Health & Wellbeing Series - Session 4: Spiritual Wellbeing

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recording has started all right ker and welcome to the
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New Zealand Defense Force Wednesday wellbeing Series this cord today is on
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spiritual wellbeing
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[Music]
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Tam Amy hoto my name is Amy hobin my ancestors
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come from Ireland however I was born here in altero New Zealand raised in wuru under the foot of
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Mount the fui is the Waterway and there are three local tribes U tamik and
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Tamaki on Whose fena I was raised so it's great to be with you uh this
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morning you just as I'm introducing myself you might like to go ahead and share in the chat where you are joining
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us from so I'm a chaplain with the New Zealand Army I'm a mom a wife a priest
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with the Anglican Church I've had an active Christian faith for 38 years I've
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worked with faith-based organizations for over half that time as a School
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Chaplain a hospital chaplain and an aged care chaplain and for the past five
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years I have been person in charge of an Anglican Parish in palon
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North I'm the nearest chaplain here in Linton I've um been with the Army again
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uh six months now however uh I'm not new to the New Zealand Defense Force I
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originally joined the army in 2001 as a medic with postings to Burnham or hakia
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and hu and a deployment to Afghan in ' 06 as a Ford Patrol medic my husband
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Tony has been with the Army 26 years uh currently working as a civilian
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instructor with combat School Linton and we have our son aurin and he's 11 years
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old uh joining me is chaplain Elijah Peters uh also from Linton an amazing
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Chaplan I do like him and it's not just because he has an interesting accent so
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Elijah if you're via would you like to introduce yourself K Amy Koto uh my name is Elijah
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Peters as Amy is already implied directly I'm an nzed army chaplain here
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in Linton as well I'm an amera kiwi so born in America reborn in West
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ockland um since 2008 I over that span of time have uh
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been in the charities sector uh governed multiple Charities over the past um over
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13 years in Auckland as a pastor also a husband father quite like photographer
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photography not professionally however but love it uh love nature especially
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hiking um I'm a moroco practitioner I'm a dad joke connoisseur I'm a member rep
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and uh just as an aside today tell a bro with a mo he looks sharp spread some love I think that's me Amy I'll turn it
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back over to you that's awesome thank you Elijah and Elijah's uh will just be monitoring the
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the chat conversation so that if you um have any input um any questions uh he
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can sort of pause me we can gather those up and uh and hopefully you can you can
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sort of feel a little more in the room with us um and through that okay so let's start with
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a um work here we go uh this is an an enoy a a prayer composed by the late
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venerable Dr H who was a mentor for me when I was going through
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Seminary toy
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toy the sky is constant the Earth is unchanging the love of God is Dependable
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the gifts of God are continuous H to the Lord Creator Redeemer and Giver of Life
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amen um I like this because it reminds me that uh no matter what goes on in our
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lives as we journey through the highs and lows there are things in life that are stable and secure um like the sky
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like the Earth like the birds like the wind and I don't know about you but it um uh gives me great
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comfort uh
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here murri place the things of the spirit to the four and all house shall
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follow behind uh this fatoki highlights the
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importance of the spirit of our wer as a lead and guide in our
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life so the scope of our quor this morning we'll look at what do we mean by
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spirituality why aanga what does spiritual health look like what can
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affect our spiritual Wellness specifically the problem of pain and the
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gift of gratitude spiritual interventions and practices and then
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where we can go for Spiritual support
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okay so what do we mean by spirituality and why DOA so feel free now just in the
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chat to share some one-word ideas um with what this U might mean for
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you uh this question um what is spirituality it might seem simple enough
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but we know in reality it's not spirituality is a concept ccept that can't be easily defined as it is
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understood and experienced differently by each person uh there are however some
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common themes that help us better grasp what it is so the most commonly mentioned ones
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are the non-physical connection
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belonging meaning and purpose Divine God higher
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power Transcendence beliefs and
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values the supernatural the most common way of
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defining spirituality is well in my mind is and
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it's super simple connecting to something greater than the self that could be God that
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could be a higher being that could be the sacred could be nature it could be
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Mother Earth music the Arts culture serving
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Humanity serving your country um they are all examples of connecting to something greater than the sou all
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examples of of spirituality Amy also in the chat I saw
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a reference to finding your Tong AWA your your place of standing oh that's that's beautiful I
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love that that's a great answer actually I'm going to just tuck that way in the back of my mind um that's awesome thank
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you [Applause]
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beautiful um so you can go um to the local church the mosque the temple uh
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any spiritual or religious group and Come Away with lots of different perspectives on spirituality and there's
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nothing wrong with that however what's most most important is your own
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understanding of spirituality when you have a spir a spiritual experience what do you feel
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what emotions do you have what do you see what happened with
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you uh in you you already have a Tre Treasure Trove of
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understanding so I challenge you to go ahead and Define spirituality wher or
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Tonga for yourself based on your own own thoughts and
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experiences so I wanted to touch um beef briefly on spirituality and
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religion one of the common misunderstandings is to presume that a talk about spirituality is a talk about
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religion there's a lot of crossovers they have a lot in common but spirituality does not need to be
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religious although this may be an important part of your
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spirituality some people say that they are spiritual some say they are
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religious some uh say they're spiritual but not religious some say I'm just me
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I'm just trying to explore the world and then some say that they're spiritual and
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religious um many Mai for example um have strong traditional spiritual
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beliefs and practices why DOA while many also identify with strong uh religious
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beliefs or hold a collection of spiritual beliefs what they all have in common is
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that they're all trying to connect with something greater than the self um I for example have uh strong
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spiritual beliefs um not too dissimilar to T Mali and my ancestral CTIC
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spirituality which is very centered on nature and the Earth and I also have
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have strong uh religious beliefs associated with Christianity so um I too
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hold a collection of spiritual beliefs that lead and shape my
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life however we understand spirituality uh it is real and it does need care and
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attention uh I wanted to uh share a video with you um duud to techn ology
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and difficulties with that I've put um the the title of this video in the chat
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so hopefully you can Chuck that into Google and have um a look at it later uh
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but this is um uh the video just in a nutshell um is
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Michael N and chair of Mano waterwa um talking about feeding and
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re-energizing um your wua and he says that we come into the world as WIA and we leave this world as
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WIA and WIA is who we are in and through um all of our life um but not many
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people feed our wi um we draw upon it um and then we're not re-energizing it
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we're not um taking care of it so much but there are things that can do that um
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for us like kadakia like Wy like being in love um for Michael he gave a couple
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of examples listening to the grandchildren laugh and play that feeds
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his WIA looking across his Fina feeds his WIA he wears a beautiful um pamut
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around his neck and he'll go and uh and put it in amongst the the local Raco at
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night so um overnight the like nature and just um just feeds into that t and
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then when he wears it for him that feeds his wi um but a lot can feed our wi so I
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wonder um for you what feeds your Wier feel free to put that in the
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chat yeah share share your um share your thoughts with us
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please uh and inal Mali uh I mean tial Mali has a lot to a
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lot to add to this to topic because wi wi Tong is like really fundamental to
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mom um the image on the left um a common way of thinking about spirituality is to
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view it as an aspect or a part of who we are alongside the physical the mental
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the social the cultural tell Mii however and other spiritualities and
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religions understand spirituality as not only a part of who we are but it is who
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we are and that's captured uh in the image on the right well I've tried to capture it there we are souls we are
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Wier having a human experience that is social physical mental emotional
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spiritual and cultural so I wonder what difference
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might it make to our health and well-being if we knew ourselves as Souls
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at our core would we take better care of our non-physical our hearts and our inner
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well-being would it make a difference to our perspectives on others and how we care for others so how do you feed your
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wi for me uh when I get my hands in the soil when I plant I weed I care for life
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in my G Garden that feeds my wi when I paint when I mix colors create shape and
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light on a canvas that feeds my wi when I go to church and I have Holy Communion
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the bread and the wine that feeds my wi um like I said I my roots are in in
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Ireland and so when I um when my wear my colors when I wear my tarten and I think
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about my ancestors uh and their life um that feeds my word
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oh I just saw a comment there watching trees Sway in the wind yeah getting outside in nature being in the wind and
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the Sunshine um yeah that's that's beautiful I love the comment about
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watching the Hawks soar in the updrafts um outside I think seeing that kind of
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stuff just is uh it's quite magical absolutely
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watch my family grow the sun sets from my desk looking
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over CA Island lucky
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desk church family spending time with family sitting on the beach few mentions of water in the beach dancing uh dancing
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in the living room I've got no rhythm but I I think I know a little bit of the joy of just being able to let loose is
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that you Elijah dancing in the living room attempting
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poorly love it love it um for some people I know poetry um you know the
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creative of Arts are are really a connection point for them that's great those are all
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wonderful like wonderful comments great uh so for those of us that like images
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to try and understand things um I have one what does spiritual house look like
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so this image here is one of a huge fireplace built of stones the stones
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used to be scattered about in a field but now they're brought together you can
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look at the fireplace as a whole or you can look at the individual Stones some
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are large some small some are cracked some are pretty but they're all the
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we're like that big old fireplace we are a d DC collection of different
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experiences and stories histories happenings and understandings all how to
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together by mortar and that mortar is our spirituality our
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Wier we are scattered about but spirituality puts us together holds us
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together or can or will when we see it we understand it and we learn how to
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nurture it
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place the things of the spirit at the four and all else shall follow
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behind so what does spiritual well-being have to do with my health and being with the Defense
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Force so so much research suggests that cultivating a sense of spirituality can
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gift us a stronger sense of well-being a satisfaction improved physical health
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reducing blood pressure heart rate while improving our immune system a better
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handle on adversity failure and loss insulation from mental health support
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towards recovering from mental health um and illness better relationships fewer
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health problems and living a longer more fulfilling life but that's that's a lot
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right that's huge um and I've done a little research uh I know that science is really
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starting to ramp up on this um Google in particular if you're interested Dr
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Andrew Newberg um he's a neuroscientist and he's making um
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connections between neuroscience and spirituality with some really impressing impressive findings or at least I think
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so for example there is an area in the back of our brains called the proprial lobe
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which helps to establish a sense of self and sense of space and time and Newberg
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says that when people are in deep meditation or prayer practices what he
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has observed is a decrease in activity in the proprial lob so when this
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decreases our sense of self decreases and the Unseen boundaries between us and
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them uh also decrease so in that we may feel a sense of Oneness or
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connectedness this could be with God or the world or with people then this
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connection enhances our sense of compassion and empathy for others for
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God the planet um and the self that whole time
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the me it quietens down and we also realize oh wait I'm not alone
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being spiritual um and being spiritually ready um is also important um of being
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combat ready and like there's a not not a lot of research not a lot of people
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sort of talk about this well I don't think so anyway um but in my experience in
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training or in operational environments service people need to negotiate
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challenging moral and ethical situations process of and Trauma combat
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stress hardship and tragedy be prepared for conflict to pull the trigger and to
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make it through an incident intact ready for the next challenge all while being
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far from home the spiritual Dimension draws upon people's beliefs and values
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World Views core religious and spiritual practices human values and
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connections and and all of this um can help us to maintain a sense of
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motivation of character resilience and integrity the heart and soul of every
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Soldier every sailor a and woman are everything they are what sustain us and
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the same is entirely true for everyone else we all need to be combat ready in
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one sense of the phrase and strengthening our Wier our spiritual mortar does that
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so how is your spiritual health are you spiritually ready to face whatever
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troubles Rise um to challenge you and if not what could you do to get
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there okay so if we're feeding and looking after our wer let's think about things that can
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affect our spiritual Wellness so if you'd like go ahead and
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share some thoughts in the comments what affects our spiritual
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Wellness just as you're thinking about that um another video um I was looking
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to share uh this time with Kia huhana Clayton Evans also from
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tewa uh she shares in this video that there are some things in our human
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experience that don't feed our WIA but they uh they don't serve our WIA they
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they sort of draw from it uh and what
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what um what heals her Wier in particular is hot water so when she's
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feeling low or she needs to re-energize her Wier or strengthen it she'll go to one of the local hot baths and have a
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soak and she says it's especially amazing when it's out in nature so can
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look up and she can see the stars and she's reminded of um her own
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you know um uniqueness um as a human being um in the
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world and she connects to her her ancestors sort of in and through that and uh she's nourished but she does kind
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of give a little warning to um you know to know the difference um in your own heart between what serves your wi and
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what doesn't there's been a few comments made so far
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Amy um stress is a thing that uh is affecting spiritual Wellness conflict in
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our relationships um trauma illness perhaps even you know prolonged illness or
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struggle with a particular encounter not feeling heard or listened to or believed
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not being affirmed um and even um tongue and cheek work can can affect our
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spiritual Wellness which I think brings up a a really valid point though in the
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in how important it is to do meaningful work and to have a proper setting for
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yourself um in that context so that the work that you do can also fill you feed
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you just as you contribute and add value to other things and it's difficult to balance that at times um definitely want
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to acknowledge that but anything and everything I think is the point here anything and everything can affect our
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spiritual well-being yes yes um and it's so
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helpful to know yourself to know what um those triggers are um that you know draw
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you away from nourishing your spirit I mean for me stretch stress is a big one so like um you know you'd think I
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wouldn't be stressed about talking about spiritual Wellness but the technology stresses me out and I've been stressed
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for a few days and have I prayed have I been out in nature have I tended to my
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garden no because I'm just focusing on my stress you know but the only thing
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that's going to get that back for me is to prioritize it put myself into um that
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spiritual Wellness space and get into the garden even though I am I can try and process while I'm digging in the
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soil my husband's always telling me um because I always moan that oh I didn't
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get out for my run today because I'm just can't stop thinking about this thing and I feel like if I go for a run
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then that's taking time away from from what I should be stressed about and he
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says well why don't you go for a run and think about that thing at the same time um I'm like oh yeah that makes sense um
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but yeah all those things you're sharing um yeah I'm hopefully after this I can
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go back through these comments and have a really good look um there's some amazing things you're sharing thank you
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so much but I guess everything that you've shared or what I've heard so far is in
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my list here um on the screen so as we say you know there's lots and lots of things that can affect
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it um so oh um as I said before um Kya um uh the
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lady I mentioned just prior um talking about um knowing the things that don't
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serve our wiw uh I've got a a word cloud here of some ideas of
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what those things might be so you know experiences can affect our wua but also
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um I guess attitudes and um and other things can also um draw us away from
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spiritual wellness and here's a whole bunch here so if there's anything you can add to that you know go ahead and
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and put it in the comments right there Amy I just uh want
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to acknowledge the comment that's just been uploaded um talking about some of
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those rhythms um he says I go to our urupa to talk with my mother and Tupa who have gone um
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they have influenced me in helping those who have lost Foo I have katakia every night online with my nephew which is um
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which which is a a beautiful thing that technology can permit these days the
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nephew however however is in the spinal unit um some mother passed two months
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ago um so these rhythms help ground him and um lead to this appreciation for
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life and so it kind of reminds us I guess of that delicacy often of life um
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and how there there are rhythms that we can commit our elv too some with greater
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effort than others these rhythms help tap us into this flow that goes beyond us it goes through us but it also exists
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Beyond us and it connects us to our family um past and present and it
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connects us to these values that we lean deeply into and that that's
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beautiful um gosh this I'm just I'm just blown away by what people are sharing um
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I just that that's really amazing thank
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you uh so the good thing is um if we can be helped to understand
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and develop reasons for being uh in relation to our pain and our
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suffering we can develop the capacity to manage uh more effectively what's going
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on for us um and all those things that we've mentioned and and that have been
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highlighted all these things these very challenging things um if they if they
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sort of go unchecked or unhelped spiritually speaking uh they can pull
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our eyes into ourselves which can lead to self- orientated thinking and self- orientated
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behavior in other words the pain and the suffering that we feel can sometimes
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overtake us to the point where that's all we feel that's all we think about
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that's all we talk about and it can stifle our spirituality our connections our beliefs and values our meaning and
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purpose and that can be the problem of pain and for some it may even lead to
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spiritual distress and that's when a person is no longer able to find meaning
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purpose peace Comfort strength or Connection in
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life there's a little quote there by Clara who's 8 years old and children can be like so wise and so insightful she
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says pain makes you forget about friendship and working together you want to hit back when you are hurting I think
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that's so
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true so part of um us understanding and
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developing a reason for being in relation to our pain I think part of
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that is to start to see that pain can have purpose pain communicates for instance
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when we're anxious it tells us that there's a real threat in our lives and when we're overwhelmed by life's events
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it teaches us to rest uh pain can also be a good teacher
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sometimes when we experience pain it teaches us to avoid dangerous situations
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and those of us that have children or mapuna you might um connect there um
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with the children because they often stumble and fall um and we can't always protect them and sometimes we we have to
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let them run free you know and so that they learn um not to run at the swimming
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pool you know but when they experience that Fain pain it's teaching them to oh
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actually maybe I shouldn't have done that I won't do that next time doesn't always work though right does it
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um pain shapes our character think of all the stories of individuals who have achieved great things in their lives how
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many achieved those things with no Struggle No Pain No suffering pain and
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failure are a part of who we are and through that struggle we can Propel
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ourselves further than what we we ever thought some of us may have experienced
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a bit of this if you've done recruit training or core training pushing yourself beyond what you thought
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you were capable of and then there's when pain isn't helpful but
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accepted um there are times in life when pain
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isn't helpful but it must be accepted and acceptance isn't SOC combing to
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something but understanding the reality of it managing it and trying to move Beyond it
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it's not helpful to ignore the pain no matter what its type but we can't let it
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Define us um or take control of Our Lives um my own particular experience of
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pain and suffering in where it wasn't helpful but has been accepted um my
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husband and I we suffered um a miscarriage a few years ago and although
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I'd never ever say that I was happy happy with that loss it was you know terribly terribly um painful but through
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that L loss I have strengthened the memory of my little one the pain somehow
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helps to keep the memory alive and I've built ways to memorialize my little one
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and even helped others who have had um similar sufferings so pain uh can purpose and I
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think if we can sort of Journey with that with our own pain we can um find
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meaning and purpose and and spiritual care um despite it you know um in the
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thick of it um there can be Silver Linings Amy I'd like to add as well that
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I think that there will be times where the fruit if you will of pain is a
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natural outworking um it it can be a thing that is just built into the process but often it does
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require work I remember attending a support group with my grandparents um
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who who had a number of friends at the time who had cancer the the title of their group was making the most of your
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cancer and I thought that was the most at the time I thought that was the most bizarre name for a group because I
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thought you know Cancer's the enemy and in a way it's like they're accepting it
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and and at the time I thought it wasn't healthy but as I've grown older as I've
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known other people with cancer or lost loved ones and friends with cancer I've
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understood something very special and precious about that and that is there are some things we can't change about
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life but what we can change is what we bring to life what we bring to the circumstances that we do encounter and I
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think that's the work that we're talking about that's the effort that pain can have a purpose because you create that
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purpose you create that meaning you create that value by your investment in yourself and in your circumstances
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making the most of the moment that um you're given in life yeah that's that's
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wonderful thank you um don't get me wrong like um you know the purpose of pain in and
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through my experience um it wasn't it wasn't easy to get to that point and
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actually part of that and what I hear you're saying Elijah is that um the pain
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you need to sometimes you need to experience it you know it it uh like in
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my situation I needed to be angry and disappointed you know and I was
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spiritually speaking you know um uh I'm a priest not that that makes gives me
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any immunity whatsoever from troubles in life it doesn't uh but when we lost our
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little one yeah I was angry I was like I'm I just given God silent treatment
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for ages I'm not talking to you you know I was yeah and I needed help so I I went
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to my uh I went to my Vicor and a couple of my clergy friends and I said to them
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I can't talk to God I'm so angry you know um because I thought this was a blessing and it was taken away and you
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know and all those spiritual questions like why me why is this happening um that we ask so much and um and I said I
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can't talk to them and uh they they were able to do that on my behalf and they
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they slowly um they cared for me when I kind of couldn't really spiritually care
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for myself um but you know I think it's I think
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it's you need to be able to experience the pain it's okay to be angry it's okay to be annoyed and disappointed um you
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know but pain can also have a purpose like I said pain the pain of my experience helps me to remember that my
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little one that little life that was lost was real you know so um it's it's
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about perspective I think but certainly can be helpful um to allow us to sort of
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pull our eyes away from um our insides and pull them back out kind of into the
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world and into our families and into life that's still going on around us
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so the perspectives on pain is is one intervention um another really good one
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is uh the practice of gratitude looking at the gift of
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gratitude and this also can begin the process of pulling our eyes further away from our pain and bringing warmth sense
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of well-being and thankfulness back in uh and I'd like to invite um Elijah to
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share a story with us um as gratitude was something that that's helped him out
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in his life yeah Amy and I were as we were preparing for this webinar um as we
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exchanged stories one of the ones that came up for me something that I found quite helpful when I felt quite low
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actually probably an all-time low uh in my own life I had these strong feelings
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of being stuck with nowhere to go in a way I guess you could describe it as a sense of hopelessness we had been on
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quite an interesting immigration Journey here in alota and there were as many
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roadblocks and and detours as could be possible and it was incredibly
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discouraging it had been rough and it left us exhausted we had crossed the finish line so to speak but it just
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didn't feel very joyous I struggled to see my purpose I was struggling with my ident identity I
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linked sort of my work and what I did with with my purpose and struggle with
39:03
identity and how I fit in to the community I was a part of and I couldn't really see value that I brought to the
39:09
circumstances I was in I've had a number of people come into my own office that exhibit some of these same feelings and
39:17
more um but it is it is a is a difficult
39:22
and and it's frustrating but it's the difficult position to be in and and at
39:30
times feeling like you don't have the energy to take the next step that you think and feel that you might need to
39:35
take so with the help of a uh clinical therapist in over several months I began
39:40
to explore with him this idea of how gratitude can actually help us to
39:48
restore our spirit restore our well-being and how a simple spiritual
39:53
practice had these benefits in multiple areas one of the concepts that he introduced
39:59
me to was this idea of taking captive of every thought we might refer to it or think of it as being mindful but he used
40:05
the phrase take captive every thought and then um he said that like what I was
40:11
giving my attention to was was like as as if I was giving it away to the wind
40:17
but the reality is that we don't have unlimited bandwidth and what we think about and what we give our attention to
40:22
really is an investment in oursel today and in our future self and it either gives us life where at times snatches it
40:28
away so um he invited me encouraged me to start looking at what gifts I had in
40:34
the world around me he gave me a book to read called A Thousand Gifts where this woman is on a journey to identify a
40:41
Thousand Gifts in the world around her and she identifies some of those very obvious things all the way down to
40:47
seeing that that rainbow uh reflection that you see in a bubble as it as it
40:53
flew out of her kitchen sink one day just the little things like that finding gratitude um in some of those things and
41:00
then he asked me to just write those down just continue to add to your list every single day try to write 10 things
41:06
you're grateful for and then add to the list the next day but at the end of the day read your
41:12
list and then do the same the next day finish the day read the list next day read you know add to it read the list
41:20
and I had hundreds and hundreds of these little um Treasures that I had been finding in the world around me
41:28
um I'm not a journaler I don't like journaling at all it didn't feel like journaling I was I was doing an
41:34
inventory of the world around me that that resonated with me I built this um
41:39
huge list and ultimately I gave myself the gift I gave myself the gift of A New
41:45
Perspective the gift of being able to see how near so much good was how much
41:52
treasure was how much gold metaphorically that I had all around me and it's not so much that the bad wasn't
41:59
there it wasn't so much that there wasn't the difficulty or the pain that I had experienced but what I had allowed
42:05
that pain to do is prevent me from seeing any of these gifts around me and so it wasn't just giving my you know
42:12
just ignoring the pain it was actually lifting up treasure in my life around me
42:18
and over time I believe completely restored my uh my spiritual
42:24
well-being go that's that's awesome Elijah yeah something so simple um you
42:31
know can really draw our eyes away from the pain and and really lift our spirits and and that practice of of uh gratitude
42:39
is is such an easy goto I just saw that comment right now
42:45
just in response to that uh I like having a gratitude jar write down one thing I'm grateful for each day and pop
42:51
it in the Jack yeah that's so um spiritually uplifting
42:59
thanks Elijah um so I just have a list here of
43:05
some other ideas in terms of um interventions and practices and some of
43:12
them we've already sort of mentioned we've got you know the spiritual journey um for those who like to write I
43:18
suppose um a gratitude visit so that's when you write to a person who's been
43:24
really influential in your life and then you call them and you read to them what you wrote I
43:30
have yet to do that I've been thinking of doing that um just embrace the awkward right um but it's all about I
43:40
guess coning up those feelings for yourself but not just for yourself for the other person too a it's great and
43:46
counting your blessings recall an event from your past in which you experience
43:51
some positive emotions uh recount a moment when you laugh so hard your
43:59
stomach uh the practice of meditation uh mindfulness focusing on
44:06
the present moment prayer um used to seek guidance ask for forgiveness help
44:13
to forgive Express gratitude um or
44:18
volunteer um so that's just like a tiny little list there'll be so many things
44:23
um that you could do um that will help
44:30
um one thing for me uh in terms of a practice um I wrote myself a spiritual
44:39
letter U and when I say letter is more of a a short message um to myself that's
44:45
motivating and encouraging and it's a message that I have just in my um just
44:52
just popped into my Bible um in my office at home um I also so have it in
44:57
my car and I've got a copy here um at work and the purpose of the message is
45:03
to remind me remind you of what the day was given to you for it includes tasks
45:11
that you want to accomplish accomplish that are not routine for you yet it includes things that you want to stop it
45:18
reminds you of who those figures are that you wish to emulate and it helps to
45:24
begin the day with a goal and a set purpose and so I've got my spiritual
45:33
message here I thought I'd share with you just as an example oh one too
45:39
far there we go okay so so mine's um are we bit
45:46
religiously because obviously um I you know I'm a priest I'm a chaplain this is
45:51
this is a a huge part of my world uh so
45:57
um gosh H not I can hardly see my screen it's so
46:04
tiny okay so the first you can see the first part there what was the day given
46:09
to you for uh and I've put today was gifted gifted to me by God for my
46:15
continual repentance that is my turning from um turning towards God that I might
46:22
become more like Christ Jesus so that's that's for me that's why um I was gifted
46:29
this day um second things that I want to accomplish uh read the spiritual letter
46:36
to yourself have at least one act of devotion including reading scripture and prayer be appr priest for people and for
46:44
yourself persevere with with things that you struggle
46:49
with uh things I want to stop doing I want to stop giving up and particularly
46:55
like I said before that's with regards to allowing my stress to get in the way of looking after my health and
47:01
well-being and also stop eating junk because I love junk food I love lollies and chips and I want to stop that and I
47:08
want to drink water instead when I get tempted um My Heroes um you know Jesus
47:15
is a hero for me um basically everything about who he is and also my father so my
47:22
dad who he's been through the whole cancer Journey a couple of times
47:27
um and I just love that he endures through hard times he practices gratitude and caring for himself for his
47:34
family and he is someone that I I wish to emulate um so I'll read this you know to
47:41
myself every morning and just in some spiritual way it just starts my day like
47:47
on a high and it reminds me of who I am what I'm about um and it just feeds my
47:56
WI um so that's something that you might
48:02
like to try um and maybe you're just starting on your WI a journey this is a um a great place to start um or maybe
48:10
you're further down the track or maybe your your heads are full heads are fully in the cloud like like me and Elijah and
48:16
um but wherever you are you know um I we we both just uh you know want to
48:23
encourage you in your own journey and figure out ways for you of
48:28
of what connects for you um so where you go in the NZ death
48:35
with spiritual support well obviously we're going to put a massive shout out to the chaplain I don't know if you've
48:41
ever met a chaplain I hope everyone has um you can find them at every base uh
48:47
and camp and uh like there's we're into so much stuff um we're
48:55
247 uh we're here here for service Personnel we're here for civilians
49:01
reservists um we're here for ex-serving peers we're here for families and we
49:07
provide pastoral care um welfare support spiritual care and guidance um and like
49:13
I said whether you're religious or spiritual or whatever you are um we're interested and we'd love to um support
49:21
you um we visit workplaces medical centers homes hospitals detention
49:27
centers uh we Lia with command teams over how and health providers we do
49:33
referrals um we advise command on spiritual moral ethical um and Welfare needs of
49:41
families uh we like I said provide pastoral care particularly in um
49:46
critical incidents uh and supporting purs predeployment during deployment
49:51
post deployment and just like a whole bunch of other stuff
49:57
um so you can go to the defense Health Hub and um search chaplins and it'll
50:03
show you um where the chaplain are give you contact details for chaplains in
50:09
your base or your camp or wherever you are um so if you need support or you
50:14
know even if you don't really need support and you just want to come and have a coffee you just want to meet us
50:20
um we love that um just come and find us give us a call
50:29
uh so there we go um are there any uh any particular questions or any any
50:36
comments I suppose I can jump in there Amy just from the Q&A side of things uh there
50:43
doesn't seem to be any questions but the chat has been going off so thank you
50:48
very much um like I said I I feel like I've missed out on some really cool stuff in
50:54
the chat like I mean we've brought a lot of of it out but I'm wondering if there's things I haven't read or seen so
51:00
I'm really Keen to go back through and just um and have a look at all those wonderful comments that you made um
51:06
thank you for engaging with us that was really awesome um and thank you uh Elijah for your story um and thank you
51:14
for helping out with the um the it stuff for the
51:19
chat uh so I guess in closing well we can we can give it
51:25
another minute two for any questions we've got um do we have time still got eight minutes on the clock um but I I
51:34
wanted to say thank you uh as well Amy I I'm expressing what others have already said in the chat but I appreciate you
51:40
putting the work in on this and uh I want to Echo what Amy has said about you
51:45
don't have to have a problem to come and speak with a chaplain and and the I
51:51
guess the vision I have for our future of health and defense is that
51:57
you don't have to it shouldn't have to go to a chaplain to receive spiritual support um I would like it to be so
52:04
iquit us just everyone um has a a level of spiritual engagement and
52:12
understanding of spiritual well-being and how it is expressed in their life and in the lives of others that we can all actually weave together a really um
52:20
strong fabric of spiritual health and I I'm not just saying it because I believe
52:26
because the role that I'm in but I've just had too many experiences in life where um the only answer was a spiritual
52:35
response to what I was going through and so I think that that alone is is um for
52:42
me sufficient enough to to make sure that I'm exercising my health in that
52:47
spiritual space just like I might in the physical in this the the communal and social as well as the mental space it
52:55
all is a it's all link it's all connected um so yes that's awesome yeah great thank you
53:03
so um just correct me if I'm if I if just make sure I've got this right but
53:10
my understanding is next week the session on funo well-being and
53:15
support yes that's correct yeah great Wednesday 11 o'clock um and a calendar
53:20
invite will be sent out to us with details uh so yeah shall we um conclude
53:27
with kak um
53:50
okay good everyone um you're wonderful have um a great day and hope to connect
53:57
with you all at some point um yeah thank you very much
54:04
again thank you very much Amy and Elijah and all for joining
54:13
us someone's asking if you can share the presentation um perhaps um if you were
54:21
to email chaplain Amy hobin that's hou
54:26
n um she can hook you up with a link I believe that's that worked I think
54:33
already today okay um yeah also as well we'll be sharing this presentation um on the in
54:41
the recording of the session as well on the workforce savings well-being Library
54:46
as well so that link will be in the next calendar invite
54:52
awesome that's great thank you all