view of time. Transcendent sages have a type of consciousness that abides
“under the aspect of eternity,” that sees time not as a commodity or an in-
strumental need but as a vast panorama, of which our human lifetime is but
a small part. Ram Dass (2000, 141) wrote that sages-in-training are learning
to live by “soul time” and that souls live by a different calendar, one in which
“our egos are like mayflies that are born in the morning and die in the eve-
ning.” This panoramic view of time redirects values away from the material-
istic concerns of our current culture and toward more holistic values, which
respect the needs of the entire planet. From a panoramic view of time, we can
be patient and persistent and are less likely to become frustrated if we do not
immediately achieve our objectives. This perspective on time supports the
quietude that characterizes transcendent sages.
Transcendent sages do not stand out. They have little interest in standing
out. Yet they are there to see if we only look. Another paradox is that some
of the role models we desperately need are right there in front of us, but we
don’t see them.

conclusion

The idea that elders can possess a high capacity to bring spirituality into their
lives and into the world has been around for thousands of years. But what is
  spirit ual journe ying

it about later life that brings this about? The concept of spiritual development
presumes that humans have the capacity to evolve spiritually, to identify with
their spiritual nature, and, over time, to strengthen their conscious connec-
tion to this sacred aspect of self. This development enhances the chances that
a person will be able to manifest wisdom as he or she develops spiritually. The
concept of the spiritual elder presumes that spiritual development and later
life stages can combine to affect how sages act in various social roles and also
to prepare individuals to manifest themselves as sages and assume the role of
spiritual elder.
Becoming a sage is an evolutionary process through which spiritual de-
velopment is nurtured, the capacity for wisdom develops, and an individual
learns what is needed to prepare for and take up the role of spiritual elder
and to be a sage. The openness that aging can create through child launching
and retirement can also be an opening to become a sage-in-training. No one
knows why some people are drawn to this possibility as a conscious journey,
why others unconsciously develop spiritually, and why still others show no
signs of spirituality.
Although spiritual development involves continuous cycles of develop-
ment, being a sage is manifested in ways that are loosely related to stages of
later life. At the beginning of later life (the 60s), many people are involved
in being sages-in-training, engaging the inner tasks of spiritual growth, and
learning from their elders how to behave as a spiritual elder. They are becom-
ing “rooted in their being.” In the middle of later life (the 70s and early 80s)
many who have been on the journey have become actualized sages, fully in
touch with their spiritual nature and able to keep that nature at the center as
they function in the world. They are adept at “being while doing.” In old age
(the mid-80s and older), transcendent sages are common. These people are
radiantly at peace and are “being and transcending.”
A recurring theme in this chapter has been that sages and spiritual elders
are not rare and that by raising consciousness about the characteristics of
sages and the process of becoming a sage, we can better recognize them. And
as we recognize the extraordinary depth that sages and spiritual elders bring
to our collective quality of life, we may come to see value in creating more
opportunities for sages to be a more visible part of our world.
 chapter five
   
Transpersonal Sociology and
Serving from Spirit

This chapter deals with two questions: How would social organizations look if
they were populated, organized, and managed by people with a transpersonal
viewpoint and philosophy of life? and, What is spiritually centered service to
the community and how does it differ from other kinds of service?
For these questions, the existing literature is of little help. Although or-
ganizational management and service are familiar topics in the literature of
various religious traditions, in American culture nearly all of this discussion
takes a Western, instrumental view of these as practical rather than spiritual
concerns. Our literature pays scant attention to the spiritual development of
the people in the spiritual community and how it might affect the values of the
community, how people are organized to promote those values, the processes
spiritually developed people use to approach goals, and how their processes
might differ from conventionally organized spiritual communities.
For twenty years I taught organizational management, first for thirteen
years in a mainstream academic environment and later for seven years in a
university community that aimed to prepare students to approach their work
from a contemplative perspective. Because I believe that to teach a subject,
one needs experience in the field as well as familiarity with the literature, I
did extended field placements and made many site visits to a wide variety
of types of organization, particularly professional organizations and service
organizations in the field of aging. These experiences provided me with an
experiential base I could use to understand how organizations with a critical
mass of people with a transpersonal viewpoint differ from organizations that
take the hierarchical, competitive approach to organizational life widely used
in American culture.
  spirit ual journe ying

This chapter attempts to present what I have learned about this topic—the
ideas I have developed about how organizations and communities can suc-
cessfully operate using principles of transpersonal sociology. It is necessarily
sketchy, and it is filled with conclusions that need to be verified by other in-
vestigators. But I think this is an important topic, and I offer this discussion
as a starting point, as food for thought, and as a stimulus for future research.
In my experience, organizations that operate using principles of transper-
sonal sociology are much more elder-friendly than are traditional top-down
organizations.

what is tr anspersonal sociology?

The word trans is of Latin origin and means beyond, on the other side. The
term transpersonal first came into use to describe an approach to psychology
that acknowledges and incorporates the transcendent, or spiritual, aspects
of the human mind, which can be joined with cognitive and developmental
psychology to create a more holistic approach (Walsh and Vaughan 1993).
Transpersonal consciousness transcends personal awareness and leads to a
nonpersonal realm within awareness. Transpersonal psychology acknowl-
edges that there are multiple states and levels of consciousness, that psycho-
logical development tends toward higher or ultimate human potential, that
higher levels of consciousness are nonpersonal or transpersonal in that they
are beyond ego-centered consciousness, and that higher levels of conscious-
ness are transcendent and spiritual.
Transpersonal sociology asks how social psychology, interpersonal rela-
tionships, and group dynamics are affected by the presence in a group, organi-
zation, community, or society of large proportions of people whose conscious-
ness is at a transpersonal level. In The Perennial Philosophy, Aldous Huxley
(1944) surveyed the wisdom of sages from a variety of spiritual traditions
and wrote that most traditions contain the idea that beyond the phenomenal
world of matter and individualized consciousness there is a manifestation in
consciousness of what he called “the ground of all being within.” The Quakers
say, “There is that of God within everyone.” The Bible says people are “made
in God’s image,” and this can be taken to mean that God is within us, waiting
to be manifested. The Koran says that God pervades everything, including us.
Buddhists believe that we all contain a great emptiness or space and that if we
dwell in that space, we transcend ego.
Huxley goes on to say that not only can we know the ground of being by
 transpersonal sociology and serving from spirit 

intellectual inference, we can also know it directly through contemplative,

intuitive methods. So people have a dual nature: a phenomenal ego, which
is necessary for survival in the world, and an eternal spiritual self, which is
a transpersonal domain and which can be seen as God, the Absolute, the
Void, or the Ground of Being. Finally, The Perennial Philosophy holds that the
primary purpose of life on earth is to identify with and manifest the transper-
sonal ground of all being.

a model of tr anspersonal communit y

Consider what social life would be like if a significant proportion of people in

a community lived according to this “perennial philosophy” and had attained
the capacity for transpersonal consciousness. How would life be different?
That is the subject of transpersonal sociology. Here is how it might look.
Individuals in the community engage in contemplative practices regularly,
to nurture their conscious connection with pure being, transcendence, and
the ground of being. Children are introduced to contemplative silence early
in life by being included in communal silence. Discussions within the com-
munity are held against a backdrop of varying degrees of contemplative un-
derstanding of the ground of being. Community members know that aware-
ness of the ground of being is “running in the background” of all they do. The
experience of inner silence, stillness, and peace seems enhanced by having the
experience in a group of people who are all opening themselves to this expe-
rience. The group consciously includes periods of silence between topics of
discussion to help them remain spiritually grounded. Interpersonal relation-
ships include an element of respect for the ground of being they share. It may
not matter whether this is demonstrably true; what may matter is that people
in the community act as if it were true. This stance toward others nurtures
empathy and compassion and respect.
Because all people are assumed to have the potential to transcend the
personal and become a voice of wisdom, the community is nonhierarchical,
completely democratic, and led by actual consensus. Meetings for decision
making contain periodic pauses to remember and silently honor the ground
of being that the community wants to be consciously aware of throughout all
its discussions. Positions of responsibility are allocated based on individual
interest, knowledge, and skills and contain strict term limits to prevent the
development of positional power within the community.
In the transpersonal community, the number of years of experience living
  spirit ual journe ying

the culture matter. Elders earn added respect by their way of being, which is
honed through many years of practice. Members of the community under-
stand and value the process of “becoming a sage.”
Values in a transpersonal community center on nurturing spiritual con-
nection in its people and creating community culture based on that connec-
tion. If everyone from all times and all places is assumed to have or have had
a spark of the ground of being within themselves, then spiritual texts from a
variety of traditions are welcome as food for thought, but authority does not
come from texts; it emerges from the collective consciousness of the com-
munity, from their contemplative practice together. Members of the commu-
nity seek to dwell in the now as transcendent beings. As Eckhart Tolle (2003)
points out in Stillness Speaks, this Now is not a nanosecond but a timeless
place, not fixated on ideas of past or future for purposes of manipulation or
self-aggrandizement.
Values such as nonviolence, respect, fairness, honesty, integrity, and sim-
plicity are not givens; they emerge out of experience in a transpersonal com-
munity. Injunctions to community members tend to be general, and much is
left to the contemplative interpretation of the members.
I want to digress briefly to illustrate how this process can lead to a spiri-
tual/ethical framework that can be used to guide community members. In
many ways, the Buddhist eightfold path (Surya Das 1997) efficiently describes
the general orientation of many groups that use principles of transpersonal
sociology.

the eightfold path

Wisdom Training
1. Right View
2. Right Intention
Ethics Training
3. Right Speech
4. Right Action
5. Right Livelihood
Meditation Training
6. Right Effort
7. Right Mindfulness
8. Right Concentration
(Ibid., 93)
 transpersonal sociology and serving from spirit 

Figure 11. Wheel of the dharma.

The eight subjects contained in the eightfold path are not meant to imply
a linear set of steps. Instead, they are depicted as a circle, with all eight top-
ics interconnected at a hub in the middle (figure 11). In the descriptions of
the eightfold path, the word right is used not in a context of right and wrong
but rather in a context of completeness or inclusiveness, coherence, and con-
nectedness.
Thus, right view is facing the ultimate with openness and willingness to
transcend the personal. Right intention is aiming to live as much as possible
from a nonpersonal, self-transcendent perspective, which supports processes
such as good will and nonviolence toward others. Mastering these two topics
is called wisdom training.
Right speech involves being aware of the effects of one’s speech and using
speech in a nonadversarial way. Principles of right speech include: speak the
truth—don’t lie; use words to help, not harm; don’t gossip or tell tales; and
speak kindly, not harshly or abusively (ibid., 173–78). Right action involves
basic dos and don’ts such as: don’t kill; don’t take what isn’t given freely; give
to others in need; refrain from habits that harm body, mind, and spirit. Right
livelihood involves making a living ethically and from spiritual conscious-
ness. Together, right speech, right action, and right livelihood are called ethics
training because contemplative ethics involves a process of bringing spiritual
awareness to these three important areas of life.
  spirit ual journe ying

Right effort involves a passion for spiritual growth. Right mindfulness in-
volves being rooted in the Now, and right concentration involves being able
to remain focused spiritually amid the trials and tribulations of everyday life.
These capacities are called meditation training because they deal with differ-
ent aspects of remaining spiritually awake and paying attention.
The eightfold path is but one example of a system designed to give guid-
ance to those who wish to live a spiritually centered life. Its main virtue is its
generality. How each of the elements plays out in an individual life depends
on how that individual engages life issues with mindfulness and transpersonal
awareness. Group culture built up from this process is different from group
culture that is imposed “top down.”
Now let us return to our example community. Within the community,
small groups of members gather to gently serve others who are struggling
with their spiritual journey, mostly by compassionate listening. The contem-
plative group process in the community minimizes the possibility that the
group will be led astray by a charismatic egotist, because decisions are not
made in haste and must be based in consensus. By the time everyone is per-
suaded of the value of a course of action, it is unlikely to be based in someone’s
misguided or self-centered interpretation of a situation. This does not mean
that decision making is easy, and often a clear course of action may take some
time to appear. Mistakes happen and so does self-forgiveness, both within
individuals and within the community.
Clearness is a vital part of the process. When people regularly practice
coming to discussion from a place of contemplation, transpersonal con-
sciousness, and beingness, their capacity to see the world as it is and not as
they might wish it to be is greatly enhanced. Compassion is a second vital
element. Compassion is rooted in universal love, an experience that does not
come through personal consciousness but through transpersonal or nonper-
sonal consciousness. Compassion is not the overly idealistic romantic love
that we see in movies or on television. It is a feeling of enormous well-being
that comes with the experience of being connected to all things through the
ground of being.
Parker Palmer (2004) tells the following story, which he calls “true com-
munity.”

Five years after leaving Berkeley, I found myself sitting in circles again. This
time it was at Pendle Hill, a Quaker living-learning community near Phila-
delphia, where I spent eleven years starting in the mid-1970s. But these
transpersonal sociology and serving from spirit 

circles, I soon discovered, were of a different sort. They were not heady,
aggressive, self-congratulatory, or manipulative. They were gentle, respect-
ful, and reverent in the way they honored self and world, and slowly they
changed my life.
In these quiet Quaker circles, people were doing neither the amateur
psychotherapy nor the faux politics that I had experienced in Berkeley. In-
stead, they were doing therapy and politics rightly understood: reaching in
toward their own wholeness, reaching out toward the world’s needs, and
trying to live their lives at the intersection of the two.
In these quiet Quaker circles, I saw people challenged, but I never saw
anyone harmed. I witnessed more personal transformation than I had seen
before, and I watched more people embrace their social responsibilities as
well. That was when I started to understand why Quakers, who have always
been few in number, have often been over-represented in the great social
issues of their time.
The circles of trust I experienced at Pendle Hill are a rare form of com-
munity—one that supports rather than supplants the individual quest for
integrity—that is rooted in two basic beliefs. First, we all have an inner
teacher whose guidance is more reliable than anything we can get from a
doctrine, ideology, collective belief system, institution, or leader. Second,
we all need other people to invite, amplify, and help us discern the inner
teacher’s voice for at least three reasons:
The journey toward inner truth is too taxing to be made solo: lacking
support, the solitary traveler soon becomes weary or fearful and is likely to
quit the road.
The path is too deeply hidden to be traveled without company: finding
our way involves clues that are subtle and sometimes misleading, requiring
the kind of discernment that can happen only in dialogue.
The destination is too daunting to be achieved alone: we need commu-
nity to find the courage to venture into the alien land to which the inner
teacher may call us.
I want to dwell for a moment on that little word discern, which means
“distinguishing between things.” I think again of C. S. Lewis’s tales of Narnia,
that land of inwardness the children enter through the back of the magical
wardrobe. There is much in Narnia that is good and beautiful, especially the
voice of truth—the voice of Aslan, the great lion—that is sometimes heard
in the land. But there are other voices in Narnia as well, voices of tempta-
tion, deception, darkness, and evil. It takes four children, a variety of guides,
  spirit ual journe ying

and seven volumes of pitfalls and perils to sift through this mix of messages
and travel toward the truth.
Occasionally, I hear people say, “The world is such a confusing place
that I can find clarity only by going within.” Well I, for one, find it at least as
confusing “in here” as it is “out there”—usually more so!—and I think most
people do. If we get lost in New York City, we can buy a map, ask a local,
or find a cabbie who knows the way. The only guidance we can get on the
inner journey comes through relationships in which others help us discern
our feelings.
But the kind of community I learned about at Pendle Hill does not pre-
sume to do that discernment for us, as communities sometimes do: “You
tell us your version of truth, and we will tell you whether you are right or
wrong!” Instead, a circle of trust holds us in a space where we can make our
own discernments, in our own way and time, in the encouraging and chal-
lenging presence of other people. (25–27)

Although most spiritual communities operate using conventional ideas

about authority structures, hierarchical power structures, and bureaucratic
rational-legal organizing principles, there are spiritual communities that have
for centuries been trying to live by principles of transpersonal sociology.
Much can be learned from them about transpersonal sociology.
A major benefit I have observed in the transpersonal approach to com-
munity is the large extent to which such organizations avoid the problem of
alienation. When everyone is part of every solution, there are fewer divisive
problems. When “the power structure” is all of us, against whom could we
revolt? This is not to say that there is no sense of discomfort or dissatisfac-
tion; these seem to be human inevitabilities. But direct democracy, consensus
decision making, centering on sacred silence, and limits on personal power
are principles that could be widely applied, and in this context dissatisfaction
is more often met with caring concern rather than impatience or anger.
Clearness and compassion are the roots of authentic, unselfish service. Clear-
ness allows us to see what is needed, and compassion creates the capacity
to face our own suffering and that of others. Serving in a context of spiritual
community is a highly effective mode. Now let us look further at how trans-
personal sociology might be actualized through serving from spirit.
 transpersonal sociology and serving from spirit 

serving from spirit

This discussion is intended as a guide to understanding and practicing spiritu-

ally centered service. It is both speculative and utopian. The subject would be
an excellent topic for research, especially because the major public effort to
encourage increased service by elders, Civic Ventures, says nothing explicitly
about spirituality and its relation to service. My thesis is that much service is
motivated by the fact that for many people, service is a spiritual experience.
For many people, service is a source of much joy and satisfaction. Uplifting is
a word often used to describe experiences of service.
The serving-from-spirit concept is based on the idea that effective service
in the community is rooted in two things: a cultivated connection with the ex-
periential spirituality that lies within each human being, and knowledge and
skills needed to be effective in whatever arena of service one chooses. Serving
from spirit is a stance from which to be of service and a model of how one can
grow spiritually while becoming more effective in service to the community.
In How Can I Help? Ram Dass and Paul Gorman (1985) assert that service
stems from the human impulse to care. We can see this especially clearly in
how communities respond to disasters such as floods or tornados. At such
times, the impulse to care for one another is overwhelming. The impulse to
care is a noble inclination, but it tells us little about how to care or what will
be effective. Service over the long run requires that we build on the impulse
to care.
The serving-from-spirit model begins with the goal of being spiritually
grounded while serving. As people grow spiritually, they develop levels of
consciousness and awareness that alert them to the obstacles thrown in their
paths by our self-centeredness. Ego-based service is first and foremost about
the ego’s needs. A reflective process of examining personal motives for serv-
ing can help identify ego-based motives. Enlightened service rises above the
ego to more clearly see what is needed. To move toward enlightened service
requires skill in remaining spiritually centered while doing the work of ser-
vice.
Many well-intentioned people find their service less satisfying than they
would like because they do not have essential information about the structure
and operation of the field in which they wish to serve. Most areas of service
have their own unique concepts and language about what they do and how
they do it. “Paying your dues” involves getting the experience needed to en-
  spirit ual journe ying

sure being sufficiently informed to serve effectively. This does not mean pas-
sively accepting other people’s definitions of what is good, true, or beautiful;
it means making sure to understand the situation before weighing in with
suggestions for change.
A person who is accomplished at serving from spirit is able to stay spiritu-
ally centered amid the ups and downs of working in an organizational environ-
ment, often in situations involving people who are in desperate need. Those
serving from spirit are also knowledgeable about how to work within the or-
ganizational context and with the types of people who are to be served.

listening to one’s entire being

People find their way to spiritual paths and to community service in many
ways. The mind, the ego, the heart, the body, and the soul can each lead us.
But if people are only listening to one part of being, then they are not taking
advantage of all their resources for being clear about what they are doing
or thinking about doing. Listening to one’s entire being involves cultivating
sensitivity to each dimension of being. This possibility is greatly enhanced
by contemplative practice—meditation, rumination, and inner stillness and
quietude. In this sense, contemplative practice is an important companion
on both the inner spiritual journey and the outer journey of service. Contem-
plative practice can put people in touch with higher levels of consciousness,
from which it is possible to see clearly the workings of mind and ego, true
compassion, actions that would truly be of service, and a pace that is healthy
for the body.

mindfulness and tr anscendence

Mindfulness and transcendence are important qualities to bring to the spiri-

tual journey and to bring to service. Mindfulness is being right here, right
now. It is an intense awareness of the present moment. With mindfulness
people are able to see more clearly what is before them. They are more likely
to see what will actually be helpful in serving another human being or serving
an organization. In this framework, it is not so much a matter of doing for
others as I would like to be done for, but doing for others as they would like.
It is a matter of doing service that is not self-centered.
To employ mindful service, we also need a vantage point that transcends
our ordinary consciousness of self. Ordinary consciousness is ego-centered.
 transpersonal sociology and serving from spirit 

We are the main character in the drama. But as soon as we begin to witness
our ordinary self, we have transcended that self and can see it more clearly
than we possibly could from the middle of our ego-agendas of desire or fear.
To the witness, we are only one of the characters in the drama and not nec-
essarily the most important one at a given moment. When we look into the
eyes of another person and realize that we are looking at another being just
like us, we can experience a unity-level of consciousness. Witness and unity
consciousness are both transcendent levels of awareness that make it more
possible to grow spiritually and to serve effectively.

becoming wisdom and compassion in ac tion

Being wise and having compassion are not all-or-nothing conditions. They
are qualities that exist in degrees. They are not something we have but are
capacities we can develop. They are qualities that we might be able to bring
into being in a given situation. If we have cultivated wisdom and compassion,
we have a greater capacity to manifest those qualities, but this happens in the
present moment. Whether we can manifest wisdom and compassion depends
on how centered we can remain. When we are in a situation of service, we are
usually called to be wise and to be compassionate. How well we can do this
depends a great deal on how long we have been practicing wisdom and com-
passion. In practice, a circle of sages is always more effective than a single sage
precisely because even sages cannot be all things to all people.
Often we think of service as something that involves volunteering or work-
ing within an organizational context. However, service is really an intention
that we can take with us into a wide variety of situations. What would happen
if we went joyfully about our daily lives seeing every person as someone we
could potentially serve, in however small a way? What would happen if we
took every opportunity to tend our planet and our environment? Often these
do not involve big programs or long-term tasks but are things we can do mo-
ment by moment by moment. It takes only a few minutes to listen intently to
someone who needs a receptive ear; it takes only a few seconds to pick up a
piece of trash. The feeling of service is something that happens in the pres-
ent moment, whether we are doing it in an organizational context or on our
own.
  spirit ual journe ying

obstacles to effec tive service

Ego often blinds us to what is needed. We sometimes focus on our needs

rather than the needs of those being served. In service, the Golden Rule is not
serving as we would want to be served but instead serving others as they want
to be served. It is difficult to provide client-centered service from the point of
view of our own personal ego agenda.
Lack of background in the field in which we wish to serve can waste time
and energy because we don’t realize what we don’t know and spend time re-
inventing the wheel. By patiently and humbly assisting and working alongside
skilled people who are already familiar with the service environment and its
demands, we can efficiently gain the knowledge and skills we need.
Lack of clarity can result when we are too close to a situation. To achieve
a clearer vision of what is needed, we need to have a bigger picture. We can
then see ourselves, other servers, those being served, and the context for all
of it at the same time.
Professional standards of service are helpful when they convey practical
knowledge or guidelines that improve service. However, when professional
standards are used to create monopolies of opportunity to serve, they get in
the way of the expression of the impulse to care.
We all have a threshold of sacrifice, a level of contribution of time and
money that we can devote to service and still be able to meet other important
obligations to ourselves, our family, and our community. When we pass this
threshold for a lengthy period, we can find ourselves in conflict that reduces
our capacity for effective service.

paying one’s dues

Each new service environment we enter has its own language and customs,
and we need to give ourselves time to assimilate these elements. Otherwise we
risk behaving in ways that seem arrogant, naïve, or clueless to those already
working in the environment. Curiosity and humility provide a useful stance
from which to pay one’s dues and earn the respect of others in the environ-
ment. It is helpful to be careful about assuming that knowledge from another
field can be readily adapted to a new situation. Asking lots of questions and
asking for help learning the ropes can be useful strategies.
Much of our service occurs in an organizational context. What are the mis-
 transpersonal sociology and serving from spirit 

sion and vision of the organization? What values serve to anchor its opera-
tion? What are its major goals? What outcomes does it seek? To what extent
are the clients involved in setting goals? Who are the major stakeholders in
the success of the organization? These and many other questions create a big
picture within which our service work will take place. It’s important to know
how our work fits into the whole.

taking care of oneself

Effective service is based in a balance between caring for others and caring
for oneself. Each of us needs rest, nourishment, and perspective if we are to
be able to serve over the long run. Rest is not just sleep, although sleep is
important. Rest also occurs when we pace ourselves so that we are not living
in a perpetually rushed state. Nourishment of the body is equally important,
but so is nourishment of the mind and spirit. Contemplative reading of sacred
texts or books and articles on spiritual themes is an example of a practice that
nourishes the mind. Meditation is an example of a restful practice that nour-
ishes the spirit. Movement disciplines such as yoga and tai chi can stretch
and relax the body and release built-up tensions. Leading a contemplative
life aimed at nurturing the whole person provides a perspective that allows
us to bring enough love to our acts of service that we can endure the pain of
compassion.

does life stage matter?

If we think about stages of adulthood in terms of issues and challenges of

young adulthood, middle age, later adulthood, and old age, then there are ma-
jor differences in terms of competition from interests other than community
service, effects of the amount and type of life experience, and interest in an
intentional spiritual journey.
In young adulthood, people often focus on finding a livelihood that is right
for them and making decisions about mate selection and family formation. By
the time people reach middle age, their job and family responsibilities often
become routine, perhaps still demanding but well within their capacity, and
opportunities for community involvement often increase. In later adulthood,
having launched children into adulthood and having retired from the work-
force can bring increased freedom to choose a life of community service. In
old age, many people maintain their involvement in community organiza-
  spirit ual journe ying

tions, especially religious organizations, and a few find themselves serving as

sages or spiritual elders.
In terms of the intersection of spirituality and community service, young
adults often experience strong pressures to concentrate on employment
and family, both of which can mobilize the impulse to care. For many young
adults, issues concerning the meaning of life have not yet stimulated them
to think about a conscious spiritual journey. By the end of young adulthood,
most people have had enough experience living with the results of their own
actions to have deep respect for the difficulties of deciding the right course
of action.
By middle age, many adults have begun to question materialistic culture’s
definitions of the good life. Many have followed society’s prescription for life
satisfaction only to find the results less than satisfying. They may then em-
bark on a search for meaning, and the world’s wisdom traditions offer many
spiritual paths for finding it. At the same time, increased opportunities for
community involvement and service can provide an experience of meaning
through service. The spiritual journey and the journey of service can comple-
ment each other.
Later adulthood can also bring a need for new direction. Those who did
not develop an orientation to serving from spirit in midlife may find them-
selves drawn to it later, as child launching and retirement create opportunities
to rethink one’s lifestyle. After a period of resting up from the demands of
middle age, many people at the beginning of later adulthood begin a period
of experimenting with various ways to lead a satisfying life. Eventually, some
settle into a life focused on community service.
In old age, there are adults who are uniquely qualified to serve as sages
and spiritual elders—individuals who combine a deep spiritual connection,
insights based in their considerable life experience, and concern for nurturing
the upcoming generations of adults. As parents, many spiritual elders help
ease the transition of their offspring into later adulthood. They serve as role
models and mentors for middle-aged and older adults as well as for young
people. Spiritual elders continue to participate in the life of the community,
but they have often moved beyond the need to take an operational leadership
role.
 transpersonal sociology and serving from spirit 

conclusion

In this chapter I have looked at how groups, organization, communities, and

society might be affected by the presence of a large percentage of people with
a transpersonal perspective. I have also looked at how spirituality might in-
fluence aging in community. I began with a description of the “perennial phi-
losophy” as a way of understanding spirituality that might apply across many
religious cultures. I then used this philosophy to describe how a community
might work if it were committed to making spirituality a full partner with
other aspects of community culture. I also considered how service might look
if it were motivated by a transpersonal perspective. The description of trans-
personal community may seem utopian, but communities all over the world
are attempting to live this way. They offer much food for thought about the
possibilities for aging in such communities.
As plausible as the material in this chapter might appear, or not, the re-
search behind it consists mostly of my own observations of aging individuals
and a limited number of organizations and communities over the past fifteen
years. The ideas here are best looked at as a complex of concepts and hypoth-
eses that might guide further study in this area.
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 part iii

Examples Using an Expanded View

   
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 chapter six
   
Continuity, Spiritual Growth, and
Coping in Later Adulthood

Despite a social world that has a negative orientation toward aging, most ag-
ing and older people have good health, high self-acceptance and self-esteem,
a high degree of life satisfaction, a satisfying and meaningful lifestyle, and
a long-standing convoy of social support (Atchley and Barusch 2004). This
happens because over decades of life experience, a large majority of adults
have developed robust ideas about what they want out of life and how to get
it. Most people don’t just sit back and let life happen; they try to influence the
directions it takes for them. They usually understand that they don’t control
life’s direction, but they believe they can influence it. They have enduring val-
ues that serve as the basis for their life structure, their day-to-day decision
making, and their vision of a desired future. They are also resilient; they have
encountered enough surprises, contradictions, and paradoxes in life to know
that they have to pay attention and cope when the situation demands it. What
they have learned from life is a powerful resource for coping. Most have also
discovered that coping is easier when done with the support of others.
Focus on the inner life, service to others, and deepening connection with
the sacred are bright spots of growth and development for most elders. Many
elders see these trends as fully available to them and as goals around which
they can organize their lives. The sense of optimism and equanimity that
comes from leading this sort of life is also a great resource for coping.
When we see elders for whom things have gone awry, we can look to their
personal systems for clues concerning unwanted discontinuities, an inade-
quate sense of meaning, and a murky view of where they are headed.
Thus, the strong coping capacity most elders possess rests on an equanim-
ity that comes from continuity of values, lifestyles, and relationships, plus
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

turning to spirituality as a frontier of individual development and commu-

nity formation. Continuity provides a benchmark for organizing thoughts
and action; spiritual development provides a spacious context and an expan-
sive perspective, which can foster a sense of equanimity even in the face of
adversity.
I will explore each of these topics in more detail. Data to support the vari-
ous ideas presented come from my twenty-year longitudinal study of aging
and adaptation (Atchley 1999) and from my research on spiritual develop-
ment and service in later adulthood (Atchley 2000, 2003, 2005).

continuit y

Continuity is dynamic and evolutionary. Like continuity in a stage play, con-

tinuity here means a character evolving over a lifetime of action and learning
and struggle and joy and heartbreak. The character remains recognizable in
most cases, but evolution is also obvious. Continuity of personal style, values
and beliefs, lifestyles, and relationships constitutes a solid base from which to
greet changes in circumstances, both positive and negative.
Using the results from a longitudinal study that began with 1300 people
age 50 or older in 1975, whom I followed for twenty years, I was able to look at
internal continuity of ideas and external continuity of activities and relation-
ships as respondents adapted to aging. Details of this study were published in
Atchley (1999). Here are some of the major conclusions:

— Continuity means evolutionary consistency and linkage over time; stability

or equilibrium is a type of continuity, but evolutionary forms of continuity
are more common.
— Continuity over time is often seen in the psychological, behavioral, and so-
cial patterns of aging individuals. As a theme, continuity is highly integrated
with many aspects of life.
— Continuity usually coexists with discontinuity, and continuity far outweighs
discontinuity.
— Continuity is more evident in general patterns than in the specifics sub-
sumed thereunder.
— Individual perceptions of reality consist of personal constructs that indi-
viduals actively develop by learning from life experience.
— Individual patterns of adaptive thought continue to develop throughout
life.
 c o n t i n u i t y, s p i r i t ua l g r o w t h , a n d c o p i n g 

— Using continuity strategies to pursue goals and adapt to change does not
necessarily lead to successful results, but if we take life satisfaction as a mea-
sure of success, then continuity is usually a successful adaptive strategy.
— General patterns of thought, behavior, and relationships are robust and can
accommodate considerable change in detailed patterns without triggering
a sense of discontinuity.
— Through decision making about self-concept, life course, and lifestyle and
experiencing the consequences, individuals acquire a sense of personal
agency and efficacy.
— Enduring patterns of thought, behavior, and relationship are the result of
selective investments of time and attention made by individuals over a pe-
riod of many years.
— Continuity of general patterns of thought, behavior, and relationship is the
first strategy people usually attempt to use to achieve their goals and adapt
to changing circumstances.
— Continuity of personal goals provides people with an enduring sense of de-
velopmental direction.
(Adapted from Atchley, 1999: 151–54)

In general, findings from both qualitative and quantitative analyses of the

longitudinal study data strongly supported these conclusions. The findings
support the idea that continuity is multidimensional. Continuity does not oc-
cur by inertia or chance; it was recognized as an intentional choice by a large
proportion of the respondents.
Most people develop a personal system that is a result of decades of learn-
ing through life experience. Some people don’t learn much from life, but most
do. Their personal system is a reflection of their values and their experiences
trying to live by them. Values are some of the most enduring inner constructs
we have. They fuel our aspirations and our fears.
By late middle age, most adults have developed self-confidence, a feeling
that they can influence their own fate. In fact, only about 1 percent of the
participants in my longitudinal study had low self-confidence. Most also had
a high degree of emotional resilience. Health was the factor most likely to
affect both self-confidence and emotional resilience, but even people who
had poor health and functional disability seldom had low self-confidence or
lacked emotional resilience.
“Being able to accept myself as I am” was a prevalent personal goal, which
became stronger over time. This reflects a shift in orientation from self-esteem
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

based on feedback from others to self-esteem based on an inner integration,

which Erikson, Erikson, and Kivnick (1986) referred to as integrity. Other
important self-referential values included being dependable and reliable and
being self-reliant. People wanted to be able to be counted on and to stand on
their own two feet. They wanted to be seen as a good person by others. The
resilience of these values even in the face of substantial disability suggests
that as long as people saw these values at work in their lives in some fashion,
self-respect could be maintained. And this self-respect was rooted in realism,
not idealism.
In later adulthood, respondents also valued social connections with family
and friends, with family having primacy for most people. More than 80 per-
cent felt that it was important to have at least one close, intimate relationship.
Having a confidant was important for both men and women. By late adult-
hood, values such as being prominent in the community or being accepted
by influential people were unimportant for most respondents. I found a high
prevalence of continuity over time in values, with 80 percent of study partici-
pants showing evolution within a basic value framework over the twenty-year
period.
Lifestyles are constructed to produce life satisfaction, and life experience
tells us how well we are doing with that. By later life, most respondents had
settled into a lifestyle that reflected their values and that was robust in terms
of helping them adapt to change.
Over the twenty years of my longitudinal study, continuity of activities oc-
curred most commonly for reading (83.5), being with friends (75.4), being
with family (67.5), attending church (66.9), and gardening (56.6). Note
that most of these activities are ones that an individual can easily adapt to
changes in health. In overall activity patterns, few study participants took up
new activity areas as they aged. Most adjusted their level of participation in
activities with which they already had experience. When I looked at how re-
spondents adapted to functional losses, most were able to maintain the same
pattern of activity at a lower level of participation. This allowed them to con-
tinue to get satisfaction from the same lifestyle despite functional limitations
or changes in living arrangements.
Life experience is filled with paradoxes, contradictions, and ambiguities.
Relationships, especially the convoy of social support, help us understand the
nuances of life, grapple with decision making under conditions of uncertainty,
and receive comfort in times of trial.
 c o n t i n u i t y, s p i r i t ua l g r o w t h , a n d c o p i n g 

spiritual development

Spiritual development supplies new perspectives and motives that provide a

renewed sense of direction in later life. It is promoted by questions such as,
Is this all there is? What does it all mean? How do I fit into the picture? What
will happen to me when I die? How can I leave a legacy for future generations?
How can I give back to a world that has nurtured me? Do I need to get even
with a world that hasn’t nurtured me? These and many other questions fuel
a spiritual journey that for most people becomes more intentional in midlife.
This happens as parents begin to age and experience frailty, as family and
cohorts begin to die in larger numbers. It can also result from having been
successful and finding that success doesn’t provide the meaning we were led
to expect.
At its heart, the spiritual journey is about becoming rooted in being, about
nurturing and living in a connection with the ground of being, however la-
beled. It is also about developing a perspective about life that transcends the
purely self-centered. Nonpersonal consciousness combines with spiritual de-
velopment to create a channel for the universal love that is compassion. Com-
passion is a prerequisite for meaningful service. It takes a lot of compassion
to be with others’ suffering.

Within each I Am lies the great source of all being

Light from within, that’s our illumination
To dwell in silent peace and stillness, that’s our meditation
To see the passing world with clearness and compassion
And when we clearly see, we are drawn to be love and to serve.
(Adapted from Atchley, 1996)

Many elders participate in small circles of friends who support one another
on their life journeys, including their spiritual journeys. There are also groups
that focus their attention specifically on the spiritual journey. Many religious
communities have numerous small groups that serve this purpose. They may
be called study groups, women’s groups, men’s groups, or issue groups, but
many of them also provide support to the group members as they grapple
with life issues, including spiritual development.
Not everyone is lucky enough to be part of a spiritual community that
fosters such groups. The Sage-ing Guild was created both to promote inner
spiritual work and to recover the role of sage in the community. It offers edu-
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

cational programs and resource materials, especially concerning how to form,

facilitate, or convene small groups aimed at spiritual development and spiri-
tually centered service (see www.sage-ingguild.org). The point here is that
spiritual development often occurs spontaneously and naturally, but because
it is an enjoyable purpose we may also be attracted to a conscious spiritual
journey, either alone, in the company of others, or both.
Spiritual development is in essence an increasing connection with the non-
personal ground of being that lies within each human being, whether he or
she is religious or not. Spiritual development leads people toward deeper spir-
itual experience, an expansive view of time and space, and the joy of service
for its own sake. For those drawn to it, spiritual experience gradually infuses
more and more of life, until most experiences are at least partly a spiritual
experience.
Because joy in the act of serving comes to be its own reward and doesn’t
depend on social acknowledgment, it is available all the time. Spiritual devel-
opment creates an increasingly large space in consciousness, and in that large
nonpersonal space, it is possible to see the ups and downs of the world with
something approaching compassion and equanimity.
Most elders continue to serve their families, but in new ways that tap into
the wisdom that comes with learning from a lifetime of experience. For most
people, the role of grandparent is a wonderful mix of caring and mentoring,
without the heavy childrearing responsibilities of parenthood. It is one of later
life’s greatest service opportunities, and in it, we serve not only our grandchil-
dren but our children as well.
Most elders gradually learn compassionate listening, which creates space
for younger people to express their hopes and fears and often opens the door
for mentoring, which is in many ways the social equivalent of being a mid-
wife. The mentor doesn’t determine the nature of the new being, just eases
the birth.
Most elders are part of circles of friends who support one another by pro-
viding a safe context for learning and coping. Often, elders are also very much
in touch with nature’s need for us to serve it. Caring for plants, animals, and
the natural environment seems an important way to be rooted in the earth.
Years of being on a path of service leads to an understanding that every
contact with every thing can be an opportunity for service, so we don’t have to
worry about opportunities. We may have long-term service commitments we
are willing to make, but we also are awake to opportunities that spontaneously
arise to be helpful. To know what is needed, we must clearly see, which is very
 c o n t i n u i t y, s p i r i t ua l g r o w t h , a n d c o p i n g 

much a spiritual practice. Clear seeing demands that we be able to stand out-
side our personal agendas, and spiritual development promotes this process.
When we are committed to service, we see opportunities everywhere and
we don’t have to be preoccupied with whether we have the “authority” or are
“required” to serve.

coping

In combination, continuity and spiritual development explain why a large

proportion of elders adapt well to the ups and downs of aging. But let us look
more closely at the dynamics of coping.
Continuity is an adaptation strategy. When people need to adapt, more
than 90 percent first try solutions that have worked for them in the past, use
self-knowledge to make decisions, and lean toward activities that have already
proved satisfying. Nearly 90 percent have a personal philosophy of life that is
a consistent force in the decisions they make.
In terms of specific patterns, how people adapt is highly individualized.
But we can make a few general statements based on my twenty-year study
(Atchley 1999). First, relationships are a vital element of adaptation for most
people. When asked, “What enables you to cope? What keeps you going?”
most people speak first of family and friends. Having a positive attitude is a
close second. This is expressed in many ways: a sense of humor, looking on
the bright side, being determined or strong, loving life, enjoying little things.
Such an attitude is highly related to level of self-confidence. Religiousness and
keeping busy are a distant third and fourth. Some people mention immersion
in nature as a way to put their troubles in perspective.
Spiritual development is one of the few goals that increase in importance
with age. In my longitudinal study, for example, at the last data point (1995),
everyone was age 70 or older. Seventy-nine percent said that their inner life
was more important to them then than when they were 50 (Atchley 1999).
Spiritual development supports adaptation by fostering a perspective in
which time becomes panoramic and space become infinite. In such a context,
there is less to be anxious about.
As mentioned earlier, Lars Tornstam’s (2005) theory of gerotranscendence
holds that as people age they gradually transcend the biological, psychologi-
cal, and social bonds that cause us all so much anxiety. In my longitudinal
study, I found that, compared with when they were 50, a large proportion of
respondents said that they were less afraid of death now, felt a greater connec-
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

tion with the universe, and got more enjoyment from their inner life (Atchley
1999).
When we see elders just sitting, we are quick to assume that there is noth-
ing going on, but we may be wrong. I had the following conversation with an
80-year-old woman:

“There are times when you seem to be in a far-off place in your mind,” I
said.
“Yes,” she said.
“Is it a pleasant place?” I asked.
“Oh, my, yes,” she said.
“Can you tell me what it is like?” I asked.
She replied, “Words don’t describe it. It’s warm and cozy. Thoughts come
and go, but are of no importance. I feel completely at peace.”

No wonder she liked to have her contemplative time in the afternoons.

We should be careful not to assume that everyone needs to be busy all the
time. Contemplative time is important, too.

spiritual needs

Elizabeth MacKinlay (2006, 69) wrote that “if we do not assess for spiritual
needs, we will not even begin to notice these needs nor begin to find ways of
addressing them. As I see it, spiritual needs underlie the psychosocial needs
of people—they lie at the very core of what it is to be human. If we neglect
these, especially for people at critical points of their lives and for those who
are facing their frailty, dying, and death, then we neglect something equally
important as failing to provide food. . . . Spiritual care can no longer be an
optional care component.” MacKinlay sees the need for meaning as the most
fundamental spiritual need. Creating a spiritual life that provides a sense of
ultimate meaning gives a resource for putting life events, both positive and
negative, into context, transcending losses and disabilities, creating a sustain-
ing sense of connection with the sacred, and developing the capacity for deep
inner peace.
Because spirituality is highly subjective, assessing spiritual needs does not
lend itself to standardized approaches to needs assessment. While writing
this book, I talked with many people about their spiritual journeys, and in
these conversations I was struck by how often the spiritual process involved
contemplating and working with profound questions. I began writing these
 c o n t i n u i t y, s p i r i t ua l g r o w t h , a n d c o p i n g 

questions down and organizing them into categories. Then I began offering
them to people as a resource for personal spiritual self-assessment. Many
people found them useful, and many also found them daunting. These ques-
tions are reproduced in this book as Appendix B, Questions for Reflection
and Spiritual Self-Assessment. The format supports self-assessment, but the
questions could easily be modified for use as a way of finding out about spiri-
tual needs. Spiritual needs, which are not apparent on the surface, are some
of the most subjective, deeply private needs we have, and approaching them
through asking general questions has worked well for me. In interviews, I also
found it best to begin with one or two basic questions rather than overwhelm
the respondent with the full list.

challenges to coping

Most elders live in a world in which continuity and spiritual development are
robust resources for coping. However, two things can happen to make elders
more vulnerable: disability and thinning of the social network. When this
happens, continuity needs to be seen as evolutionary, not business as usual.
With brittle continuity, elders try to maintain independence, often at the ex-
pense of social contact. Elders needing long-term care prefer to get it at home,
but unless they have a rich social network indeed, they may find themselves
increasingly isolated.
Research shows that elders are constantly making new acquaintances and
developing new friendships. But as people become homebound, this becomes
more difficult. Unless they are tied into a community with strong outreach,
elders can find themselves in a situation in which the only people they see
are those who are paid to visit—often not a good situation. Mrs. E’s story il-
lustrates the difficulties increased disability can pose for those who “age in
place.”

Mrs. E lived in a small city of 25,000 in the Midwestern United States.

At 65, she lived alone, but was active in her community. She founded a
singles group for middle-aged and older adults and was active in state
politics, often hosting visiting candidates and doing logistics for their
events. She spent her time caring for her small home, flower arranging,
and visiting with her many friends. She was also close to two older sisters
who lived about an hour’s drive away. Her life was full of activity, she
found meaning in relationships, and she also enjoyed her solitude.
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

At 75, Mrs. E had had a stroke, which left her balance impaired and
required that she give up driving and use a three-wheeled walker to get
around. Gradually she lost contact with many of her friends. They came
to see her at first, but as the months went by they gradually stopped
visiting. Her sisters were also becoming more impaired, and their visits
became much less frequent, although they kept in touch by phone. Mrs.
E required help with bathing, meal preparation, medication management,
and housekeeping. She could no longer do flower arranging or decorating
without assistance, and because getting out was so difficult, she became
increasingly housebound.
Without the mental stimulation of being with others, Mrs. E became
increasingly paranoid, more and more fearful about new residents in the
neighborhood and even the service providers who came to set up her
medication trays or deliver meals. Her activities consisted of watching
television, cooking an occasional meal, reading the newspaper, poring
over catalogs, and talking with her sisters on the phone. She became in-
creasingly isolated.
At 79, Mrs. E had another stroke, which was at least in part brought on
by her inability to follow her medication regimen. She was worried about
the expense of her medications and would save pills instead of taking
them. Her doctors did not expect her to survive this stroke, but she did.
During her lengthy recovery, she lived in a nursing home near her daugh-
ter, who lived in an adjacent state. Gradually, she recovered her ability to
speak and walk with a walker. Because she was in a rich social environ-
ment in the nursing home, she also recovered her excellent social skills
and made many new friends. The art therapy staff person at the nursing
home was encouraging, and Mrs. E discovered an interest in watercolors.
Some of her watercolors were featured in local exhibitions. The activities
program at the nursing home offered her many opportunities to listen
to musical performances, attend religious services, do her art, and keep
up with current events—all things she had stopped doing when she was
housebound.

Mrs. E and I had the following conversation about a year after her move to
the nursing home.

“Do you miss [your former home and community]?” I asked.

“Not really,” she replied.
“Would you want to go back?”
 c o n t i n u i t y, s p i r i t ua l g r o w t h , a n d c o p i n g 

“No.”
“Why not?”
“I like it here,” she said.
“What’s so special about here?”
“The people. I have lots of people to help me, I get to do a lot of things
I enjoy, I get to see [her daughter and son-in-law] more, and I can still
talk to my sisters on the phone. I’ve made new friends. Art excites me.”

At 80, Mrs. E seemed more contented with life than she did at 75. Her
case illustrates how a supportive environment can help a person reconstitute
continuity. Mrs. E’s awakened interest in art, which she sees as related to her
earlier activity of flower arranging, is a new spiritual connection for her.

conclusion

In working with elders, we must remember that most elders have two some-
what contradictory goals: remaining independent and maintaining their social
network. Often, to maintain the social network means having to accept help
both in getting out and in bringing people in. The need to be independent and
self-reliant, which is so important to most people, can become a hindrance
to good adaptation when disability occurs. Without help, everyday tasks of
self-care become so energy- and time-intensive that they are all-consuming
and leave little in the way of resources for activities that maintain quality of
life. One way to work with this situation is to include social elements in care
plans. Being in the flow of art or music is not of instrumental value in terms
of meeting the body’s needs, but it can nourish the soul. And both art and
music can have the advantage of not being dependent on verbal ability. Thus,
they are not just activities designed to keep people busy. They can also have
spiritual and healing qualities.
Continuity theory can help us map the personal systems of those we serve.
By asking careful questions about what has been important to persons in the
past, we can see how to help them see ways to realize their underlying values
in the present. However, we cannot expect them to voluntarily turn their back
on a life structure that has served them well in the past. That is why most peo-
ple cannot see anything good about moving to an assisted living or nursing
home setting. They need help in seeing continuity in their life before and after
the move. Most fundamentally, continuity resides in the values that inform
choice, not just in the specifics of everyday environments and activities.
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

I have painted an optimistic picture of aging and the human spirit based
on my thirty-five years of research on adaptation to various aspects of ag-
ing. I have gained tremendous respect for the people I have studied, for their
magnificent insights and capabilities. I also have great admiration for their
capacity to prevail in the face of what sometimes seem insurmountable dif-
ficulties. My main points are that continuity of values, attitudes, lifestyles,
and relationships, as well as spiritual development in later adulthood, provide
most people with robust resources for coping with changing circumstances
and also provide a sense of direction.
To be of help to elders, we can benefit from having a framework within
which we can learn about their personal systems. Those who work with elders
can use these perspectives to discover and support their clients’ aspirations
for the last stages of life.
Continuity and spiritual growth are robust resources that see most people
through the aging process. But disability and a thinning social network can
create a need to reconfigure the personal system. Many people need outreach
services that accompany and support them as they modify their personal sys-
tem to their new circumstances. Continuity and spiritual development are
helpful in this process, too.
 chapter seven
   
Spiritual Beliefs and Practices
and the Experience of
Time and Aging

Time has two aspects. There is the arrow, the running

river, without which there is no change, no progress, or
direction, or creation. And there is the circle or cycle,
without which there is chaos, meaningless succession of
instants, a world without clocks or seasons or promises.
—Ursula K. LeGuin

Time is not a road—it is a room. —John Fowles

This chapter is about the influence of spiritual beliefs and practices on the
experience of time as people age. To deal effectively with this complex topic,
we must look briefly at several meanings of time and at why the experience of
chronological time might accelerate with age. Then we can examine spiritual
beliefs about time and practices that might affect perceptions of time. Finally,
we can consider how spiritual beliefs and practices might mediate the rela-
tionship between age and the experience of time.
Life is too short. This common saying is seldom uttered by young people;
it is used by middle-aged and older people to indicate that time is precious
and that we cannot afford to waste it, especially on interpersonal conflicts
or frustrating activities. But the experience of time depends on the context,
which includes age and spiritual beliefs and practices.
Experiential time can be fast or slow; it is relative. As Albert Einstein said,
“When you sit with a nice girl for two hours, you think it’s only a minute. But
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

when you sit on a hot stove for a minute, you think it’s two hours. That’s rela-
tivity” (Safransky 1990, 49). The subjective nature of experienced time does
not mean that it is not affected by social and cultural influences. Indeed, like
most personal mental constructs, the meaning of time is conditioned by so-
cial norms and expectations.
Historical time stretches back at least five thousand years in the written
record and forward as far as the mind can project, but this sense of the word
year is different from the meaning we attach to a calendar year because we
can experience the passing of a calendar year whereas we cannot experience
a millennium. Unless we transcend our own potential lifetime in our view of
the future, we cannot think about the needs of future generations. Being able
to think in panoramic time is thus an important human skill.
We are all tied to the various biological clocks within our bodies that influ-
ence the processes of senescence. We experience the effects of these biological
clocks, such as gradual stiffening of joints in later adulthood, even though they
operate outside our consciousness and therefore outside our experience.
By contrast, we are constantly made aware of chronological time because
it is used to order our lives. Unlike preliterate societies, which tended to use
rough measures of time, based mostly on movement of the sun, phases of the
moon, change of seasons, and annual cycles of animal and plant life, mod-
ern and postmodern societies are fixated on chronological time. Most of us
carry devices strapped to our wrists that allow us to know the chronological
time reasonably precisely. We use technology to keep our room temperature
constant across the seasons and to light our environments at all hours of the
day and night, which allows us to ignore the natural rhythms of daylight and
darkness. Our lives are organized around a time to arise, a time to go to work,
time schedules at work, times to eat, times for prayer, times for recreation,
and a time for sleep. Constructing an ideal lifestyle in today’s world could be
expected to include a daily routine tied to the clock. Clock time is used so
extensively to organize our many activities that few people can get by without
a time-planning device such as a detailed calendar.
In addition to hourly, daily, seasonal, and annual cycles of time, the cul-
tural life course sets forth general chronological age ranges at which we are
expected to move from one life stage to another. Thus, most people enter
middle age around age 40, later adulthood around age 60, and old age around
80. These cultural life stages are composite pictures of lifestyles and values
that are expected of persons in a particular life stage. Most people go through
the various life-stage transitions on schedule, chronologically.
 spirit ual beliefs, pr ac tic e s, time, and aging 

Despite the heavy emphasis on chronological time in our culture, most

people are aware that our perceptions of the speed of time’s passing are not
mechanistic but depend on what we are experiencing during a given span of
chronological time. The conventional wisdom has it that, with advancing age,
time is experienced as accelerating, to the point that by age 90 the years seem
to go by rapidly. Most aging individuals report that this generally fits their
experience. Possible explanations for this phenomenon are several. First, indi-
viduals may be so overhabituated that nothing novel seems to happen in their
lives, which in turn may give them few experiential referents from which to
estimate the speed of time’s passage. Second, as people are freed from child-
rearing and regular employment, they may be liberated from the tyranny of
the clock. As a result, they may no longer be intensely sensitive to the passage
of time; they may not pay as much attention to time. Third, it is possible that
the activities that engage elders are more susceptible to what Mihaly Cszik-
szentmihalyi (1990) calls “flow,” one characteristic of which is losing track of
the passage of time. Fourth, as people grow older, accomplishing routine tasks
may take longer, and what once was a comfortable daily routine may now
seem time pressured. These all seem reasonable explanations for why time is
perceived to pass more quickly as age increases.
However, there is also evidence that both belief and behavior can influence
perceptions. What we believe to be true, we are more apt to perceive to be
true, and vice versa. For example, if we believe that sane people can experi-
ence visions, then we may be more likely to interpret an experience of an angel
as a vision rather than a hallucination. Likewise, if we continue to practice in
an area of life, our perceptions can be influenced by what we learn from our
practice. For example, musicians must learn a complex process of creating
rhythm and timing in music. As they continue to practice, their experiences of
both producing rhythm and listening to rhythm can change over time. Young
musicians often seem to be trying to create the largest possible number of
notes for a given time period, whereas older musicians often pay more atten-
tion to the beauty available by alternating periods of sound and silence into a
simpler, more elegant rhythm.
Studies of how aging might influence the experience of time have thus far
ignored the spiritual aspects of being human. However, it is likely that both
spiritual beliefs about time and spiritual practices over time influence the re-
lation between aging and the experience of time.
As in earlier chapters, I use spiritual here to refer to beliefs, practices, and
experiences that loosely revolve around an inner domain of human experi-
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

ence. Spiritual experience includes sensory and psychological input but ex-
tends to include transcendent ways of knowing as well.
To develop understanding of how aging interacts with the experience of
time and how this relationship may be mediated by spiritual beliefs and prac-
tices requires concepts about the many relationships among aging, spirituality,
and time. We will illustrate how this might be done by selectively reviewing
beliefs about the meaning of time in various spiritual traditions, by discuss-
ing the relationship between various spiritual practices and the experience of
time, and by looking at how spiritual beliefs and practices might mediate the
relationship between aging and the experience of time.

beliefs about time

Important beliefs about time include whether or not there is a continuation

of personal consciousness after death, whether elders are obligated to take a
panoramic view of time in order to lead the society into the future, whether
life stages are related to inner spiritual growth, and whether inner spiritual
growth changes the experience of time. Does spiritual growth include a time-
less state of consciousness in which the experience of time does not exist?
Does spiritual growth require focus on transcendent experience, present-
moment awareness, or both? How does the focus of awareness affect experi-
ences of time?
Belief in a personal afterlife is characteristic of many religious belief sys-
tems, and belief in a personal afterlife means that the life span of one’s human
body is but a tiny fraction of the time available, which downplays the impor-
tance of the current lifetime. Likewise, belief in an afterlife in another life form
through reincarnation minimizes the importance of getting it right within
one lifetime. By contrast, some religions contend that this is it, you only go
around once, and time in the current lifetime is therefore more important
than for those who believe in eternal life in some particular form. If people
believe in one lifetime, then approaching the end of that lifetime can produce
much more powerful spiritual growth as well as despair at lack of growth.
For example, perceiving that there is not enough time left to perfect the self
can be an important motive for letting go of perfectionism and being able to
integrate the ideal self with the real self, with its range of good and bad quali-
ties and history. Of course, even people who believe in an afterlife may face
an existential crisis when physical death becomes real to them if they have not
converted their belief into the certainty of faith.
 spirit ual beliefs, pr ac tic e s, time, and aging 

Young and middle-aged adults are often expected to focus their attention
on relatively short-range goals, such as getting a formal education, main-
taining a connection with the economy, selecting a life partner and rearing
children, and contributing their energies to the community. Leaders of busi-
.

ness, government, and voluntary organizations develop five-year plans, not

hundred-year plans. But Zalman Schachter-Shalomi and Ronald Miller (1995)
make the point that elders are uniquely qualified to take the long view. Child
launching and retirement, a long span of experienced historical time, with its
many changes, and feelings of generativity about the welfare of grandchildren
and great-grandchildren are interests that motivate elders to be concerned
about what sort of world we will be leaving for our offspring over the next
hundred years. To Schachter-Shalomi and Miller, this perspective leads to
greater concern over the welfare of the planet Earth, especially its environ-
mental, intercultural, and political integrity. Elders traditionally played this
role, but in the process of modernization this role was transferred to “experts,”
who often do not look at issues from a panoramic time perspective. Spiritual
Eldering is the expression Zalman Schachter-Shalomi and Ronald Miller use
to indicate that recovering the role of elder in postmodern societies requires
a level of spiritual development on the part of elders before they can have the
transcendent attitudes and panoramic view of time required to play the role
of spiritual elder.
Many faith traditions relate spiritual development to stages of the life
course. For example, the Hindu conception of life stages includes a house-
holder stage and a renunciate stage. In the householder stage, people use their
concern with family and vocation to motivate an inner spiritual journey in-
volving meditation, not as an escape from reality but as a way of seeing ulti-
mate truth in their everyday lives. In the renunciate stage, which traditionally
began with the birth of the first grandson, people do not drop out of life to
become recluses. Instead, they become so focused on the Absolute within
themselves that they gain a transcendent perspective that allows them to see
themselves and their world in a different way, a way in which time is fully
understood as a human creation. From an experiential point of view, time is
in you, you are not in time.
This basic Hindu philosophical position was used by Lars Tornstam to
develop his theory of gerotranscendence (Tornstam 2005). He posited that
advanced aging increases interest in contemplation, which in turn produces a
shift in perspective that dramatically reduces the importance of chronologi-
cal time. Thus, one might argue that the loosening of social constraints that
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

occurs in later adulthood and old age allows contemplative understanding to

blossom into transcendence, with a dramatic effect on the experience of time.
Note that these are concepts of the relation between aging, life stage, spiritual-
ity, and the experience of time.
Thomas Cole (1992) provided an insightful portrait of how biblical ideas
from Jewish and Christian perspectives shaped early American Protestant
conceptions of the relation between life stages and spiritual development. Old
age was seen as the culmination of a spiritual journey of life. Elders, through
their lifelong struggle to understand and carry out the will of God, were more
developed spiritually compared with the young. That is, experience across
time was assumed to be a necessary element of spiritual insight. Elders were
expected to set a moral and social example for the young. Early American
religion had high expectations of elders, including dignified behavior and ap-
pearance and continued social contribution. These ideas are very much a part
of the life course expectations in American churches today.
But these ideas of spiritual growth over time compete with a view that the
effects of aging—whether aging means growing decrepitude and incapacity or
continued vitality—are largely under the individual’s moral control. And the
evangelical view of salvation as immediately wiping away sin means that the
experience of elders is downplayed. The notion of respect for elders remains,
but a sense that elders, by virtue of their experience of contemplation and
struggle, can be spiritually advanced, is often missing.
Concepts of time, and therefore of aging, as being needed for spiritual
growth can be a sometime thing, depending on the directions of cultural
change. By the year 2000, religious thought was again becoming more open
to the image of spiritual growth with aging. This trend is no doubt related to
more cultural emphasis having been placed on the positive aspects of aging
during the 1990s. It is also probably related to the greater attention in popular
culture and gerontology research to the voices of experience, to the journals
and oral histories produced by elders themselves, which often contain com-
mentaries about how extended life experience relates to spiritual insight.
Most religious traditions also contain beliefs about the effects of transcen-
dence and present-moment awareness on the experience of time. For exam-
ple, although the major concepts of Jewish, Christian, and Islamic traditions
are all rooted in a personified conception of God, there are within each of
these traditions mystical, experiential concepts of God, not as person-like but
as mysterious and capable of being only incompletely apprehended by the
verbal mind. For instance, in The Cloud of Unknowing (Anon. 2004), perhaps
 spirit ual beliefs, pr ac tic e s, time, and aging 

the first Christian meditation guide to have been originally written in the Eng-
lish language, the anonymous fourteenth-century author holds that God is
obscured by a “cloud of unknowing,” which can be navigated only by assuming
an open stance of bare being. The cloud of unknowing is within the experi-
encer, not something external, but to even sense the cloud of unknowing, the
meditator must leave worldly concerns, including time, behind in a “cloud of
forgetting.” This conception of God is similar to the Hindu conception of the
Absolute. Eternal God, or Absolute, is not characterized by infinite time but
by an absence of time. Thus, if people connect with the experience of God
or the Absolute within themselves, they transcend time as well as the other
aspects of a phenomenal world bound by concepts such as time and space. As
Ken Wilber (2001, 148) put it, “The Absolute can be present in its entirety at
every point in time only if [the Absolute] is itself timeless.” This same general
perspective is contained in the Buddhist concept of nothingness, which is less
an absence or void than no-thing-ness; not this, not that, but an entirety in
which ideas such as subject/object, time, and space do not apply.
To experience “the ground of being,” Aldous Huxley’s (1944) term for the
ultimate principle that forms the eternal context for spiritual experience, thus
requires that we transcend conventional consciousness. A major obstacle to
transcendence is being distracted by worldly concerns. Although it may be
possible by strength of will to develop the skill needed to be “in the world but
not of it” early in life, transcendence is thought to be more common in later
life, for the reasons mentioned above.
Paradoxically, aging is also thought to make possible a greater capacity to
be in the present. Although stereotypes hold that elders dwell excessively in
the past, my research has shown that healthy elders living in the community
experience a balance of thoughts and experiences from the past, present, and
future (Atchley 1999). Indeed, the proportion of elders who have the capacity
to patiently attend to the present with present-moment awareness is much
greater than that of young and middle-aged adults. Present-moment aware-
ness is also a form of timelessness, in the sense that the present moment, not
the passage of time, is of the essence.

spiritual pr ac tices and the experience of time

Various religious traditions contain rituals that are designed to break the hold
of the everyday world on consciousness. For instance, the Jewish concept of
the Sabbath is more than just a day of rest; it is a time for renewing one’s
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

relationship with God. The Muslim practice of daily prayer creates five op-
portunities each day—on arising, at midday, in mid-afternoon, at sunset, and
when retiring for the evening—to focus attention on the divine. Catholic mo-
nastic traditions schedule breaks for prayer and contemplation seven times
each day: at daybreak, around 9 am, at noon, at 3 pm, about 6 pm, in the
early evening, and at midnight. Most meditation-based traditions encourage
practitioners to have a specific time for meditation each day in order to make
meditation a habit. These rituals all use concepts of time to create pauses in
the swirl of worldly activities, pauses during which attention can be focused
on ultimate concerns.
The discipline of regular spiritual practice over time creates a rhythm of
connection with the ground of being, and this rhythm can become a self-sus-
taining system in the sense that, in all their variety, the experiences that come
from spiritual practice become ends in themselves. Over time, contemplative
prayer and meditation may become less means to an end and more ends in
themselves, and in most cases this occurs over an extended period of time.
Meditation is a central spiritual practice in many spiritual traditions. Un-
fortunately, the word meditation often evokes a stereotype of people dressed
in flowing robes and sitting in the lotus position. People confuse the outer ap-
pearance for the inner intention. In fact, there are many different meditation
methods, and individuals may use one or several of them, depending on their
immediate needs. How various meditation practices influence the experience
of time varies greatly. For example, the Transcendental Meditation technique
uses meditation on a mantra—subvocal sounds that have been found to focus
attention—to induce a transcendent state of consciousness that is completely
beyond sensory and verbal experience. In this state, the meditator loses track
of time completely. On the other hand, Buddhist mindfulness meditation in-
volves paying close attention to sensations of breathing, which focuses at-
tention on simply being rather than on what the body or the mind may be
doing. In the beginning, mindfulness meditators often experience the passage
of time as excruciatingly slow. But after years of daily meditation and inten-
sive meditation retreats, practitioners tend to “give up on time.” As conscious
being becomes a larger and larger part of the mindfulness meditation experi-
ence, which takes time, time often matters less during meditation.
Prayer is also a central spiritual practice for most faith traditions. Prayer
can be classified into ritual prayer, petitionary prayer, and meditative prayer.
Ritual prayer, repeated over and over for countless repetitions, can have tran-
scendental effects, carrying the practitioner out of conventional conscious-
 spirit ual beliefs, pr ac tic e s, time, and aging 

ness and into greater sensitivity to the divine. But ritual prayer can also induce
a devotional attitude toward God or serve as a reminder of important reli-
gious or spiritual ideas. Petitionary prayer asks something of God. Medita-
tive prayer has little form. The practitioner simply “waits upon the Lord.” The
point is to be present, open, attuned to messages from God, yet not expecting
any specific experience. James Peacock and Margaret Paloma (1991) found
that younger adults were much more likely to engage in ritual and petitionary
prayer compared with older adults, and older adults were much more likely
to engage in meditative prayer compared with younger adults. In my twenty-
year longitudinal study of adults who were age 70 and older at the completion
of the study, I found that the incidence of contemplative prayer increased
substantially with age.
Meditation and prayer are spiritual practices that tend to work mostly with
the mind and basic consciousness. However, movement disciplines such as tai
chi or dance, music, and other arts can also be important spiritual practices.
As spiritual practices, expressive disciplines can invoke what Cszikszentmi-
halyi (1990) calls “flow,” which is experienced as an intense and effortless con-
centration wherein there is no experience of time. Thus, as spiritual practices,
these activities can require intense attention to the present moment; they can
also transcend time.

spiritual beliefs and pr ac tices, aging, and the

experience of time

Virtually none of the studies of changes in how the passage of time is per-
ceived as one ages has been able to look at individual differences that might
be attributable to spiritual beliefs and practices because these studies did not
assess individual spiritual beliefs and practices. In this section, I look at some
possibilities that might be useful for future inquiry.
How might spiritual beliefs and practices mediate the relation between
aging and the experience of time? First, such mediation might occur as a re-
sult of the effects of spiritual beliefs and practices on the potential causes of
altered time perception with age.
For example, some perceptions of a speed-up in time with age may be a re-
sult of paying less attention to time through overhabituation or the experience
of flow. If overhabituation is a cause of the perception that time accelerates
with age, then mindfulness practice could be expected to offset this tendency.
The practice of mindfulness meditation involves intense awareness of the de-
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

tails of the present moment. Mindfulness is the opposite of overhabituation,

and in mindfulness people perceive their environment more intensely than
in conventional consciousness. In a state of mindfulness, people are intensely
focused on the present moment and not preoccupied with time.
Even people who are overhabituated may find that spiritual practice takes
them to a region of consciousness in which time is irrelevant and therefore
not perceived as passing quickly. For example, people who engage in ritual
prayer for long periods each day or who spend much of their time in con-
templation might be unlikely to perceive the pace of time as important. This
would be especially likely in those whose practices emphasize being rather
than doing. On the other hand, spiritual practices that emphasize repeated
ritual might increase the potential for a “good” type of overhabituation. For
example, people who spend hours each day in ritual prayer may be in a pleas-
ant state during this time but still be left with the question, “Where did the
time go?”
To the extent that spiritual practices promote an experience of losing one-
self in the activity, a process called flow, they take the practitioner to a world
unbounded by time. Not all practices that produce the sense of flow are spiri-
tual, but most spiritual practices have the potential for flow. Of course, to
be able to ignore time, people must be free to some extent from social time
constraints.
If perceiving time as passing quickly is a function of paying less attention
to it, then later life offers many opportunities to free life’s schedules from
“the tyranny of the clock.” Retired people often report that they experience a
much more relaxed pace and more freedom from time pressures compared
with when they were working. People who have launched their children into
adulthood often experience a dramatic increase in “free time.”
Where the spiritual journey may be involved here is in influencing what
people do with the time freed by retirement and the empty nest. Those who
use this time for contemplative reading, meditation, prayer, or devotions are
choosing a lifestyle that emphasizes an inner journey in a region of conscious-
ness in which time is less relevant. For example, a man in his 80s reported to
me, “You become free of time when you realize that time is in you, not you
in time.”
On the other hand, those who use the time freed by retirement and child
launching to become more involved in a path of service may find that they
have substituted one set of time-based obligations for another. But time pres-
sures are subjective, and those who have been on a contemplative spiritual
 spirit ual beliefs, pr ac tic e s, time, and aging 

path for many years may be able to engage in service without feeling the pres-
sures of time because they take a mindful approach to service, which pro-
motes realistic expectations of what can be accomplished and a let-be attitude
toward time.
If aging causes people to slow down, even though they want to continue in
their customary lifestyle, then aging may cause an increase in time pressure
and a sense that time is speeding up. Many older people drastically simplify
their lifestyles in order to balance their capabilities with their expectations.
The spiritual journey can have an effect here by altering a person’s sense of
priorities. As people grow spiritually, they tend to take a transpersonal view
of life. They often deemphasize their social and materialistic goals in favor of
more enduring inner qualities, such as altruism and generativity.
Beliefs can also mediate the relationship between time and aging. If people
believe that their fundamental being is timeless, then death is less fearsome
and there is little reason to feel that time is running out, which could be ex-
pected to reduce the sense that time is speeding up. On the other hand, if
people believe that death is final and that time is finite, as they get older they
may begin to see time as a scarce resource and to see it as passing faster.
If people believe in a personal afterlife, time is irrelevant in that their life
is eternal. However, if they believe that eternity will be spent either in heaven
or hell and that what they do in this life determines which, they may have a
heightened sense that time is running out and that time is passing ever more
quickly.
If people believe that transcendence and enlightenment are possible, they
may experience these states. People who have transcended their purely per-
sonal concerns are unlikely to be concerned about the pace at which time
passes, regardless of their chronological age.
These various possibilities by no means exhaust the potential ways that
spiritual beliefs and practices might mediate the relationship between aging
and the perception of time. They do illustrate a complex web of possibilities.
As we continue to ask the types of question raised in this book, we will con-
tinue to find that spiritual beliefs and practices have important influences.
I have found it useful to think about human beings as interactive systems in
which bodily systems, knowledge, mental capacities, coping styles, lifestyles,
and social environments interact in complex ways and evolve by incorporat-
ing feedback from experience. From this point of view, physical, psychologi-
cal, and social characteristics are basic structures and processes. Beliefs and
practices of individuals are imbedded in a culture and a society, and change in
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

the individual or in the culture or society can change beliefs or practices. But
changing beliefs or practices can also affect physical, psychological, or social
characteristics, and widespread individual changes in belief or practice can
change culture and social arrangements.
Given that a multitude of specific elements is subsumed under the labels
of beliefs, practices, aging, and adult development, the number of potential
interactions is astronomical. Even if we confine ourselves to the experience
of time as affected by physical, psychological, and social aging and adult de-
velopment, especially spiritual development, the number of potential dimen-
sions to explore is mind-boggling.

conclusion

This chapter begins with a particular general finding in gerontology: aging

is often accompanied by a perception that time goes by faster and faster, es-
pecially in later life. The relationship between aging and the experience of
time might well be conditioned by spiritual beliefs and practices in several
important ways. Thus, the chapter illustrates how concepts about spirituality
might help us understand variations from this generalization about aging and
the experience of time. The logic of this analysis could be used to examine the
mediating effects of spirituality on a wide variety of other general findings in
gerontology.
 chapter eight
   
Spirituality and the Experience of
Dying and Death

What difference does spirituality make in the experience of dying and death?
How do dying and death influence spirituality? Those are the central ques-
tions for this chapter. Of course, the answers to these questions are deeply in-
fluenced by how we answer two other questions: What is my spiritual nature?
Am I a person having spiritual experiences or am I a spiritual being having a
human experience?
No topic in this chapter has been adequately studied. The ideas here are
suggestions about issues that might be studied and how one might think
about them and communicate about them. Intellectually, we know that ev-
eryone dies, but as Ernest Becker (1973) pointed out long ago, people tend not
to like this idea, and many societies and cultures have gone to great lengths
to deny that death is real. Many cultural beliefs deny the reality of death by
describing in detail a world to which we pass when our time on this earthly
plane has ended. Becker felt that these many versions of an afterlife served a
single function—to relieve the inevitable anxiety associated with death of the
personal self.
What we believe about both the existence and nature of an afterlife and
conditions for a smooth transition can profoundly influence our experience
when we think about our own death. People who believe that personality and
self somehow transcend their body and continue into an afterlife in some kind
of personal form, and that a virtuous life leads to heaven while an unvirtuous
life leads to hell, may fear death if they are uncertain about whether, as per-
sons, they are virtuous enough to receive the reward of heaven. By contrast,
people who see God as an “infinite sea of being” from which they were spiritu-
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

ally born may see death as a gentle releasing back into that infinite sea, not as
a person but as nonembodied life energy.
Spiritual experiences can give us confidence in cultural beliefs about death
or take confidence away, depending on the match between these experiences
and the substance of our beliefs about death. Consider these examples.

Annie was a long-time meditator who had directly experienced the “Ab-
solute” within herself many times. She saw spaceless and timeless being
as familiar and unthreatening territory. She did not fear personal death.
She saw death as “going home.” By age 88, Annie was blind, nearly deaf,
and severely crippled by painful arthritis. She had fallen several times and
was unable to transfer from her wheelchair without assistance. By her ac-
count, her life had become one of sameness and pain. Annie summoned
her many friends and told them that she was ready to die. She asked them
to accompany her on this last journey. After a ceremonial celebration of
Annie’s life, Annie ceased taking liquids. Her goal was to die as painlessly
as possible. Her friends took shifts being with her around the clock. The
first day without fluid was the hardest for Annie, but after that she was
peaceful and lucid throughout. After five days, Annie was weak but radi-
ant just before she lost consciousness, and several of her friends were
with her two days later when she took her last breath.

Koji was a 60-year-old Japanese man whose family was Buddhist, but
he was not a practicing Buddhist. When he was diagnosed with pancre-
atic cancer and given only a short time to live, Koji was overcome by a
consuming terror. He believed that he would be entering “the Void,” but
he had no experience of this place. To him it seemed a great unknown.
When he thought about his impending death, he experienced a numbing
anxiety throughout his body. His wife would sit with him for long periods
as this usually taciturn man repeated “I don’t want to die—I don’t want to
die” over and over again like a mantra. Nothing seemed to comfort him.
He remained terrified to the end. His lack of spiritual experience or reli-
gious faith gave him no possibility of resources from these areas to help
him cope.

Kenneth believed that Christ was his personal savior and that as long as
Kenneth held this belief, his sins would be forgiven and he would be as-
sured a personal afterlife in heaven. When he was young, Kenneth had
spi r i t ua l i t y a n d t h e e x pe r i e n c e o f dy i n g a n d d e at h 

believed this cognitively, but by his 60s he felt it “in his bones.” For him,
this was not a cliché, it was real. At 71, Kenneth was diagnosed with ALS,
commonly called Lou Gehrig’s disease, which is a progressive deteriora-
tion of nerve functioning throughout the body. ALS often involves a long
and painful progression before it finally shuts the body down. Kenneth’s
belief that he was assured of going to heaven was a great comfort to him
through four years of suffering. He said, “I try to remember that the pain
and inability to do things is temporary and to see Jesus looking at me
with incredible love and I know that soon I will be with Him.” Kenneth’s
positive and hopeful perspective inspired those who took care of him.

Sarah grew up Methodist. She attended church regularly throughout her
life, and her faith grew and deepened over time. Familiar hymns and ser-
mons on familiar biblical topics and a community of like-minded people
gave Sarah a deep sense of well-being. She made sure that her daughter
Julia, an only child, regularly attended Sunday school, and Sarah said
prayers with Julia at bedtime each night. When she was 10, Julia was ab-
ducted and murdered. Sarah was devastated. She could not reconcile this
happening with any conception she had of God. The culprit was never
found, and Sarah focused her anger and desolation on God. She took this
event as proof that God does not exist; heaven does not exist; only bleak-
ness exists. Three years after Julia’s death, Sarah’s husband left. Sarah
tried many forms of counseling and took antidepressants, but she never
regained a sense of well-being. Forty-three years later, when Sarah died,
she found no comfort in either spirituality or religion. She saw death as a
release from the “flatness” that had been her life since Julia died. She met
death with relief, but not hope.

Why some people seek refuge in spirituality and religion during difficult
times and others reject spirituality and religion in response to extreme hap-
penings is a mystery.

dying and de ath as spiritual journeys

Cultural concepts of the “good death” vacillate back and forth between ac-
ceptance of death and a battle against death. Thomas Cole (1992) describes
nineteenth-century concepts of “edifying” death as a process of enlighten-
ment that occurs if one does one’s death properly. Most scholars consider
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

this a comforting romanticization of death, but recently a movement has

emerged to encourage “conscious dying.”
Conscious dying is rooted in the “consciousness movement” that began in
the 1940s and gained prominence in popular culture in the late 1960s. Higher
states of consciousness and awareness were presumed to be unrealized hu-
man potentials. Eastern philosophy and spiritual practices were seen as being
especially useful in cultivating inner mystical experiences of higher states. But
by the 1970s, early Christian sources, such as The Cloud of Unknowing and
the writings of St. John of the Cross and St. Teresa of Avila, were supporting
Christians on mystical inner journeys.
In 1982, Stephen Levine published Who Dies? An Investigation of Con-
scious Living and Conscious Dying, which quickly became a central resource
for people who wanted to integrate what they had been learning from the con-
sciousness movement with issues of dying and death. It also introduced many
people who worked with dying people to the consciousness movement.
One of the central themes of Eastern philosophy is that to progress spiri-
tually we must come to terms with aging and death. As long as we deny or
repress aging and death, we cannot experience our true nature as spiritual be-
ings. Conscious dying starts with the premise that to be fully conscious as we
die we must learn to center our awareness in consciousness—in pure being,
not in our minds and not in our bodies. Awareness centered in the mind leads
to fear of decline and extinction of the mind. To move awareness away from
exclusive focus on the mind, loosening our attachment to the mind can be
helpful. Awareness centered in the body can lead to preoccupation with de-
cline and loss of physical capacities. To move awareness away from exclusive
focus on the body, relaxing our clinging attachment to the body can help. If we
see our existence as being made up of being, embodiment, and consciousness,
then concerns about the health of body and mind can be seen as appropriate
because they serve the whole. But preoccupation with physical existence or
thought can be seen as unhealthy because it is not balanced by beingness.
The concept of conscious dying presumes that dying experienced from
higher states of consciousness is less likely to lead to fear or anxiety com-
pared with dying experienced from excessive concerns with preserving one’s
body or personality. Aging can often be an ally in adopting a detached attitude
about the body and mind. As people age, they often learn to be philosophi-
cally accepting of losses they can do nothing about, and this detachment from
body and mind can encourage spiritual development in later life. The research
spi r i t ua l i t y a n d t h e e x pe r i e n c e o f dy i n g a n d d e at h 

on gerotranscendence (Atchley 1999; Tornstam 2005) indicates that, for most

people, aging is accompanied by reduced fear of death.
As we saw in Chapter 6, continuity and spiritual development are impor-
tant resources for coping with challenges of later life, and this is particularly
true of dying. Continuity of spirituality, values, and relationships is especially
helpful as support, and spiritual development leads toward a higher place
from which to view one’s dying.

what happens at the moment of de ath?

No one knows for sure what happens when we die, but most of us have come
to at least a working conclusion about this event. The evidence we have comes
mainly from reports given by people who have had near-death experiences,
who have been thought dead or pronounced dead but who have been revived.
Consistencies across near-death reports include feelings of peace, feelings of
painlessness, hearing strange sounds, out-of-body experience, seeing light or
beings of light, and reluctance to return to the body (Raymond Moody 1975;
Williams 2005). This list brings to mind the following quote from Huxley:
“Lightly, my darling, lightly, even when it comes to dying. Nothing ponder-
ous or portentous or emphatic. No rhetoric, no tremolos, no self-conscious
persona putting on its celebrated imitation of Christ, or Goethe, or Little Nell.
And of course, no theology, no metaphysics. Just the simple fact of dying and
the fact of the clear light” (quoted in Levine 1982, 249). However, a small pro-
portion (12) of respondents in a 1982 Gallup Poll reported that their near-
death experience involved torment, not peace (www.gallup.com).
Many people who have near-death experiences say that the experience
changed them, usually from people preoccupied with matters of achievement
and material gain to people concerned with helping others. One could take
this as evidence that near-death experiences take people to a higher state of
consciousness, which puts conventional values into a different perspective.

de ath as spiritual tr ansition and belief in

an afterlife

The Tibetan Buddhists exemplify a highly organized approach to preparing

for a death that is seen as a complex passage. They believe that following
physical death we enter an intermediate state of being as we await rebirth. In
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

this intermediate state, we begin by having spiritual clarity associated with

death and then we experience terrifying hallucinations arising from the im-
pulses of one’s previous unmindful actions, often called karma. Tibetan Bud-
dhists believe that a dead person can be helped in this transition by hearing
inspirational words that draw awareness toward clarity rather than toward
karmic impulses. Thus, for several days after death, friends and family sit with
the dead body and read helpful texts. Tibetan Buddhists prepare for death by
becoming familiar with these texts so that they will recognize them when they
hear them after death.
Roman Catholic Christians believe that persons who die with only pardon-
able sins that have not been absolved do not go to hell but go instead to purga-
tory, where they are purged of their sins until they reach the absolute purity
required to enter heaven. People who follow this doctrine could be expected
to be motivated to have as few unrepented sins as possible so as to minimize
their time in the “fires” of purgatory.
Obviously, whether we see death as a spiritual transition or not depends
on beliefs about the existence and nature of an afterlife and the conditions
required for a smooth passage from this life to the next. (See Kastenbaum
[2004] for a comprehensive discussion of the enormous variety of beliefs con-
cerning death and afterlife.) Research on fear of death suggests that from the
viewpoint of a dying person, the specifics of these beliefs are not as important
as the person’s confidence in them. Atheists who were confident that death
means just ceasing to exist were likely to be unafraid of death. Religious peo-
ple who were confident in their beliefs about an afterlife were equally likely to
be unafraid of death. However, people who were unsure in their beliefs about
death were the most likely to experience a high degree of fear and anxiety
about death (Koenig 1995).
My hypothesis is that for many people spiritual experiences are a resource
in deciding the plausibility of various scenarios about the nature of death and
an afterlife. For example, if a person has experienced higher levels of con-
sciousness as being nonpersonal, it may be difficult to accept beliefs about
an afterlife in which one remains a person and interacts with persons in one’s
family or with friends who have died. On the other hand, if a person has ex-
perienced having conversations with the personal spirits of friends or family
members who have died, then beliefs in personal continuity into an afterlife
may be more plausible.
spi r i t ua l i t y a n d t h e e x pe r i e n c e o f dy i n g a n d d e at h 

existential influences on the experience of

dying and de ath

The extent to which death is seen as an unknown is related to opportunities to

see people die and to see the dead. These opportunities are not randomly dis-
tributed in the population and depend partly on regional, ethnic, and cultural
influences, including social class. For example, where people die, whether the
body is displayed, how (naturally, or embalmed and cosmetically presented)
and where (home, funeral home, or church), and the existence and content of
memorial services all have the potential to influence attitudes toward death
and to stimulate spiritual experiences associated with death.
In American society, death is mostly experienced in the media. On televi-
sion and in movies we may see dozens of people who are fictionally “dead” for
every actually dead person, and even pictures of the truly dead do not have
the immediacy of seeing someone die and be dead. Consider an experience I
had as a child.

By the time I was ten, I had seen many people “die” in the movies, and
these same people were miraculously “resurrected” for the next grade B
shoot-’em-up. One Saturday I was walking home from the movies and
saw a woman hit by a car. Her body was catapulted high in the air, hit a
tree limb, and she landed on her head on the sidewalk about thirty feet in
front of me. Her skull was caved in and a large pool of blood formed. Her
eyes were half open and vacant. I stood stunned on the sidewalk for only
a minute or so before someone came out of a nearby barber shop and
placed an apron over the woman’s upper body. One minute she was walk-
ing across the street and the next instant she was dead.
This experience drove home the reality of physical death for me. See-
ing this real and sudden death forced me to think about what happens
when people die in a way that none of the fictional deaths I had seen in
the movies had. At that time in my life, although I attended a Baptist
church, I was attending a parochial Catholic school, and we were study-
ing about purgatory in religion class. I wondered if this woman would
go to hell or if she would go to purgatory. I doubted that she would go
straight to heaven, because I had learned in school that even saints are
not pure enough to go to heaven without first being purged of sin. I asked
my mother about this that evening, and she said, “I imagine she’s in a bet-
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

ter place now.” I took this to mean that Mom thought the woman was in
heaven. So this experience not only altered my view of the fact of death, it
brought me into direct contact with religious differences in the meaning
of death and conditions for experiencing an afterlife. I liked the idea of
assuming that people would go to heaven unless you had evidence to the
contrary.

By the time people reach later life, they have usually had many experiences
that require them to cope with the contradictions and paradoxes about death
and an afterlife that exist in our American cultural soup.

concerns about dying and qualit y of life

The greatest fear about dying is that we will lose control over the circum-
stances of our dying and be forced to endure pain, suffering, and indignities
we did not choose. Many more people fear this than fear death itself (Atchley
and Barusch 2004). One of the greatest benefits of being part of a spiritual
community is confidence that if the need arises, there will be people to ac-
company you on your final journey who share your spiritual perspective on
dying and who will intercede on your behalf with health care providers whose
agendas may conflict with yours.
However, we should not assume that people are helpless in the face of the
medical-industrial complex. Here are two examples in which aging people
took charge of the conditions of their dying.
Being a close friend or immediate family member often provides an oppor-
tunity to be intensely involved in another person’s dying process. In the mid-
1990s I was part of the dying process of Millie, my best friend and colleague
of more than twenty-five years, and Gar, my wife’s beloved father. These two
endings were different in duration and circumstances, but I was struck by the
ways in which both were able to influence their experience of dying.

At 81, Gar seemed in good general health, but he was a long-time smoker
and had mild diabetes. He suffered congestive heart failure in the early
evening at home. Gar told the EMTs to let him die. But guidelines didn’t
allow that. Instead, Gar was transported by helicopter to a large medical
complex a half-day’s drive away. Gar kept saying, “I don’t want to go.”
Three days later, the doctors at the medical center convinced the fam-
ily that with a coronary artery bypass and heart-valve replacement, Gar
could probably enjoy several more years of good health. Gar was not so
spi r i t ua l i t y a n d t h e e x pe r i e n c e o f dy i n g a n d d e at h 

sure, especially after the staff required him to watch a video graphically
showing all the things they were asking his permission to do to his body.
I noticed that at several points during the video, Gar’s attention was obvi-
ously elsewhere. But in the end, mostly to please his family—I think, Gar
gave his consent.
While the surgical team was beginning anesthesia, Gar suddenly went
into cardiac arrest. They performed CPR on him. Some time later, a vis-
ibly shaken surgeon came to tell us, “We lost him, and frankly I don’t un-
derstand what happened.”
I thought about what Gar had been saying to everyone for three
days—that he was ready for his life to be over. No one stood ready to
be his ally in this. But in the end, it seemed to me that his intention was
more powerful than the wishes of his family or the arsenal of Western
medicine. He wanted to leave, and he left.

At 71, Millie was diagnosed with lung cancer, which was treated with
surgery and multiple courses of chemotherapy and radiation. She had
a period of monitoring and things were looking good, but a follow-up
exam revealed that cancer had spread to her bones and from there would
invade her entire body. She was told that her dying would take about six
months.
In July, as I sit in Millie’s bright, airy living room, I become aware that
I feel anxious. For the first time in more than twenty-five years of close
friendship, I don’t know what to say or do. Millie is dying, but it won’t
happen soon. I am committed to accompanying and serving her as best I
can during this last journey, but nothing I have ever done before has pre-
pared me for this moment.
Over the next week or so, I become clearer about what she expects of
me. Because she can no longer easily go out into the world, my daily job
is delivering a stack of office mail and helping Millie attend to it, but what
she really wants is the latest university gossip.
I am part of an intricate division of labor involving more than a dozen
close friends and family members Millie has mobilized to meet her needs
during her dying. There can be no mistake about it: Millie is in charge
and makes the important decisions. I feel enormous relief to be able just
to follow instructions.
By early October, Millie seems frail and is in a lot of pain. She fre-
quently appears to be embarrassed about being in pain, as if she doesn’t
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

think it is seemly. But there really is no dignified way to be in agony. We

sit in silence for long periods. I am beginning to appreciate this silence—
almost like group meditation, except Millie would never admit to medi-
tating. I think the peacefulness is helpful to Millie, but we don’t speak
about it.
In early November, Millie is excited about traveling from Ohio to At-
lanta to attend the Gerontological Society of America meetings, where
she is scheduled to receive a prestigious award. I look at her and I cannot
see how she will be able to withstand the trip. She is weak and emaciated
and in intense pain much of the time. But her eyes are bright as she talks
about seeing her many professional friends one last time.
The gerontology meeting is a triumph for Millie. Even in her wheel-
chair, she is resplendent in stylish new clothes and gaucho-style hat. Sev-
eral hundred colleagues rise to their feet and give her a standing ovation
that lasts several minutes. Millie accepts this accolade with grace and
humility.
At a reception later that day, a long line of people waits patiently
throughout the two-hour event for a few last words with Millie. As al-
ways, she is attentive, gracious, and supportive with each person. One
colleague says to me, “At first, I was shocked at Millie’s appearance. She
has changed a lot and seems frail. But then I looked into her eyes, at the
fire, and I said to myself, it’s the same Millie.” I cannot fathom where she
is getting the energy to keep this up. I realize later that it is coming from
the people who want so much to be with her.
When Millie returns from Atlanta, I go over for my usual visit, and her
immediate family members are all there for Thanksgiving. Millie looks
tired but is in good spirits. I suggest that I wait until after the holiday to
come by again, because she has a lot of company. She gives me an enig-
matic look and says, “Call tomorrow.”
I call as instructed, and Millie’s daughter tearfully tells me that Millie
is slipping in and out of consciousness. She dies two days later, at home
surrounded by her loving family.
About two weeks after her funeral, Millie’s husband calls to say that he
needs to deliver something. Millie had spent time during her dying care-
fully selecting little gifts from among her personal possessions to give to
her friends. My gift is a well-used rectangular silver pillbox with a raised
figure of the Buddha embossed in the lid. The more I gaze at the worn
image, the more it looks like Millie.
spi r i t ua l i t y a n d t h e e x pe r i e n c e o f dy i n g a n d d e at h 

lessons

Gar’s experience fits the stereotype of an older person’s having important de-
cisions taken away by doctors and family, but he nevertheless seemed to take
control of his own dying through a deep inner process. The lesson is to respect
the will to die as much as the will to live.
The high level of control Millie exercised over her dying process did not
occur by accident. She consciously and carefully orchestrated her social cir-
cumstances to provide herself with the companionship, support, and power
she would need for her last journey. She gently and persistently helped family
members and friends accept and support her decisions.
Through her strong will, Millie remained in charge of the decisions about
her healthcare, and she used her extensive network of knowledgeable friends
to carefully select medical practitioners who could support her desire to be
in charge of her experience of dying. As a result, she was able to get the pal-
liative care she needed to ease her pain and spend her last months at home.
She refused treatment that would have affected her alertness, and she rejected
treatment that would have diminished the quality of her life experience. She
resisted pressures from her doctors, family, and friends to grasp at medical
straws. She conserved her energy for one last important trip, and died at
home surrounded by the loving people who knew her best. She had a plan for
how and when her life would end, and she died under the circumstances she
had prepared for.
Neither Gar nor Millie had strong religious beliefs or ever talked about
spiritual experiences. But Gar was a wheat farmer and cattleman for whom
nature’s wonders were a part of daily life, and he felt connected to the natural
world and the land in a profound, unspoken way. He looked at his own death
as a natural thing not to be postponed or avoided. Millie was an observant
Jew who did not believe in an afterlife, nor did she give much credence to
mysticism, but there was an intense aliveness—a beingness—in Millie that
hundreds of people saw, wanted to be around, and respected. I have been
told by dozens of Millie’s friends that they saw her as a spiritual person, but
she herself would probably have rejected that label—as any properly humble
sage would.
  e x a mpl e s usi n g a n e x pa n d e d v i e w

conclusion

The reality of dying and death are catalysts that propel many people to ponder
spiritual questions deeply and perhaps begin a spiritual journey. Likewise,
spiritual experiences can profoundly affect how we see the prospect of death
and the process of dying. Yet the potential ways in which these issues play out
in actual lives have not been studied extensively; here is a vast field of research
awaiting discovery.
    
Conclusion
Summary, Reflections, and Implications

I began my study of aging in 1963 in a graduate seminar taught by Clark Tib-

bitts, one of the founders of social gerontology. As a text, we used the Hand-
book of Social Gerontology (Tibbitts 1960), a thorough compendium of re-
search findings and ideas about social aspects of aging from a wide variety of
academic disciplines. In that handbook, there was an excellent chapter by Paul
B. Maves, “Aging, Religion, and the Church,” which dealt mainly with Jewish
and Christian teachings and attitudes toward aging, care of the aged by reli-
gious bodies, and participation of elders in churches. Maves concluded that
as people age, religion is increasingly a comfort to the extent that it provides
answers to “meaning of life” questions and a feeling of safety and security
by imposing religious order on the universe. The words spirituality or spiri-
tual do not appear anywhere in this chapter or handbook; neither were these
words used in the companion volume, Handbook of Aging and the Individual
(Birren 1959). These books accurately reflected the state of the literature of
that era. Thus, as a beginning student of gerontology, I had no opportunity to
include the concept of spirituality in my studies.
Fortunately, for my dissertation I did face-to-face interviews with more
than a hundred older women on the impact of retirement on the self concepts
of female teachers and telephone operators. I observed the results of spiritual
development in these women. Most of them were lively people who had a
clear understanding of themselves and of what was meaningful to them about
their lifestyles, well-honed personal value systems built from life experience,
and a quiet, strong connection to the sacred within themselves. Many of them
  spirit ualit y and aging

used their spiritual worldview and spiritual presence as the basic organiz-
ing force in their lifestyles, family lives, and service work in the community.
Unfortunately, it took me about fifteen years to gain the vocabulary needed
to fully describe what I was observing in these women because gerontology,
like most of America, was not paying attention at that time to spirituality as
an inner experience or connection to the sacred or to its potential motivating
power.
Earlier, I discussed Robert Wuthnow’s (1998) argument that since the 1950s
spirituality in America shifted from a religion-centered “spirituality of dwell-
ing” toward a person-centered “spirituality of seeking” and later toward a
“spirituality of practice.” A spirituality of dwelling emphasizes unchanging rit-
ual and organizational structure. Comfort, security, and answers come from
predictability. By contrast, a spirituality of seeking emphasizes journeying
and negotiation. On a journey we never know exactly what we will confront,
but we must remain aware of our needs and pay attention to opportunities in
order to meet our changing circumstances. On the spiritual journey, we never
have perfect maps, so we need an enduring set of questions that will allow us
to discover the ground of being in that time and place.
Wuthnow (1998) argues that most people live a life that balances dwelling
and seeking; they like the security of dwelling and they like the openness of
seeking. Wuthnow also sees an emerging practice-oriented spirituality that
emphasizes an ongoing, constant commitment to doing the hard work of nur-
turing spirituality. Thus, we become what we do, and returning to spiritual
practice over and over again creates habits of mind and habits of being that in
time seem natural. But because spiritual practices are most often part of an
open spiritual context, these habits become enlivening instead of stifling.
If all we did was to look at these three types of spirituality and how they
play out in the lives of individuals over time and in various birth cohorts as
they experience aging, we would have a much more complex, interesting, and
authentic view of spirituality and aging than is currently available in gerontol-
ogy. We would have a view that more accurately matches the complexity and
importance of spirituality in the lives of most aging people.

major points

This book has covered a wide variety of subjects. It represents my attempt to

tie together various ideas in the vast field of spirituality and aging. If nothing
else, it is an example of how the jumble of concepts and empirical evidence
 conclusion 

in the field can be put together into a meaningful mosaic. I hope this effort
will serve as a starting point for those who wish to do research, teaching, and
service in this field.
Much of the argument is based philosophically in an open-systems view
of spirituality—what it is, how it kindles itself within human beings, how
people develop their capacity for spiritual experience, how various aspects
of the phenomenal world stimulate a human concern with the spiritual, how
spirituality influences the development of identity and self, and how years of
spiritual journeying affect an individual’s ways of being in the social world—
especially through lifestyles and compassionate service to others. Millions of
aging people in America, perhaps a billion or more throughout the world, are
aiming to live a more integrated spiritual life, one in which spirituality does
not have to be reserved for one or two relatively marginal compartments of
life but can flourish as a centerpiece of values and behavior.
While most of the literature views spirituality as a positive force in hu-
man life despite its difficulties and frustrations, there is a danger in an overly
individualistic approach. Most people recognize the difficulty of accurately
interpreting their spiritual insights and the important role that discussion and
feedback can play in honing the individual’s capacity for expression and dis-
cernment. In a community of spiritual peers who are each presumed to have
some capacity for wisdom, it is much more difficult for spiritual insights to
be converted into ego agendas. Thus, spiritual community is not only about
belonging but also about support, checks and balances, and feedback along
the spiritual journey.
Spirituality is an abstract, sensitizing concept that refers to a region of hu-
man experience involving awareness of being and transcending a purely per-
sonal, self-centered viewpoint. Spirituality is a subjective, existential region of
experience. Spiritual experience begins with basic spirituality, an unadorned
sense of being. To this is added a sense of “I” as perceiver and actor, having
the capacity to experience spiritual qualities through various human avenues
of experience. Spiritual experiences have identifiable qualities, such as clarity
and discernment, awakening of compassion, wonder and awe, intangibility,
ineffability, and they can occur through a variety of avenues: physical, sensory,
consciousness/awareness, thought, intuition, transcendence. Spiritual expe-
riences may or may not be consciously associated with or conceptually linked
to the sacred or a higher power.
Spiritual experiences are related to many other aspects of spirituality, such
as spiritual growth, spiritual capacity, spiritual identity and self, spiritual
  spirit ualit y and aging

history, spiritual concepts and language, spiritual practice, spiritual break-

through, spiritual process, and spiritual community.
Spirituality is a human capacity, which all people probably have to some
extent. Developing this capacity is mysterious in that not everyone perceives
or accepts the invitation to spiritual consciousness. Yet by later life, a large
majority of people are in touch with and value their inner life and can identify
elements of their lives that they perceive to be spiritual. This has been found
in numerous studies, beginning with Clark and Anderson’s (1967) wonderful
ethnography of aging in middle America.
Since the 1950s, the concept of spirituality as a focus of human growth and
development has grown substantially in importance. Meaning is increasingly
found more through an “inside-out” process of spiritual journeying, alone or
in groups, and less in an “outside-in” process of learning and conforming to
a religious culture. Nevertheless, most people continue to use religious ideas
as resources for their spiritual journeying. In a spiritually oriented religios-
ity, however, the authority is heavily vested in an inner existential process of
“authenticity” and less in the authority of religious doctrines or functionar-
ies. Even those who participate in a “charismatic” religious process expect
the charismatic leader to kindle authentic experiences within them, to kindle
their spirituality (Roof 1999).
The growing importance of spirituality is reflected by a rapidly expanding
literature concerning the nature of spirituality, spiritual growth, and spiritu-
ally centered lifestyles. Workshops and retreat opportunities abound, and a
large proportion of the population between ages 45 and 65 is involved in small
groups within which they explore their spirituality and nurture their spiritual
journeys. Even within established religious denominations, such small groups
have become a vital way in which people integrate spirituality into their lives.
Most people believe that they are responsible for their own spiritual experi-
ence and journey. Yet this popular heightening of interest in spirituality has
not spread to gerontology.
Spirituality intersects with aging because spirituality increases in impor-
tance as people age. This has been found in several longitudinal panel studies
that followed the same individuals over time (Atchley 1999; Clark and Ander-
son 1967; Fiske and Chiriboga 1990; Roof 1999). Years of experience on a spiri-
tual journey usually improves a person’s capacity to experience the spiritual
qualities of a large array of experiences, so the spiritual consciousness of indi-
viduals has a tendency to expand as they age. This occurs even in people who
are not aware of being on a spiritual journey. Spirituality is a major resource
 conclusion 

for most people in coping with changes that occur as a result of aging, includ-
ing “negative” changes, such as widowhood and disability, but also “positive”
changes, such as retirement and grandparenthood (Atchley 2006). Spiritual
experiences heavily influence values, especially the fine tuning of long-stand-
ing values, and this influence increases with age. Spirituality infuses the lives
of a large proportion of older people, so spirituality is not a peripheral topic
for gerontology—it is a vital context for understanding aging. Spirituality thus
deserves to be a major topic in its own right within gerontology. As the baby
boomers age, spirituality will be increasingly important in understanding the
priorities and aspirations of aging people (Roof 1999). The goal of this book is
to provide a systematic treatment of spirituality as a subject in its own right
and to expand the view of spirituality within gerontology to begin to match
the richness and complexity that it has in the everyday worlds of most middle-
aged and older people.

implications for inquiry: avoid reinventing

the wheel

To avoid reinventing the wheel, we need to educate ourselves deeply about

what has come before us. Although it is true that gerontology has not done
much with questions about spirituality and aging, this does not mean that
nothing exists in the historical record. I will illustrate the value of this by re-
ferring to several books that offer great potential riches to those who would
study spirituality, including spirituality and aging.

William James

In 1901 and 1902, William James, Harvard professor and founding figure in
American psychology, gave a series of twenty lectures that were later pub-
lished under the title The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human
Nature. In that era, spirituality as a term to describe direct subjective experi-
ence of the sacred was not in the vocabulary of psychology, but it is clear from
the text that James was interested in spirituality, and he expressly says that he
is not dealing with religious organization, doctrine, or practice. He defined
“personal religion” as “the feelings, acts, and experiences of individual[s] in
their solitude, so far as they apprehend themselves to stand in relation to
whatever they consider the divine” (James 1905 [2005], 37). He then proceeded
to probe the psychological aspects of many spiritual topics still current today:
  spirit ualit y and aging

the unseen reality of the spiritual, spirituality and health, spirituality and the
self, conversion experiences, mysticism, and many others.
James achieved a remarkable clarity of conceptual and existential under-
standing of his subject, and I have learned a lot from him. For example, James
felt that spirituality has its roots in mystical states of consciousness, which he
defined as having four characteristics: ineffability (it can’t be transferred or
imparted to others); noetic quality (mystical states involve knowing as well as
feeling); transiency (mystical states cannot be sustained long but the memory
of them gives us a sense of depth and richness), and passivity (mystical states
cannot be “produced”—we must be prepared to wait for them to appear).
Mystical states lead us to understanding: “Our normal waking consciousness,
rational consciousness as we call it, is but one special type of consciousness,
whilst all about it, parted from it by the filmiest of screens, there lie potential
forms of consciousness entirely different. We may go through life without sus-
pecting their existence, but apply the requisite stimulus, and at a touch they
are there in all their completeness” (ibid., 383). James makes excellent use of
his own introspection and a variety of case materials and illustrates well the
value of a multimethod approach.

Aldous Huxley

Aldous Huxley was a well-known novelist and highly regarded intellectual

who became interested in spirituality in the 1930s and published The Peren-
nial Philosophy in 1944. The book is a beautifully written and well-integrated
anthology of wisdom about an underlying philosophy that can be used to
understand the subjective nature of spirituality and how it plays out in various
aspects of life. The enormous variety of topics covered include the relation
of individual consciousness to the ground of being, the nature of the ground
of being, self-knowledge, compassion, truth, grace and free will, good and
evil, time and eternity, salvation and enlightenment, silence, prayer, suffering,
faith, and spiritual practice. One of the major strengths of the book is that
for each issue, the reader is exposed to the words used by numerous people,
from a variety of religious and cultural backgrounds, whose writings have
stood the test of time. The reader thus comes to a triangulated understanding
of the concept at issue, an understanding that is close to what researchers call
“construct validity.” Huxley offers three important words of advice to those
who wish to know about spirituality: detachment, charity, and humility. He
 conclusion 

is a strong advocate for the position that to study spirituality adequately, the
investigator has to be willing to try contemplative methods.

Ken Wilber

Ken Wilber provides a useful perspective on the epistemology of spiritual-

ity, that is, how we come to know about this region of human experience. In
his book Eye to Eye (2001), Wilber discusses three “eyes” (methods) through
which we “see” (know). The first is the eye of our senses and technological
extensions of our senses, whereby we come to know about the external world
of space, time, and objects. The second is the eye of reason, through which we
come to know philosophy, logic, and the mind itself. The third is the eye of
contemplation, through which we come to know transcendent realities.
The process of knowing in each of these three realms has a similar struc-
ture: procedure, illumination, and confirmation. “If you do ——, then you may
come to understand ——, which needs to be confirmed by ——.” The proce-
dure, the form of illumination, and the nature of confirmation is different in
each of the three “eyes.” Procedure is empirical in the eye of the senses, logical
in the eye of reason, and meditative in the eye of contemplation. Illumina-
tion takes the form of generalization in the eye of the senses, induction in
the eye of reason, and intuition in the eye of contemplation. Intersubjective
agreement among peers is the root of confirmation for all three major ways of
knowing. The difference lies in who one’s peers are considered to be.
Wilber’s central point is that each way of knowing provides valuable
knowledge and that no one way of knowing can cover all subjects. Thus, to
study spirituality we need sensory knowing to understand sensory spiritual
experiences, intellectual knowing to see relationships among different aspects
of spirituality, and contemplative knowing to understand the nature of tran-
scendence. If gerontology is to understand spirituality, a substantial number
of researchers will need to spend time learning the methods and procedures
of contemplative knowing.
In the study of spirituality, there is currently a deep chasm between people
who emphasize empirical and logical knowing and those who emphasize con-
templative and intuitive knowing. The empiricists have little interest in, nor
do they attach much credibility to, contemplative or intuitive knowing, which
they see as “soft” and lacking in “precision.” People who emphasize contem-
plative or intuitive knowing dismiss empirical and logical knowing as “overly
  spirit ualit y and aging

mechanistic” and lacking in “heart.” Neither side in this unfortunate conflict

seems to see that they need each other. Wilber’s perspective creates a bridge
over this chasm, but the two sides have hardened positions that so far have
prevented them from seeing its benefit.

implications for inquiry: focus rese arch on

spiritualit y as its own topic

As a concept, research has so many possible meanings that most people can-
not keep them all in mind, so they tend to think of research as referring to the
types of research that predominate in their own fields. The following discus-
sion is tedious, but I think it is important to understand in some detail the ex-
tent to which the study of spirituality has been neglected in gerontology. Think
about the following types of research: experiments, surveys, field observation,
records review, literature review, historical research, interpretive analysis of
in-depth interviews or texts, and meta-analysis of multiple types of research.
Even this list is not exhaustive. Then think about the various types of survey
research: forced-choice, self-administered surveys (mail or distributed/col-
lected); interview surveys (forced choice, open-ended, forced choice with a
few open-ended); opinion surveys (mostly phone). Then think about survey
design: cross-sectional slice of the population or targeted subgroup of the
population, panel study of the same individuals over time, cohort sequential
study of the same cohort over time (but not necessarily the same people), and
key informant surveys designed to harvest the knowledge of people highly
experienced in a given aspect of life. There is no one of these ways of doing re-
search that does not have application in the study of spirituality and aging, yet
by far the dominant form of research is forced-choice survey, either by mail
or phone, and most of the time only a few items on spirituality are included in
a much larger array of items. Sometimes the survey will be followed up with
in-depth interviews of a few dozen respondents to the larger survey.
This emphasis on surveys is illustrated by an ambitious research project
sponsored by the Fetzer Institute and the National Institute on Aging that
resulted in a report entitled Multidimensional Measurement of Religiousness/
Spirituality for Use in Health Research (Fetzer Institute 2003). Note that the
focus was on religiousness/spirituality, as if these topics were so intertwined
as to be inseparable. The project looked at questionnaire items from previous
research on a wide variety of topics: daily spiritual experiences, meaning, val-
ues, beliefs, forgiveness, private religious practices, religious/spiritual coping,
 conclusion 

religious support, religious/spiritual history, commitment, organizational

religiousness, and religious preference. No conceptual or theoretical back-
ground or framework was presented that would help researchers approach
the issue of assessment from a deep understanding of the complex nature of
the phenomena being measured.
For example, the “Daily Spiritual Experiences” category [emphasis added]
includes items that are clearly based in a particular religious view—“I feel
God’s presence,” “During worship, or at other times when connecting with
God, I feel joy which lifts me out of my daily concerns,” “I ask for God’s help
in the midst of daily activities,” “I feel guided by God in the midst of daily
activities,” “I feel God’s love for me directly,” “I feel God’s love for me, through
others,” “I desire to be closer to God or in union with Him,” and “How close
do you feel to God?” From many Jewish/Christian religious perspectives, this
language might be an effective way of asking about the connection between
religious theology and spiritual experience. But what about the 40 percent
of respondents who are “unchurched” (Lindsay 2000)? What would be their
response? Other items provided ambiguous answers about spirituality: “I find
strength in my religion or spirituality” and “I find comfort in my religion or
spirituality.” If someone says “every day” to these questions, is their response
about religion or about spirituality? There is no way to tell. Similar conceptual
problems exist in all the areas covered by the report.
Based on the conceptual/theoretical framework provided in Chapter 2 of
this volume, some items from the Fetzer report seem to qualify as assess-
ments of spirituality: “I experience a connection to all of life,” “I feel deep
inner peace or harmony,” “I am spiritually touched by the beauty of [nature]”
(The actual word was creation, a religiously loaded word), and “I feel a selfless
caring for others.” So it does seem possible to ask sensible, inclusive questions
about spiritual experience. Note that to make this determination, to have
this discernment, I used criteria from my conceptual/theoretical framework
about spirituality.
To increase the chances that questions on religion and spirituality might
be included in large-scale surveys, the Fetzer/NIA working group developed
a 38-item “Brief Multidimensional Measure of Religiousness/Spirituality.” Of
these items, 28 clearly dealt with religion, 6 were clearly about spirituality,
and 4 were ambiguous. Many of the religion questions were cast in Jewish/
Christian language.
The Fetzer report no doubt was done by people who worked hard and
took their jobs seriously. The report’s flaws reflect accurately the widespread
  spirit ualit y and aging

oversimplification of and confusion about spirituality that is imbedded in

gerontology—and most other social sciences, for that matter. The Fetzer re-
port illustrates the “state of the art” concerning measurement or assessment
of individual spirituality. I do not mean to be any more critical of the Fetzer/
NIA working group than I would be of the groups that created all of the other
existing measures that indiscriminately mix religion and spirituality and thus
continue to confuse the issue.
To invite more conversation on this issue by survey researchers, I offer my
Spirituality Inventory in Appendix A. Its 85 items have been written with an
eye not only for content but also for wording that is inclusive. These items
have been pretested on a small sample of older adults and generally can be
answered by most respondents, but much study and refinement remains to be
done to identify the psychometric properties of the inventory.
For qualitative researchers, Appendix B consists of my open-ended Ques-
tions for Reflection and Spiritual Self-Assessment, which can be adapted for
use as an interview guide. In keeping with my theoretical framework, these
questions are designed to provide feedback to individuals about their spiritual
journey. Chapter 6 discussed the possible uses of these questions by practitio-
ners who wish to do spiritual assessment.
Much of the literature on spirituality is based on variants of a single ques-
tion: “To what extent do you consider yourself a spiritual person?” While an-
swers to this question are certainly of interest, they leave many more questions
begging to be asked. It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that gerontology as
a field does not really want to know much about spirituality and does not
consider it very important, yet spirituality shows up in the top tier of personal
values of a large majority of elders.
To advance our understanding of spirituality and aging, we do not need
more research projects; we need more research programs. Research projects
are designed to study limited topics carefully and serve knowledge building
in an incremental way. Research programs can study a subject with many co-
ordinated research projects, which can employ a variety of perspectives and
methods. The expanded view of spirituality and aging in this book cries out
for research programs.

implications for gerontology education

If we want to include spirituality in research and practice in gerontology we

have to begin to teach in depth about spirituality and aging. As it stands now,
 conclusion 

introductory students rarely get more than a few minutes’ discussion of spiri-
tuality, if that. Religion and spirituality are often lumped together, with reli-
gion getting the bulk of the attention. Few people specialize in the study of
spirituality, and most gerontology professors are probably intimidated by the
prospect of teaching about something they do not have in-depth knowledge
of. I hope that this book will help them be more comfortable teaching about
spirituality as a subject in its own right.
Spirituality should be included in any gerontology education program that
aspires to teach a holistic perspective. For today’s students, the compartmen-
talized separation of courses may be outdated. What may be more effective
is to begin with research and practice topics and show how holistic and mul-
tidisciplinary perspectives can lead to more effective research and practice.
Thus, we could consider spirituality as an important factor relevant to lifestyle
choices, adaptation to life events, intergenerational relationships, and so on. If
we were to look, we might find this to be true. The limited evidence we have
suggests that it is.
The implications of the entry of the baby boomers into the older popula-
tion are high on many lists of considerations concerning program planning.
In Roof ’s (1999) large panel study of boomers, most respondents felt that spir-
ituality—an inner path or journey—was a central concern, whether the jour-
ney took place in a religious context or not. Seventy-three percent of Roof ’s
respondents said they were significantly spiritual. They felt that they were
responsible for coming to their own understanding of issues about mean-
ing and faith. Religion was judged on the basis of what it could contribute to
that understanding. Most felt quite free to mix and match ideas and practices
from a variety of spiritual and religious traditions to form their own unique
approach to spirituality. Most were also involved in small groups of fellow
seekers who supported and nurtured one another’s spiritual journey. Given
that the upcoming older population is using open-systems approaches to
spirituality, and religious authority is less crucial, understanding spirituality
will become even more important for gerontology.
An open-systems approach presumes that the system is evolving based
on experience with using it. Thus, the system for dealing with the spiritual
journey and openness about precisely where the journey will lead can be ex-
pected to supplant former views of spirituality oriented around conformity
and security. Systems seldom remain in equilibrium long enough to identify
what one would conform to. Instead, a premium is placed on being able to
respond effectively to whatever happens. Part of today’s spiritual journeys
  spirit ualit y and aging

requires having faith in the system’s direction of movement rather than in a

specific outcome. This fits right in with a practice of dwelling in the questions
rather than fixating on today’s answers. To deal with tomorrow’s spirituality,
students and their teachers will do well to try theories built around open-
feedback systems. At several points in the book, I have used examples from
continuity theory, which is an example of an open-feedback-systems theory.
An open-feedback-systems approach to spirituality has two important ad-
vantages: flexibility and less potential for divisiveness. Because the system is
in a constant state of feedback, it remains flexible. Because an open-systems
approach to spirituality is rooted in individually created personal constructs,
people can see their viewpoint in the system, and there is less incentive to try
to annihilate other viewpoints.
A major disadvantage to systems theory is that it does not offer specific,
stable solutions “once and for all.” Some people need a “once and for all” level
of certainty, and they are unlikely to be served by an open-feedback-systems
approach to spirituality. Another disadvantage is that such approaches do not
produce “The Seven Habits of Highly Spiritual People.” Systems approaches
advocate for systems approaches, not a particular system or recipe. You find
out if your system works for you by observing it in action.
Students will be more attracted to the study of spirituality and aging if
they are allowed to work on their own spiritual process at the same time. If
they are encouraged to engage the same questions the research participants
are responding to, the students have a greater potential to become better re-
searchers or practitioners. To the extent that students experience their own
spirituality, they may come to better appreciate the role spirituality plays for
elders. A nonreligious language of spirituality may help by allowing students
to discuss spirituality without being drawn into discussions of differences in
theology or religious doctrine.

spiritualit y and aging for pr ac titioners

For people who work directly with aging people a big question is, Who is
the client? Is it the stereotyped feeble older person who has no life and is
lonely? Or is it a vitally involved person on a spiritual journey despite the
inconveniences and losses that can come with age? Or is it another spiritual
being just like them but in a different human form? George Fox, a founder of
Quakerism, said we should go joyfully about the world, answering that of God
in everyone. Fox’s point was to respond to the basic spirituality of each person
 conclusion 

and not the personality or social background. At the level of basic spirituality,
what is there to get into conflict about or to object to? What would happen if
we learned to tune into the basic spirituality of the people being served? To
tune into the spirituality of those being served, would we need to tune into
our own? Would trying to tune into the basic spirituality of another person
help us tune into our own?
The expanded view of spirituality presented in this book provides a frame-
work for learning important things about many of the people we work with.
There are few things more important to many aging people than their inten-
tions for their own spiritual journey. But we cannot assume that we know
anything about those intentions or that we have even a basic outline of how
they see that journey. We have to wait for them to tell us in their own time and
in their own way. Some will tell us in words, others in body language, others
in the art they make, others through the music they sing. How does a person
reveal his or her basic spirituality? It can done in any of a hundred ways. To
see it, we must create a safe place, one in which aging persons can express
themselves.
Earlier I wrote that to study spirituality, researchers benefit from being
able to use their own spiritual capacities and perspectives. So it is with serv-
ing the spirituality of clients. How Can I Help? (Ram Dass and Gorman 1995)
is the best resource I have seen on how to help from a spiritually awakened
place. The authors begin with the notion that we all have an impulse to care
when faced with others in need. Whether we translate that impulse into ac-
tion depends on how we deal with barriers to the natural expression of caring.
Spiritually grounded caring comes from compassion, not pity.

Compassion and pity are very different. Whereas compassion reflects the
yearning of the heart to merge and take on some of the suffering, pity is
a controlled set of thoughts designed to assure separateness. Compassion
is the spontaneous response of love; pity, the involuntary reflex of fear.
(Ibid., 62)

Who are we to ourselves and to one another?—it will all come down to that.
Will we look within? Can we see that to be of most service to others we must
face our own doubts, needs, and resistances? (Ibid., 15)

To see situations clearly and dispassionately, we benefit from learning to see

things from nonpersonal consciousness, or witness consciousness, as Ram
Dass and Gorman label it.
  spirit ualit y and aging

Witnessing is dispassionate. It’s not committed to one result or another; it’s

open to everything. Because it has . . . no axe to grind, it is more able to see
truth. As the Tao Te Ching says, “The truth awaits for eyes unclouded by
longing.” The Witness, however, is not passive, complacent, or indifferent.
Indeed, while it’s not attached to a particular outcome, its presence turns
out to bring about change. As we bring what is into the light of clear aware-
ness, we begin to see that the universe is providing us with abundant clues
to the nature of the suffering before us, what is being asked, what fears have
been inhibiting us, and, finally, what might really help. All we have to do is
listen—really listen. (Ibid., 68–69)

Thus, commitment to objectivity turns out to be a spiritual practice that is es-

sential to doing effective service.

Light from within, that’s our illumination.

To dwell in silent peace, that’s our meditation.
To see the passing world, with clearness and compassion.
And when we clearly see, we are drawn to be love and to serve.
Atchley (1996)

a challenge

Some may be drawn to the study of spirituality and aging for purely intel-
lectual or pragmatic reasons—well and good. I suspect more will be drawn
to this subject because it also has appeal to them from within themselves and
from their experiences of aging individuals. When I was interviewing older
people early in my career, I encountered many sages, people who seemed to
possess wisdom born of a life experience that had been reflected upon. They
had a vitality and presence that I admired. “I want to be like that when I’m
old,” I thought. Today, I am like that. This did not happen by accident. I kept
their example as a guide for the direction I wanted to take, and in my own
way and with my own system I have learned much of what I needed to learn
and developed the habits I needed to develop. I also had to persist through
times of confusion and doubt. Along the way I benefited greatly from persis-
tent study, many excellent teachers, earnest practice, and several supportive
spiritual communities.
I can attest to the value of being on an intentional spiritual journey whose
purpose is to find within oneself the nonpersonal consciousness needed to
approach objectivity. I can also attest that this “road less traveled” is not an
 conclusion 

easy one. There is much prejudice against “the spiritual” within the scientific
and academic communities. The inner journey itself is filled with paradoxes.
But this inner journey, which thrives on ideas tested by experience, can be-
come a process worthy of faith.
My challenge to you is to engage the possibilities of spirituality and aging.
I am not suggesting that you believe anything I have said. I am challenging
you try these ideas out, to use the framework given here and see what hap-
pens. Contribute your feedback. Revise and improve. Junk this framework
and make a better one of your own. But please do not abandon the important
subject of spirituality and aging.
This page intentionally left blank
 appendix a

Spirituality Inventory

Please place a check mark by the word(s) that best describes your response to
the statement or question.

1. The word spiritual has meaning for me.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

2. Do you consider yourself spiritual?

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

3. Do you consider yourself spiritual?

____ Always

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never
  appendix a

4. I am a person who has spiritual experiences.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

5. My spiritual experiences include direct experiences of a higher power.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

6. I am on a spiritual journey.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

If you are on a spiritual journey, how long have you been on it? ____ Years

What age were you when your journey began? ____ Years

7. My spiritual journey has been marked by ups and downs.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

 spirit ualit y in ventory 

8. To what extent do you consider yourself a spiritual person?

____ Very spiritual

____ Moderately spiritual

____ Slightly spiritual

____ Slightly nonspiritual

____ Moderately nonspiritual

____ Very nonspiritual

9. To what extent do you consider yourself a religious person?

____ Very religious

____ Moderately religious

____ Slightly religious

____ Slightly nonreligious

____ Moderately nonreligious

____ Very nonreligious

10. I participate in an organized spiritual community.

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

11. I organize my life around participation in my spiritual community.

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never
  appendix a

12. I can count on my spiritual community for help.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

13. I can count on my spiritual community for guidance.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

14. On average, how many hours a week do you spend doing unpaid
work for your spiritual community? ____ Hours

15. I can count on my spiritual community for care.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

16. I sometimes find my spiritual community too critical.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

 spirit ualit y in ventory 

17. I sometimes find my spiritual community too demanding.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

18. I have a philosophy of life that helps me understand my spiritual

experiences.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

19. I am a spiritual being having a human journey.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

20. Spirituality is an important part of who I am.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

  appendix a

21. I try to bring my spiritual perspective into my [check all that apply]:

____ lifestyle

____ family life

____ work

____ community participation

____ religious participation

22. An important part of the meaning of life for me comes from my

spiritual experiences.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

23. My spiritual perspective serves me well in most of my life.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

24. I have confidence and trust in my way of understanding and acting

on my spiritual experiences.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

 spirit ualit y in ventory 

25. I have confidence and trust in my way of understanding and acting on

my spiritual experiences.

____ Always

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

26. I have had spiritual experiences that changed my life.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

If so, about how many times? ____ Events

27. My spirituality helps me deal with stressful situations.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

28. There is a part of me that seems eternal.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

  appendix a

29. To nurture my spiritual life, I [check all that apply]:

____ pray

____ meditate

____ read articles and books about spiritual topics

____ listen to audio or watch video presentations about spiritual topics

____ contemplate spiritual issues

____ engage in “good works”

____ participate in movement disciplines such as yoga or labyrinth

walking

____ participate in spiritual discussions

____ participate in spiritual workshops or retreats

____ engage in private spiritual devotions

____ attend religious services

In all, I devote about ____ hours a week to these activities.

30. I participate in spiritually oriented small groups.

____ Yes, often

____ Yes, occasionally

____ No

31. I read and ponder articles and books about spiritual topics.

____ Many times each day

____ Every day

____ Most days

____ Some days

____ Seldom

____ Never
 spirit ualit y in ventory 

32. I read spiritually stimulating texts.

____ Many times each day

____ Every day

____ Most days

____ Some days

____ Seldom

____ Never

33. I pray alone.

____ Many times each day

____ Every day

____ Most days

____ Some days

____ Seldom

____ Never

34. I meditate.

____ Many times each day

____ Every day

____ Most days

____ Some days

____ Seldom

____ Never
  appendix a

35. I feel motivated to help reduce pain and suffering in the world.

____ Always

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

36. I feel motivated to help reduce pain and suffering in the world.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

37. I am spiritually touched by nature’s wonders.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

38. I feel deep inner peace and stillness.

____ Always

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never
 spirit ualit y in ventory 

39. My spiritual life brings me strength.

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

40. My spiritual life brings me comfort.

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

41. My spiritual life brings me uncertainty.

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

42. My spiritual life brings me confusion.

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never
  appendix a

43. I feel a sacred presence.

____ Always

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

44. I experience a connection with all of life.

____ Always

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

45. My spiritual worldview gives meaning to life’s ups and downs.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

46. Without a sense of spirituality, my daily life would have less meaning.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

 spirit ualit y in ventory 

47. When I feel disconnected from my spirituality, my sense of purpose

is less clear.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

48. I feel that I am part of something much greater than my personal self.

____ Always

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

49. What I choose to do in my daily life is important to me spiritually.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

50. My spirituality helps me deal with troubling or confusing events.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

  appendix a

51. My experience of spirituality adds meaning to my everyday life.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

52. For me, forgiving myself and others is an important spiritual practice.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

53. Commitment to spiritual concerns is one of my most important

personal values.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

54. I am strongly committed to my spiritual journey.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

 spirit ualit y in ventory 

55. Paying attention to my spiritual journey is important to me.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

56. Nurturing my spiritual journey is important to me.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

57. I am confident concerning what I believe about spirituality.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

58. Spirituality is a quality that can be part of any life experience.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

  appendix a

59. Spirituality is a different type of experience, easily distinguished from

other types of experience.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

60. For me, spiritual experiences occur through my [check all that apply]:

____ senses

____ bodily sensations

____ emotions

____ thoughts

____ awareness

____ transcendence

61. Over the years, my capacity to experience spirituality has grown.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

62. I experience a presence of the supreme being.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

 spirit ualit y in ventory 

63. My capacity for spiritual experience has become more effective over
the years.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

64. Spirituality is an important part of my life story.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

65. I have confidence in my ways of experiencing spirituality.

____ Always

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

66. I have confidence in my ways of acting on my spiritual insights.

____ Always

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never
  appendix a

67. I have doubts about my ways of dealing with my spirituality.

____ Always

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

68. My spiritual process is open to new types of experience.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

69. My spiritual life causes me suffering.

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

70. For me, there could be no spirituality without my religion.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

 spirit ualit y in ventory 

71. Spirituality and religion are the same thing to me.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

72. My spirituality rests firmly in religious ideas and practices.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

73. My religious community is my main spiritual community.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

74. Religious rituals are an important type of spiritual experience for me.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

  appendix a

75. My spirituality brings me joy and appreciation.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

76. My spirituality brings me joy and appreciation.

____ Always

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

77. My spiritual experiences have had a strong influence on what I

believe.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

78. My spirituality has a strong influence on my relationships with

others.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

 spirit ualit y in ventory 

79. My spirituality has a strong influence on my relationships with

others.

____ Always

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

80. When I pay attention to spirituality, life seems to go better for me.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

81. When I pay attention to spirituality, life seems to go better for me.

____ Always

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

82. I feel alienated from my spirituality.

____ Always

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never
  appendix a

83. My spirituality conflicts with my personal desires and fears.

____ Always

____ Often

____ Sometimes

____ Seldom

____ Never

84. My spiritual perspective helps me see my world more clearly.

____ Strongly agree

____ Agree

____ Disagree

____ Strongly disagree

85. I participate in more than one spiritual community.

____ Yes How many in all? ____

____ No
 appendix b

Questions for Reflection and

Spiritual Self-Assessment

I beg you . . . to have patience with everything unresolved

in your heart and try to love the questions themselves as
if they were locked rooms or books written in a very for-
eign language. Don’t search for the answers, which could
not be given to you now, because you would not be able
to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the
questions now. Perhaps then someday far in the future
you will gradually, without ever noticing it, live your way
into the answer. —Rainer Maria Rilke

The questions that follow are not a test. Instead, they are invitations to self-
reflection. Whether one has a clear answer, a murky answer, or no answer is
as it is. The questions are couched in the first person to indicate that they are
posed to the reader, and the answers that matter most are answers coming
from the reader’s own experience. Most of the questions are enduring ques-
tions, and responses to them probably evolve over time. Don’t be discour-
aged if answers don’t appear immediately. Return often to the questions, with
openness and honesty, and see what happens. It may also be helpful to explore
questions of particular interest with a group of spiritual friends that meets
periodically for this purpose.

What is my spiritual nature?

What is my essential nature? Is there an eternal part of me? What is my source?
Where does my consciousness/awareness come from? If there is “that of God”
or “the Absolute” in me, how do I experience this aspect?

What is spirituality? Is there a part of my experience that I would label “spiri-
tual?” What qualifies an experience to be called “spiritual”? Is spirituality a ca-
pacity for a certain type of experience? How do spiritual experiences interact
  appendix b

with other experiences I have? Is spiritual experience something separate or is

it a quality that can accompany all experiences? or can it be both?

Is there a part of me that is especially sensitive to spiritual experiences? Can
the mind have a spiritual experience? the body? How are emotions related to
spiritual experience? Is there something in me beyond body and mind?

Do I have a spiritual center? If so, is it in the body, in consciousness, in the
mind, in all three, or beyond all of these, or all of the above? Is there more to
the mind than thought? Are emotions manifested through the body?

Is spirituality a quality of being that underlies all other experience? (Compare
a computer program that runs in the background.) If so, how do I know about
this aspect of spirituality? If spirituality is a quality of being, are there different
grades or shades or levels of it?

How do I know these things?

What does it mean to grow spiritually?

Do I aspire to grow spiritually? If so, what supports this aspiration? What
interferes? Does growing spiritually occur in stages or cycles, is it continuous,
or both?

Does the capacity for spiritual experience evolve? If so, what stimulates this
evolution? What are “spiritual practices,” and how do they relate to spiritual
capacities and experiences? Is there a difference between awakening and en-
lightenment? Is there an end point to spiritual evolution? If so, what is it?

What happens when I die? Who dies? Is death a spiritual transition? If so, a
transition from what to what?

How does my “story”—my version of my biography or personal history—re-
late to growing spiritually? How does my personality affect spirituality? How
do social biography and social relationships affect spirituality? Who is the
doer?

 spirit ual reflec tion and self-a sse ssment 

Is God involved in my spiritual evolution?*

Do I have direct experiences of something I call God? If so, how does God ap-
pear to me? What is God’s nature? Does God act? If so, how? Does God have
will? Is God’s will involved in my spiritual evolution? What is will?

Do I have confidence and trust in my spiritual process?

Does my experience lead me to confidence and trust in my ways of seeing my
spiritual nature and that of my world and acting on the perceptions rooted in
these ways of seeing? How do I deal with experiences that cast doubt on these
ways of seeing spiritually? Does my process allow me to incorporate new ex-
periences into my ways of seeing? Is my spirituality a resource for coping with
suffering? Does my spiritual process lead to joy and appreciation?

How does my spirituality manifest itself in the world?

How do spirituality and growing spiritually relate to organized religion, reli-
gious culture, or religious behavior? Are my spirituality and religion synony-
mous, separate, or somewhere in between? Does spiritual experience relate to
sacred texts, religious doctrines, or religious rituals? If so, how?

How does spirituality influence what I believe? How does spirituality influ-
ence my choices of goals and the priorities I set among these goals? How does
spirituality influence my behavior? Does spirituality influence my preferences
concerning activities, lifestyles, and human relationships? How can I manifest
my spirituality in my work? in my community? in my lifestyle?

Is there a spiritual aspect of relationships? Can a couple grow spiritually?

Can spirituality manifest in groups? Can a group grow spiritually?
Can spirituality affect culture? Can culture affect spirituality? If so, how?

* God is a word used to refer to many concepts of the supreme being. Some concepts picture
God as a person-like being who thinks, has motives, goals, and aims, has a voice, and speaks to
lesser beings. Other concepts view God as a great oneness, a being that includes all time and
space and matter and antimatter and good and evil, a being that our dualistic minds cannot
understand but that we can know through intuition. Still other concepts see God as most clearly
visible in the natural world. For my spiritual evolution, is it necessary to reconcile differing views
of God or is it necessary for me only to become clear about my experiences of God (possibly in-
cluding the experience that God does not exist) and what these experiences imply for my spiritual
evolution?
  appendix b

Do I envision a life undivided from my spiritual being?

What separates or divides me from my sense of spiritual being? Does it have
to be this way? What could I do to remain rooted in my being as I go through
all the doing that is needed in life? Does my spiritual being give me a vantage
point from which to discern clearly?

Can my ego and my spiritual being co-exist? If so, how?
 Notes

preface

1. Participants in the Omega Institute think tank met for a week at the Omega
campus in Rhinebeck, New York. Participants included Ram Dass, Zalman
Schachter-Shalomi, Carter Williams, Thomas Cole, Robert Atchley, H. R. Moody,
Eve Ilsen, Drew Leder, Carole Segrave, Connie Goldman, and several Omega pro-
gram planning staff persons. The goal of the think tank was to explore what types
of educational program might be good next steps. As a result of this experience,
I developed a weeklong workshop, “Spiritual Growth in Middle and Later Life,”
which I offered with cofacilitators Sheila Atchley and H. R. Moody in the summer
of 1996. Planning and offering this workshop gave me important insights into how
best to discuss this material.

introduc tion: setting the stage

1. For a listing of more-detailed questions subsumed under these general cat-

egories, see Appendix B.
2. Martin Heidegger (1966) used the term region to refer to a place we go in
awareness when we leave the world of discursive, calculative thinking. A region is
“the trackless and radiant core of Being.” Thus, the spiritual region is more than a
mere area; it is suffused by what Heidegger called “holy openness.”
3. Lindsay (2000) found that the proportion of adults who reported being “un-
churched” hovered between 40 and 45 percent over the period from 1978 to 1998,
which suggests long-term stability in this factor.
4. For a discussion of the processes through which this occurred, see Robert
Wuthnow (1998), chap. 2.
5. The Bhagavad Gita, which was written down several thousand years ago in
India, is probably the earliest statement of this principle. For an excellent transla-
tion of this work, see Prabhavananda and Isherwood (1944). This idea is present in
variants of the major faith traditions. It can be traced through the European litera-
ture on mysticism from the Middle Ages.
6. Abraham Maslow’s Toward a Psychology of Being (1968) was probably the
most influential statement of this point of view.
  n ote s to pa ge s  –  

7. This is not to imply that members of the clergy cannot inspire direct, inde-
pendent, and authentic spiritual experience. Many certainly do. In fact, some of
the richest discussions of how to connect directly with the sacred can be found in
published sermons. Meister Eckhart is a prime example. However, when religious
culture teaches that spiritual connection requires mediation by the clergy, then I
think damage can be done to the human spirit. For example, Valerie grew up Catho-
lic, and when she was about 9 she started asking Jesus to talk to her, and she was
somewhat surprised when He actually did. She heard a voice that was not her own.
When she told her Catholic school teachers about this experience, the response
was, “You can’t possibly have talked with Jesus. He has lots more important things
to do than to talk to the likes of you. That’s what priests are for.”
8. For a discussion of Blumer’s perspective, see Turner (1991, 403).
9. The American Heritage Dictionary (2006) defines rumination as “the act of
pondering; meditation.” This is a perfect definition for my purposes; it is just what
I intend. Unfortunately, the Diagnostic Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV) lists
rumination as an eating disorder. What’s a writer to do? I decided I should not avoid
ordinary language because some profession or academic specialty has developed
a technical meaning for these same words that conflict or sometimes contradict
dictionary definitions.
10. I believe both Huxley and Tillich developed this concept of ground following
the influence of Martin Heidegger and Meister Eckhart. Eckhart’s idea was that we
needed a larger concept of a transcendent God, one that stood as the ground for
the manifest God, with the manifest God as figure and the transcendent God as
ground.

1. the nature of spiritual experience

1. I use the term ground of being to refer to that which is the supreme context
for all other being. Others use God, Allah, Yahweh, the Absolute, and a host of
other terms. Some concepts picture the supreme being as a personlike being who
thinks, has motives, goals, and aims, has a voice, and speaks to lesser beings. Other
concepts see the supreme being as a great oneness, a being that includes all time
and space and matter and antimatter and good and evil, a being that our dualistic
human minds cannot understand but that we can know through intuitive experi-
ence. Still other concepts envision the supreme being as embodied in nature. To
study spirituality, it is not necessary to reconcile differing views about the nature or
existence of a supreme being; it is necessary only to understand how each individual
experiences and answers the question of the supreme being and how these experi-
ences relate to spiritual experiences. (For more on such concepts, see Zinnbauer et
al. 1997.)
2. Heidegger (1966) discussed a relationship between transcendent conscious-
ness and thought. He contrasted calculative thinking with contemplative thinking
by saying that the former is done by conventional consciousness whereas the latter
 n ot e s to pa ge s   –   

occurs in a higher level of consciousness, where it was possible to think in terms of

regions with fuzzy boundaries.

2. spiritual development

1. Although the book was co-authored by Moody and Carroll, Moody conducted
the research, the main theoretical ideas are Moody’s, and many of the personal ex-
amples in the book are from Moody’s personal experience.

3. spiritualit y, spiritual self, and spiritual identit y

1. For more on Mead, Cooley, and other aspects of these concepts, see Turner
(1991).
2. Carl Jung developed a complex and dynamic psychology that goes well be-
yond the scope of this chapter. Here I deal with only his notion of the “shadow
self.”
3. For more on the self system in later life, see Atchley (1999), chap. 2.

5. tr anspersonal sociology and serving from spirit

1. To the best of my knowledge, the term transpersonal sociology was first used
by Ken Wilber in A Sociable God (1983), which was mainly about religion. Wilber
used the term to indicate a new type of possibility for religions created by people
who had been transformed by transpersonal psychology. The term has been little
used since then, and almost never by sociologists. Nevertheless, I believe it is time
to offer a more fleshed-out statement of some principles we might expect to find
useful in looking at spirituality as it plays out in community.
2. The Quakers are an example of a spiritual culture following transpersonal
principles that has been successfully in operation for more than three hundred
years. In contemporary culture, many cohousing communities are also attempting
to live by principles of transpersonal sociology.
3. For examples of resource material taking a transpersonal sociological view of
organizational leadership, see Gilley (1997) and Dreher (1996).

6. continuit y, spiritual grow th, and coping in

l ater adulthood

1. The concept of integrity used by Erikson, Erikson, and Kivnick (1986) differed
considerably from the concept of ego integrity used by Erikson (1955) in his earlier
work. Ego integrity is a much more self-centered concept than the idea of integrity
as a holistic and positive integrating force balancing the negative forces of chaos and
despair.
  n ote s to pa ge s    –   

7. spiritual beliefs and pr ac tices and the experience of

time and aging

1. Habituation is a process of selectively ignoring sensory stimuli to reduce the

amount of material that has to be processed by perception. Habituation is a neces-
sary skill that allows infants to simplify sensory chaos to the point that it can be
organized into perceptions. Overhabituation oversimplifies information coming
from the environment to the point that nothing new seems to be happening. (See
Kastenbaum 1993.)

8. spiritualit y and the experience of dying and de ath

1. Unless otherwise noted, all examples are taken from my interviews and ob-
servations.
2. See Kastenbaum (2004) for a fascinating and thought-provoking discussion
of the many aspects of how dying and death are thought about in American culture.
Kastenbaum’s book is clear evidence that even our brightest minds are humbled by
the mystery that is death.

conclusion

1. Interestingly, within gerontology, anthropology seems to have preserved its

ties to the humanities to a much greater extent than have sociology or psychology.
This is probably connected to the predominant research methods in the respec-
tive fields, because anthropologists still tend to learn through intensive open-ended
interviews whereas other social scientists pursue knowledge mainly through large-
scale structured sample surveys, with their relatively rigid protocols and mathemat-
ically abstracted analyses.
2. On the one hand, the Fetzer/NIA effort could be praised for making an effort
to bring some precision to the study of religion, spirituality, and aging. On the other
hand, by starting with flawed questions from earlier research, failing to develop an
underlying theoretical/conceptual framework for discerning questions, and relying
too much on quantitative, mathematical methods of winnowing, the results were
fatally flawed. The results also indicate the difficulties of doing research in such
politically charged areas as spirituality and religion.
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 Index

afterlife, 133 tual experience and, 138; as spiritual

aging, 4–5, 9; author’s experience of, xii; journey, 135–137; as spiritual transi-
general results of, 109; and spiritual tion, 137–138. See also dying
development, 9, 113–115 dementia, 41–42
awareness, 8, 23 detachment, 68
development, spiritual, 2, 78, 114; aging
being, 6–9, 18–19, 73, 147 and, 30, 113–115; and community, 91;
Buddhism, 4, 94–96, 57–62, 137–138 concepts about, 29–42; and coping,
115; cycles of, 37–38; quilt metaphor
character, 50 of, 39–41; religion and, 30; social con-
Christianity, 4, 6, 13, 65, 138 text of, 43; stages of, 35–38; teaching
clearness, 19, 80, 96, 98 about, x; web metaphor of, 39–41; and
commitment, 5, 65–66 wisdom, 74–75
community, 27, 80–81, 96–98, 147; func- Dharma, Wheel of the, 95
tions of, 147; transpersonal, 93–94, dwelling, spirituality of, 3, 146;
96–98 dying: conscious, 136; as process, 140–
compassion, 19, 96, 157; and listening, 143; and quality of life, 140; as spiritual
114; manifesting, 101–103 journey, 135–137
connection, sacred, 2, 20
conscious aging, x, 187n1 education, 154–156
consciousness: transpersonal, 75; wit- Eightfold Path, 94–96
ness, 28, 157 elders, xvi, 73; role of, 34, 94
contemplation, 76 energy, spiritual, 27
continuity: as adaptive strategy, 110– Erikson, Erik H., 31–33, 34, 49, 85
112; aging and, 111–112; example of, experiences, spiritual, 1, 27, 147; aspects
91–93 of, 25–27; avenues of, 22–25; clergy
Continuity Theory: evidence concern- and, 188n7; diversity of, 16–18; ex-
ing, 110–111; and self, 49–51; spiritual amples of, 16–25; and identity, 54, 63;
development and, 53 levels of, 13; overviews of, 16; physical,
coping, 107, 115–116; capacity for, 109; 23; qualities present in, 13, 18–22; sen-
challenges to, 117–119; spirituality sory, 18, 23; and spiritual practices, 4;
and, 9 and values, 149; work and, 18

death, 85; aging and fear of, 137; beliefs faith development, stages of, 39
about, 134–135; denial of, 133; as event, Five Stages of the Soul, The (Moody and
137; realizing the reality of, 139; spiri- Carroll), 35–38
  index

Gallup Poll, 15 mentors, 82

generativity, 32, 85 mindfulness, 129
gerontology, 5, 25–26, 145, 149, 190n1 Moody, Harry R. (Rick), xv, 35–38,
(Conclusion) 55–57, 66, 67–68, 87–88
gerotranscendence, 33–34, 115, 125; motivation, 22
dimensions of, 33–34 mysticism, 4–5, 13–14
God, 7, 93
ground of being, 92, 127; connection to, nature, 11
3, 20; origins of concept of, 188n10 needs, 116–117
growth, spiritual, 27; questions on, 184
openness to experience of the sacred, 2
Hidden Wholeness, A (Palmer), 56
higher power, 6–7. See also ground of Palmer, Parker J., 56, 96–98
being paradox, 21
Hinduism, 4, 34, 125 path, spiritual, 66
Hixon, Lex, 57–62 Perennial Philosophy, The (Huxley), 92
human potential movement, 30 persistence, 27
Huxley, Aldous, 92–93, 79, 127, 150 personal construct psychology, 53
piety, 27
“I Am,” 6, 7, 46, 57 practices: contemplative, 76, 79; spiritu-
identity, 50; spiritual, 54–70 al, 4, 13, 27, 83, 128; time and, 127–129
Integral Spirituality (Wilber), 38–39 practitioners, 156–158
integrity, 33, 49, 189n1 (Ch6) prayer, 4, 128
Islam, 4, 13, 55–56 present-moment awareness, 2
process, spiritual, 27; questions on, 185
James, William, 2, 63, 149–150 psychology: personal construct, 53;
journey, 2–3, 5, 7–8, 56, 113; author’s, x; transpersonal, 75, 92
attractions to, 64–65; characteristics
of, 2–3; elements of, 3; as personal Quakers, xvi, 70, 80, 96–98, 189n2 (Ch5)
goal, 2
Judaism, 4 Ram Dass, 78, 89, 99, 157
Ray, Ruth, 39–41
knowing, methods of, 151–152 realization, spiritual, 69
knowledge, spiritual, 27 region, spiritual, ix, 1, 5, 8, 187n2
religion, 8–9, 14, 15; and beliefs, 8; con-
language, ix, 27 text of, 17; and language, 8; “private,” 2;
Levine, Stephen, 136 and relation to spirituality, 2, 14–16
life, spiritual, ix, 68–69 research, x, 5–6, 31, 152–154, 190n2
life stages, 122; Erikson’s 31–32; Hindu, (Conclusion); framework for, 5
34; and service, 103–104; spiritual Roof, Wade C., 8, 15, 16, 63, 65–66
development and, 43–44 Rumi, 6
listening, compassionate, 114
sacred, the, 7; experience of, 6
McFadden, Susan H., xv, 39–41 sage, 34, 73, 76; becoming a, 73; concept
meditation, 128 of, 76
mental clarity, 19 Sage-ing Guild, 82, 113
mentoring: and relationships, 86; skills sage-in-training, 81–85
of, 85–86 sages: actualized, 85–88; categories of,
 index 

81–89; characteristics of, 83; obstacles spiritual process, 27; questions on, 185
confronting would-be, 77–78; tran- spiritual region, ix, 1, 5, 8, 187n2
scendent, 99–89; and wisdom, 86–88 spiritual transmission, 27
Schachter-Shalomi, Zalman, 76, 83, students, 156
85–86 Sufism, 13, 55–56
seeking, spirituality of, 3, 146 systems, open-feedback, xi, 36, 147,
self, 46–49; evolution of, 51; as expe- 155–156
riencer, 46; ideal, 47; reflective, 46;
shadow, 48, 189n2 Taoism, 4
self-actualization, 50, 187n6 teachers and teachings, 79–80
self-assessment, 183–186 thought, integrative, 24; spiritual, chang-
self-schemas, 47; spiritual, 54–70 es in over time, 3–4
self system, 47, 49, 51; change in, 49; Tillich, Paul, 7
continuity of, 51–53 time: beliefs about, 124–127; concepts of,
service, 5, 17, 99–103, 114 121–122; experiential, 121
silence, 4 Tonglen, 84
singing, as spiritual path, 91–93 Tornstam, Lars, 33–35, 115, 125
sociology, transpersonal, 91, 189n1 (Ch5) tradition, spiritual, 4
solitude, 4 transcendence, 7, 14, 23, 25, 73; of per-
soul, stages of, 35–38 sonal self, 2, 20
spiritual breakthrough, 27, 67 transcendent consciousness, 188n2
spiritual capacity, 27, 148 transformation, 22, 67
spiritual concepts, ix, 27 transpersonal community, 93–94, 96–98;
spiritual connection, 27 benefits of, 98
spiritual development, 2, 78, 114; aging transpersonal consciousness, 75
and, 30, 113–115; and community, 91; transpersonal psychology, 75, 92
concepts about, 29–42; and coping, transpersonal sociology, 91, 189n1 (Ch5)
115; cycles of, 37–38; quilt metaphor
of, 39–41; religion and, 30; social con- unchurched people, 15, 187n3
text of, 43; stages of, 35–38; teaching
about, x; web metaphor of, 39–41; and Varieties of Religious Experience, The
wisdom, 74–75 (James), 30, 149
spiritual growth, 27; questions on, 184
spirituality, ix–x, 1, 6, 13; and aging, xi, Who Dies? An Investigation of Conscious
1, 4–5, 148–149; basic forms of, 1; as Living and Conscious Dying (Levine),
capacity, 13, 148; as concept, 5, 147; 136
defined, 6; as distinct from religion, 2, Wilber, Ken, 38–39, 67, 151–152
8–9; as experiential, 6, 13; growing im- wisdom, 74–75; and community, 93;
portance of, 4–5, 148; hostility toward, dimensions of, 74–75; Erikson and,
9; as independent topic, 152; measur- 84; manifesting, 101–103; sages and,
ing, 152–154; methods of studying, 6; 86–88; transcendence and, 74; types
as positive force, 147; practice-orient- of, 75
ed, 3, 146; related to religion, 14–16; witness consciousness, 28, 157
relational, 17; types of, 3, 146 Wuthnow, Robert, 3–4, 15, 65, 66, 146
Spirituality Inventory, 161–182
spiritual life, ix, 68–69 Zen Ox-herding Pictures, 57–62
spiritual nature, questions on, 183–184 Zinnbauer, Brian, 14–15
This page intentionally left blank
 About the Author

Robert C. Atchley is an award-winning teacher, scholar, author, and mentor who,

since 1985, has focused on the subject of how human beings develop spiritually and
manifest spirituality in their lives. He has presented numerous lectures and work-
shops to a wide variety of audiences and has written more than a dozen articles on
this subject for the general public. His knowledge of the subject comes from exten-
sive interviews and research, participation in many working groups of researchers,
writers, and lecturers focusing on spirituality, involvement in several organizations
promoting “conscious aging” or spiritual growth, and his own thirty-year conscious
spiritual journey.
In the mid-1970s, at age 35, Atchley began that journey. He read classic texts on
spirituality from different spiritual traditions, attended workshops on meditation
and spiritual development, went to India to study with the Indian sage Nisargadatta
Maharaj, and spent several years teaching at Naropa University, which emphasizes
contemplative education and is Buddhist-inspired. Since 1996 he has found spiri-
tual community in Quaker Meetings.
In the 1980s, Atchley began teaching about spiritual development as part of his
university course on adult development. He also began to include questions about
spiritual life in his research interviews with middle-aged and older adults. In the
1990s, he published a series of articles on various aspects of spirituality and spiritual
growth. He also became involved with the Omega Institute’s series of programs on
“conscious aging” and in the Spiritual Eldering Institute and the Sage-ing Guild.
In addition to conducting many workshops on his own, he was co-presenter of
workshops with Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi (“From Age-ing to Sage-ing”)
and with Ram Dass (“Conscious Aging”). Since 2000, he has published entries on
spirituality for three encyclopedias.
Atchley is Distinguished Professor of Gerontology (emeritus) at Miami Univer-
sity, in Oxford, Ohio. He is author of more than twenty books and research mono-
graphs, including Understanding American Society (1970), The Sociology of Retire-
ment (1976), Aging: Continuity and Change (1987), Continuity and Adaptation in
Aging: Creating Positive Experiences (1999), and ten editions of his introductory
gerontology text, Social Forces and Aging (2004).
He has received more than a dozen awards for his teaching, writing, and service,
including the Distinguished Career Achievement Award from the Gerontological
Society of America and the Benjamin Harrison Medallion, Miami University’s high-
est honor given to a faculty member. He received the American Society on Aging’s
award for Distinguished Contribution to the Education of the Nation.