Spiritual matters involve our ultimate nature and purpose, not as material beings, but as spirits with an eternal relationship beyond the bodily senses, and the material and temporal worlds. A sense of connection can be essential to spirituality – connection to a reality beyond that of the physical world and oneself, which may include an emotional experience of awe and reverence. Spirituality may also include the development of the individual’s inner life through such practices as prayer and meditation, including the search for God, peace or enlightenment. This is an important component of Cottonwood’s holistic mental health treatment and drug rehab process.
While the words religion and spirituality are often used interchangeably, an important distinction between spirituality in religion and spirituality outside religion. The decision to seek spirituality either in or out of a particular religion is a personal one. While some spiritual seekers find reassurance in the structure of traditional religious practice, others seek faith in a more personalized, less structured and often, eclectic mix of spiritual influences.
At Cottonwood, we believe that spiritual growth is an important part of the recovery process – whether it is recovery from trauma, grief or depression or from an addiction to drugs or alcohol. We work hard to create and maintain an environment in which our patients feel free and safe to explore their own personal process and learn to practice spiritual principles that can bring peace and balance to their lives.
Seventy-five years ago, a group of alcoholics, grateful to have found a way to stay sober, wrote the following about their experience with spiritual practice:
If we are painstaking about this phase of our development, we will be amazed before we are halfway through. We are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness. We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it. We will comprehend the word serenity and know peace. No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience will benefit others. That feeling of uselessness and self-pity will disappear. We will lose interest in selfish things and gain interest in our fellows. Self-seeking will slip away. Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change. Fear of other people and of economic insecurity will leave us. We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us. We will suddenly realize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves.
At Cottonwood, we witness the transformative power of the recovery process every day. We have seen some who have had profound and dramatic spiritual experiences, and others whose spiritual awakening is more gradual and subtle. We know that personal spiritual growth flowers in an atmosphere openness and respect for others spiritual and religious beliefs and emanate that in our holistic mental health treatment and drug rehab.
