Where is the line between Psychology and Spirituality?

I know I can't find it

The main points we’ll be covering here today:

Psychology v spirituality
Similarities between them
The people who have walked the line between both
Where psychology and spirituality merge

Psychology v spirituality

We need to start by defining what both are. We can define psychology as “the scientific study of the human mind and its functions, especially those affecting behavior.” 

Spirituality can be said to be an individual’s search for ultimate meaning, i.e. their purpose in life. This would usually mean seeking personal growth, religious experience or to make sense of their “inner life”.

So first off we can see that there is a slight difference. Psychology is said to be about looking at how and why the mind functions in the way that it does while spirituality is about finding meaning.

Spirituality is said to be about non-material meaning but psychology isn’t exactly concerned with what’s material too. The mind isn’t a thing in the way the brain is. Even defining what the mind is is a bit of a minefield.

Are they pointing at the same thing then?

Similarities between them

Both psychology and spirituality focus on making sense of what’s come to be called ‘the human experience.’ It’s a bit of a jargon term but it fits here. 

Psychology is all about making sense of how we experience the world and why we experience it in the way that we do. If we’re suffering from anxiety or depression, psychology wants to both fix the issue and the symptoms and this is done by examining the root causes and then learning to deal with them effectively.

Spirituality takes a wider view but through the lens of personal experiences. It does this by looking at the inner goings of our lives, for example looking for inner peace while at the same time showing the connection between all life and all things.

We can say then that both are really concerned with ‘finding meaning’ and we can also say that both are focused on self-reflection and personal growth.

The people who have walked the line between both

I came to psychology and counseling via spirituality. Over the years I’ve flirted with the Western spiritual tradition, i.e. awaking or theurgy, Buddhism, and Hinduism, in particular Advaita Vedanta, before finding a home in Taoism and with all of them the lines between where spirituality ends and psychology begins isn’t in any way clear. 

I don’t personally think there is a line. I don’t base this on the teachings of the sages of those traditions however, I’ve come to this way of thinking because of psychologists who threaded the line over the last century.

Carl Jung, the Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, was obsessed with trying to define spirituality in psychological terms. He took on the task of looking at spiritual issues through the lens of psychology. His books such as “The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious”, “Aion: Researches into the Phenomenology of the Self”, and “Answer to Job”, were three where this theme was really hammered home for me.

A contemporary of his, the Italian psychiatrist Roberto Assagioli, the founder of psychosynthesis psychology, put massive emphasis on the importance of spirituality in psychological development. His book “Psychosynthesis: A New Method of Healing” isn’t the easiest of reads but its main idea is that we all have a ‘spiritual center’ that can guide our psychological development. Via self-awareness and meditation exercises, the aim is to bring together the many different aspects of the personality with the aim of becoming a better person.

Carl Rogers, Abraham Maslow, and Viktor Frankl the early leaders of the humanistic school of psychology all agreed that we possess an innate drive towards self-actualization and personal growth and that this is to be achieved by looking for the answers to our struggles inside ourselves.

Where psychology and spirituality merge

Many practicing psychologists steer clear of spirituality, I guess this has to be put down to the secular world we live in now and I’m certainly not saying that’s a bad thing. For too long our religious leaders barked at us from the pulpit about how we should live so at least now we get to choose where we find meaning.

But, for many, because the search for meaning doesn’t have a one-map-for-all it can be a struggle when we lose our way and cannot make sense of our lives or find ourselves on a path less trodden.

As a practicing counselor, I have a foot in both camps and I’m fascinated by where the lines between them blur. I can certainly see the benefits of looking at both through the lens of the other.

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Hi, I’m Paddy. Thanks for reading my article. I’m a counselor, coach, and meditation teacher.

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