Spiritual Paths to Healing - 1

Posted by JohnD Tue, 29 Apr 2008 16:53:00 GMT

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Ever since reading about Bill Wilson’s struggle with alcohol and the role that religious experience played in his recovery, I’ve had hope that spirituality can also be decisive in undoing the impact of long-term depression. William James, whose Varieties of Religious Experience was so important to Wilson and other founders of AA, wrote in that study that the world is divided into two broad classes of people as far as religion is concerned, the once-born and the twice-born. The once-born take the world as it is, sum up their problems and successes and move along in life with a core acceptance of themselves and the religious practice they were raised with. The twice-born, as you might suspect, run into problems. They long for and work hard at finding a second birth into a new life of spiritual fulfillment. James describes them as the “sick souls who need to be twice-born in order to be happy.” Hmm, wonder where I fit.

Sick soul? Now I’m not saying that depression is a spiritual sickness, but my search for a way to get beyond that condition at least coincides with another lifelong search, the driving need to understand spiritual life.

Posted in Connecting, Fighting Depression, Creativity, Spirituality and Depression | Tags AA, Bill Wilson, depression, dreams, healing, reality, religion, spirituality, transcendence, wholeness, William James | 7 comments