Soul Care

Soul healing should take place on an individual level and an inter-personal level.

Soul healing is not a black and white, “just follow this plan” concept. It is a life-long journey of listening to your soul and attending to your soul’s needs. In our secular, materialistic culture, our souls are often overlooked. Instead, we fill our lives with tasks, business, and entertainment. A good movie and a bowl of chocolate ice cream are how most of us attempt to take care of our souls.

Ignoring the soul’s needs for too long will leave one feeling lost and empty. I often hear people in my office say, “I feel lost.” Behaviors that accompany that “lost” feeling are often destructive. Such coping mechanisms that are old standbys are often alcohol, marijuana, food, pornography, infidelity, gambling, emotional entanglements with people other than our spouse, over-exercise, shopping, busyness, or enmeshment with one’s children.) All of these behaviors in excess, leave a person feeling initially charged with emotions that block out the pain, but the ending emotion is guilt, emptiness, shame, and a sense of hopelessness. The cycle seems to feed on itself unless the cycle is recognized. Once you can put a finger on what it is that is feeding your cycle, then you can begin moving out of that cycle and begin to nurture your soul.

Here are some initial concepts on how to begin to care of your soul:

Journal Often: Begin to record how you are feeling and what is behind those feelings. What thoughts are you focusing on throughout the day? Are those beliefs distorted, false, lies, a belief you’ve carried over from your family of origin? Correct those beliefs with what is true and accurate.
Sabbath Rest: Work 6 days a week. Rest on the 7 day. This is on God’s Top Ten List. (See the Ten Commandments found in Exodus 20 in the Bible.) Rest is not necessarily laying on the couch all day watching TV. It is a rest from your normal activities and busyness. It looks different from the other 6 days. It is a day that you look forward to. A day to listen to the soul and attend to its needs. For extra help on getting your mind around Sabbath rest, read Sabbath by Dan Allendar.
Play: It’s is essential to finding joy in your life. Play is different for everyone. Some play by taking a hike in the woods. Others play by going to an art museum and pondering Van Gogh’s Sunflowers. Play is unique to each individual. It is a time to stop problem-solving and move into a care-free place. Nothing in the world exists except the world of play around you. Consider how a child plays. They are completely in that world of play 100%. They are not thinking about anything but that moment. What is it that gives your soul a sense of peace when you do it?
Time with Others: Conversations with a friend is healing to the soul. It’s a time to connect with others and share your feelings. You also get to hear what’s happening in someone else’s life, so it takes your mind off of your own problems. It may look like having breakfast with the same person(s) once a week on a regular basis. It may look like joining a small group at church. It may look like visiting a nursing home and sitting down with a person that looks lonely and beginning a conversations with them. It may look like going to Sonic with your daughter and asking her what’s on her mind. It may look like sitting with your spouse on the front porch discussing the day.
Slow Down: Consider all of the activities that you and the members of your family are committed to. Is it all necessary? Which activities are creating distance between you and your spouse and your family members? Will these activities really matter in the long run? Will having your daughter in gymnastics 5 nights a week during family meal time really be the best for your family 10 years from now? Unless she’s headed for the Olympics, this might be overkill and stealing away precious family time that you will never get back once your kids are grown. Is there enough time in the day for you and your spouse to connect? For you and your kids to connect? Have a meeting with your spouse and then with your children. Eliminate the unnecessary activities and pare it down so that family relationships have time to bond and build positive memories together. Don’t give that time away to too many activities or strangers. Often families are hiding from each other by having too many activities. If this is the case, you are on the path that leads to destruction. Put an end to it before it’s too late. I’ve seen one too many spouses that say they gave up on their spouse because he or she was too focused on getting the kids to football or soccer and not focused on having a relationship. If you are running from relationships, figure out why and break the cycle.
Silence: Our modern world is noisy. Most homes and most public place have TVs going 24/7. Rarely is there silence in our world. From the minute we wake up, our talking alarms to radio in the car, to TV on at home, our ears and brains are processing information from external sources. Take time for silence to listen to the soul and to process what emotions you are feeling. For instance, you are driving to work and feel tense. Turn off the sound and consider what thoughts you are telling yourself. Are those thoughts true? What’s behind them? What thoughts are stirring in your mind that are not validated by evidence? “My spouse must think I’m an idiot.” (Mindreading) “I’m going to completely screw up today when I have to present that information to my boss.” (Negative filter, Assuming the Worst). Examine your thoughts and replace with what is true. Silence is truly golden. Use it in your life to listen to what’s going on internally.
Prayer and Meditation: The more you get used to silence in your life, the easier prayer and meditation will
Worship: It will take your mind off of you and adoring your Creator. We often spend most of our time adoring ourselves or wishing others would. When we worship God, we consider that we are part of a bigger picture than ourselves. How do you think about God?

When we listen to the pain in our lives, we can begin to recognize the source of the pain and allow God to heal those areas. When we ignore it and don’t listen to it, we often settle on ideas that are not true. For instance, because a lot of pain is shared in my office, I often hear, “A loving God would never have let that happen to me.” “If God were really concerned about me, he would do __ for me.”

In my perspective, the bigger picture goes beyond our pain and is tangled up in God and Man. God allows people to have free will and make choices that are selfish and harmful to others. He has not programmed us like robots. It is not His will for a child to be molested by a father or a dad to leave his family for another woman. God gets the blame for all the bad in the world and rarely gets credit for the good. Challenge your beliefs about God and begin to search out the truth. Consider John 8:31-32 So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, “If you continue in My word, you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” Begin to think accurately of God by how he describes Himself in the Bible. The more you read about Him, the more accurate your perspective will be of Him. God is so much more than our human brains can actually understand. To begin the journey of getting to know God, begin reading a One Year Bible. You can start at the beginning or choose to read whatever the daily reading is for that day. A habit of reading the Bible daily will change the way you think about God. More than likely your views of Him are not fully developed and reading the Bible will help you make a more informed decision about Him.

~Author: Lori Tibbits, LPC with permission to post at Miller Counseling Services, PC