Photo by highersights
When a friend calls, do you have a listening ear? If so, you may be giving them not just a loving attitude, but a meaningful one also.
This month Reuters Health reported about a new study from a large cancer treatment center. It found that psychotherapy focused on spirituality and finding meaning in life may help improve the quality of life for terminally-ill patients. While hospital chaplains and clergy have been able to “walk the walk” with individuals facing the end of life on earth, recent efforts have included psychotherapists, especially to those patients with no specific religious affiliation. Dr. William Breitbart from New York’s Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center told Reuters Health, “This is a new tool. It gives more structure to what people are already attempting to do.”
His study included 120 patients assigned randomly to seven hour-long sessions with either a psychoanalyst or a massage therapist. The psychotherapy sessions addressed the meaning of life and identity. They also included an awareness of the finiteness of life, and reflection exercises. Their aim was to give patients a sense of peace and purpose. Quality of life for those who had analytic sessions improved more than those under massage therapy. Their report was published in the March Journal of Clinical Oncology.
Dr. Christina Puchalski, head of George Washington Institute for Spirituality and Health in Washington, D.C., told Reuters Health, “Spiritual well-being is very focused around peace and meaning and purpose.” Breitbart stated that he is continuing his research on a larger group of patients. His hope is that it will be used more widely in the future.
This has given me a lot to think about with those I meet in nursing homes or hospices. I often do a lot of talking or reading, always with the aim to help. But I am now much more aware of how important it is to go in with a very listening ear. If the individual does not want to hear what I have to say about God, I can still listen for their sense of what spirituality is to them. I can walk with them figuratively, in addressing the issues of meaning and identity.
My wife, her mother and my niece did a great job of this recently. My brother-in-law was facing the end of a long ordeal with an illness. While he bravely met each day, they listened to him. Some days he spoke a lot, some days not, but he had a daughter, sister and mother who listened. This was very comforting to him. When he grimaced over the tough times he had faced, they assured him of the wonderful choices he had made at various times in his life. They reminisced about the good times they had shared. When he passed, he passed peacefully, looking up.
This was a meaning-based encounter. It assured him that he was loved and cherished. How all of us wish we will have someone to listen to us when we face the end of our days here. In the meantime, we can help others tremendously by listening to them.
