REFLECTIVE JOURNALING: ANALYSIS, AND ORAL PRESENTATION
Keep a daily record of your own 15-week spiritual journey with respect to awakening to the spiritual and
overcoming or working through a specific personal challenge that tends to inhibit, limit or sabotage your
spiritual transformation. Some examples of challenges are family of origin issues, the impact of a father’s
absence, the influence of family violence, the wounded child, sibling rivalry, parent/child conflict,
abandonment issues, low self-esteem, unassertiveness, overweight, underweight, procrastination,
obsessive compulsive disorder, grief and loss, difficulty with forgiveness, low self-worth, conceit, childhood
hurts, and the seeming inability to un-bond from past wounds. Document the teachable moments, lessons
learned, fears evoked, insights gained, enlightenments, spiritual activities engaged in, and anything else
that seems to be of spiritual significance, facilitate healing and promote spiritual enhancement or
development and self-empowerment. Each student will demonstrate having experienced spiritual growth and development evidenced in the
spiritual practice of keeping a daily journal consisting of reflections, contemplations, imaginations, insights,
illuminations and inspirations gleaned from assigned readings, class discussions, reflections and selfguided experiences. Whether it is a full page or just a sentence, recording memories is a spiritual practice
that is a vital part of bringing unconscious materials to the surface for examination and processing as well
as eliciting and reflection one’s own life’s story.
The journaling assignment culminates with a three (3) to five (5) page journal summary analysis which is
handed in to the professor during a 3 – 5minute oral presentation. Both projects must demonstrate how
your spiritual knowledge and understanding were improved, increased or expanded; spiritual growth
attained or experienced; and the skill-sets developed or enhanced during the semester (your 15-week
spiritual journey) and the impact of such experiences on your life. Presenter must also explain the current
impact of journaling on his or her spiritual experience and how the new awareness will enable him or her to
maintain the spiritual gains made during the semester.
Tools for the journey:
1. Begin by admitting your confusion, sorrow, pain, deficit or failure. This is best reflected in the specific
personal issue you choose to work on – the one that tends to limit your radiation and stymies or blocks your
spiritual evolution. When you are honest with yourself about your wounds, you are dismissing any illusion
you may have about your strengths and weaknesses. Remember that in this work, “honesty is the best
policy.” When you are honest with yourself about your foibles, you discontinue identifying with repressions
and regressions. You then become ready for the insight that will emanate from trusting in yourself and
trusting in ultimate truth.
2. Work on becoming more aware of your highest self. Your highest self only wants you to be at peace. It
does not judge, compare or demand that you defeat anyone or be better than anyone. During this 15-week
journey, you are about to take on yourself by asking the following question when you are in the space
between stimulus and response: Is what I am about to say or do going to bring me the catharsis and peace
I desire? If the answer is yes, go with the flow and you will be allowing yourself be guided by the wisdom of
the highest self. If the answer is no, make a conscious effort to check yourself when you begin to think in
self-negating or intuitive-disproving ways. By engaging in this type of self-observation you are learning how
to tune-in or focus on you inner (internal or spiritual) life rather than on external behavioral observations.
3. Tune into intuitive materials. If you feel it, it is true for you. Focus on developing your consciousness so
as to bring the more materialistic, limited view of life out of focus and a higher awareness in focus.
4. Identify, acknowledge and accept your emotional states of consciousness – fear, inhibition, anger,
sadness, contempt, elation etc. Not only will this exercise provide you with great release of pent-up
emotions, it has the potential to heal wounded broken spirits and also give you something to draw on when
you are ready to write about your emotions in your autobiography.
5. Pay attention to sceneries and events that spiritually impact your life. Contemplate everything that
appeals to your senses – sight, smell, sound, taste, texture and feeling in other to grasp the deeper
meaning behind and within what’s on the surface.
6. Reflect on penetrative impressions of elements in documentaries seen in class, additional readings,
experiences form your field project, and current events
7. Integrate in your journal relevant information about the people you interact with, the materials read in
your text book and other resource materials that are congruent with your own spiritual journey. Describe
motivations, spiritual status, experiences, changes and your deepest desires as a way of harnessing
personal growth and development.
8. As a self-conscious, spiritual being you will begin to look at day-to-day events differently. Instead of
judging things by how important they are on the scale of mere external, artificial or material
accomplishments; you will focus on the spiritual depth of meaning behind outer appearances of every
experience in your life. Grasp, document and apply to practice, the deeper, more meaningful aspects ofyour activities of daily living, so that your spiritual growth becomes visible to yourself and others through
how you think and act in each moment of your life during the next 15 weeks and beyond.
9. Events: Act as though you are the reporter on the scene in “Eye Witness News” and reflect back to
yourself spiritual experiences you have had during the day. Then before going to bed at nights or first thing
in the morning, take a few moments to be alone, thoughtfully documenting same in your journal the way
such experiences impact you spiritually. This process has the potential to deepen your spiritual awareness
beyond your wildest dreams.
a. Define spirituality based on a review of the literature. Use a minimum of 5 – 7 references.
b. State your personal definition/description of spirituality. Use your own experience(s)
c. How can spirituality be cultivated?
d. What distinguishes the spiritual from other fundamental human needs?
e. Include in your paper the central features or attributes of spirituality.
f. Demonstrate your ability to integrate spirituality with two Core Values from the NASW code of ethics.
g. Identify three specific ways in which spirituality contributes to the enhancement of the individual and
family life