A shared story of professional practice: Therapists make meaning of spirituality

Abstract

This chapter considers a series of nine discussions held over a twelve month period with a group of nine alcohol and substance addictions therapists who work mainly with Maori clients in a residential unit attached to a hospital. Although the therapists’ formal practice is regulated by their professional obligations and the institutional medical model, their personal approaches to individuals in recovery are uniquely inspired by their own experiences and beliefs. To avoid institutional censure, these therapists have tended to ignore a wider view of themselves as spiritual beings and have hidden these potentially controversial beliefs. Consequently, as counsellors engage with the stories and experiences of their clients, they are adept at handling this uncomfortable disjoint between the demands of their quasi-medical roles and the collaborative alliances created in their work with clients. Although the group’s initial goal was to identify and develop the use of spirituality as an aid to working with recovering addicts, it became clear that the group wanted to examine its own spiritual experiences and pathways to meaning - experiences that replicated or closely corresponded to clients’ - and that therapists’ and clients’ core narratives resonated at a fundamental level. Although fearful that their uses of spirituality might not be fully accepted or understood by medical colleagues, the group, nevertheless, widely discussed the value of spiritual experience as an essential factor in human health and well-being and its effectiveness in reconnecting traumatised clients with their lost potentials. Their stories of co-existing trauma and addiction, the hope and growth of spiritual awareness, and the challenges and rewards of working in such a worthwhile setting, identify practitioners dedicated to engaging with their clients’ spiritual resources. Their stories both challenge and caution us as professionals not to respectfully disregard clients’ spiritual beliefs but to fully utilise them in support of healing and post-traumatic growth.