Spiritual Health Mentor
If you’re looking to develop your spirituality further or learn to meditate, or just boost your spiritual intelligence, I work as a spiritual health mentor, on one-to-one bases, in group settings, face to face or virtually via Skype/FaceTime, etc.
I’m doing a talk on spiritual intelligence in London, Wednesday 4 March 2020, 6:30-8:30 pm called: How to Enhance your Spiritual Intelligence
How to Enhance your Spiritual Intelligence
Spiritual Health Mentor / Companion promise
Listening
With compassion, discretion, and respect, I will reassure and support you through careful listening, seeking fully to understand your personal story and circumstances.
Your Spiritual Journey
We may talk about your spiritual development, exploring that you are on a life-long journey developing heart and mind, compassion and consciousness.
Spiritual Connection
We may explore together how you can best develop and deepen your connection with the wonder and energy of life.
Silence and Meditation
We may take some quiet time together; meditation can be healing, reassuring, and supportive.
What is spirituality?
Spirituality is a study of transpersonal aspects of human beings (the ‘being’ aspect) as opposed to personal development (the ‘human’ aspect or domain). Spiritual development includes spiritual and soul intelligence and spiritual literacy, which are a part of multiple intelligences (musical, kinesthetic, mathematical, linguistic, and so on). At the heart of spirituality, there are three core perspectives: connection to a larger life, peace of mind and care and compassion. Spirituality is a study of consciousness. Teresa of Ávila said that the spiritual journey is about knowing yourself and managing your power.
What is spiritual development for?
The purpose of spiritual development is to become more self-aware and to enhance and develop your awareness and consciousness as well as experience full spectrum consciousness and spiritual awakening or enlightenment and mystical state of non-dual oneness, divine or unity consciousness (unio mystica). Buddha and others suggested that all problems and suffering come from separation and duality. Buddha offered a solution by saying, “All individual things pass away. Seek your liberation with diligence.” Enlightenment provides an inner peace that transcends pain and negativity. Upanishads say, “when there is other, there is fear”. Science and quantum physics suggest that there is no separation nor duality. On a cellular level cells don’t divide; they just differentiate. It’s all one continuous life. In short, the function of spiritual development is to ‘wake up’ and become super-conscious, and the function of personal development is to ‘grow up’ and become meta-human.
French philosopher Giles Deleuze suggested that the purpose of spirituality is to “Bring something incomprehensible into the world!” He also suggests a way of seeing life, “A life is the immanence of immanence, absolute immanence: it is complete power, complete bliss.” What is immanence? A life . .. No one has described what a life is better than Charles Dickens if we take the indefinite article as an index of the transcendental. And transcendence is a product of immanence.
“Grounded in reliable physiology and psychology ‘Your Spiritual Health Programme’ is relevant to all those involved in health care.”
Professor David Peters MD, Clinical Director, Centre for Resilience, Westminster University
Spirituality also explores existential and spiritual questions such as “Why is there something rather than nothing?” This question has been puzzling scientists and philosophers, and there is no clear, definite answer yet. In Zen tradition, this question is a fundamental, classical koan (puzzle) that can lead to satori (enlightenment). This question was on Buddha’s mind when he meditated under the Bodhi tree. In the Buddhist tradition, this problem is resolved simply by assuming that the ‘background’ for all existence or an integral part of everything is pure emptiness, nothingness or void. “Form is emptiness; emptiness is form.” (Literally translated from Sanskrit “Form – voidness; voidness – form”). It is understood that emptiness doesn’t change, but the form is evolving, growing and developing and becoming more and more.
Practical spirituality & wellness
I’ve completed a diploma course in Practical Spirituality & Wellness which is the first UK, Ofqual accredited vocational diploma course in this discipline. To have a taste of Your Spiritual Health Programme – download the editable pdf and go through it. You can edit it and add your insights, etc.
Spirituality is about the pursuit of happiness, human flourishing or prosperity, joy and freedom as well as overcoming suffering.
Wellness and happiness
Wellness is a general term that describes personal well-being and health and is the opposite of illness. When we feel well and healthy – we flourish and thrive. There are many aspects of wellness and health and spiritual development and spiritual and soul intelligence is one of them. Spiritual development offers a perspective on one’s life that can boost one’s health and wellness.
People tend to be unhappy when they don’t address the need for personal growth and spiritual development as well as spiritual intelligence. Maslow famously said, “If you deliberately plan on being less than you are capable of being, then I warn you that you’ll be unhappy for the rest of your life.” This echo, what Jesus had in mind when he said, “If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.” And one more quote: “To exist is to change, to change is to mature, to mature is to go on creating oneself endlessly.” said Henri Bergson in his Creative Evolution.
Stress
One of the many definitions of stress is that anything that you don’t enjoy or find upsetting can be a stressor. Stress is your interaction and interpretation of threat. Stress is a root cause of many emotional and health problems as well as work-related issues. Recent studies suggest that stress causes inflammation and inflammation can be a factor in up to a 3rd of cases of severe depression (2018, Bullmore). There are many solutions to build resilience to stress. Spiritual development and meditation are two of them. There is always a creative solution to a problem and mindfulness allows for your natural creativity, intuition, transcendence and inventiveness to work better.
“A problem is a way of creating a future. When plants grow and evolve they do so by way of problems, developing features to avoid predators, to maximise light or to retain moisture.”
Claire Colebrook, philosopher and cultural theorist
Meditation & mindfulness
There are many types of meditation and mindfulness is one of them. When you’re mindful, you’re simply present, here now and embodying whatever you’re doing, be it walking, eating (chocolate), sitting, lying on the grass, breathing – any activity can be part of or object of mindfulness or meditation. Ultimately, anything you’re doing consciously, with attention and awareness (not mindlessly), is mindfulness. Over time, you can also develop an awareness of the connection to a larger life at the same time. It’s fairly easy to be mindful when relaxed, at ease and not bothered by anything. It’s the times when we’re stressed or anxious or not happy that mindfulness is most useful. By witnessing yourself in difficult times, you develop a healthy distance and perspective on yourself and life. A present-day Cassandra Yuval Noah Harari in his book 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, suggests meditating as a way of decoding and making sense of our lives (he meditates for a couple of hours daily and goes to meditation retreats). “Clarity is power.” Meditate to get more clarity. “Mediation is not an escape from reality. It is getting in touch with reality.” and it a way of understanding reality and a way of understanding yourself and “your operating system”.
Meditate to get clarity and reduce stress
As a spiritual companion I:
• Enable safe and sacred space.
• Provide a non-intrusive, welcoming, healing and holding presence.
• Listen with care and enable people to clarify in their language, their individual spiritual development.
• Can assert clear boundaries and intervene, when appropriate, to stop the abuse.
• Celebrate diversity and welcome the fact that there are many different paths of spiritual development which include religious and non-religious perspectives.
• Am an engaged citizen, actively dedicated to social and ecological health and honouring the spirit in all beings.
• Am aware of local resources and support for spiritual and personal development.
• Know my personal and professional limitations and can refer appropriately.
Your Spiritual Health Programme – download it by clicking on the image above
Core spiritual development aspects
Connection
Regularly connect with and experience the wonder and energy of existence. The foundation of spiritual health is your connection with the wonder and energy of life. From a flower, through a child’s smile, to the awesome night sky, there is magic and beauty to existence. It is crucial that day by day, you have times of connecting with this wonder and energy. This is your spiritual fuel. In the Spiritual Health Programme, you will discover your own best ways of making this connection.
Spirituality: Your natural connection with the wonder and energy of life
Peace of mind
Through regular meditation or silence, you’ll learn how to manage your spiritual growth to find peace of mind and reduce stress. On your spiritual journey, you become a wiser and better person. Every situation, easy or painful, is an opportunity to become more loving, compassionate and conscious. This is the true foundation of happiness and inner peace. In this programme, you will be guided through how to manage your spiritual growth to find peace of mind.
Spiritual growth: The development of love and consciousness
Human being = being (spiritual) + human (personal)
Care and compassion
Caring for others triggers a feedback loop of well-being that nourishes your own body and soul. The third foundation of spiritual health is to give care and love to others. You are part of the web of life, and your spiritual generosity supports everyone’s health. Caring for others triggers a feedback loop of well-being that nourishes your own body and soul. In this programme, you will be reminded and shown precisely how to do this.
Compassion: Caring for others while aware of their pain
“Love is pure attention to the existence of the other“. Louis Lavelle, French philosopher
Core Skills
We are grounded and centred in our bodies, embodied and in hara. Pause, still at will and become mindfully present. Aware of the subtle sensations of connection. Witness with compassion, in silence when appropriate.
Reflection
Self-reflect and manage our behaviour, health and development with compassion, love and wisdom. Are emotionally literate and transparent about our processes. Are in ongoing relationships and groups of peer support, actively seeking and welcoming feedback from others. Understand that there are psychological challenges that occur as the everyday self-emerges into spiritual consciousness. Can take responsibility, apologise, forgive and receive forgiveness. Appreciate that all life is in a continual process of emergence and are comfortable with unknowing. Possess an appropriate sense of humour.
Reflective intelligence
David Perkins of Harvard University says that ‘reflective intelligence’ (RI) is key to learning. RI means being aware of your habitual ways of thinking and learning so that you can improve them. Spiritual self-reflection is an important part of spiritual practice.
What is the difference between religion and spirituality?
“Religion is belief in someone else’s experience.
Spirituality is having your own experience.”
Deepak Chopra
In this era, fewer people define themselves as religious, and more people identify as spiritual. Spirituality gives you autonomy and freedom over your interpretation and experience of the soul or spirit, as opposed to religion which suggests or insists on participation in communal practices and interpretation of the divine, beliefs and worship. Most religions will tell you what spiritual truth is. In spirituality, you discover your spiritual truth for yourself. Both religion and spirituality have value, and it depends on your preference and worldview as well as your personal development and which one is best for you. In studies on the benefits of spirituality and religion, the researchers couldn’t distinguish between the two.
“There’s a tendency, certainly among some scientists I know, to judge religion by whether or not it gives us factual information about an objective reality. That’s not the right yardstick. There are many others who recognise that the value of religion is found in its capacity to provide a sense of community, to allow us to see our lives within a larger context, to connect us through ritual to our forebears, to alleviate anxiety in the face of mortality, among other thoroughly subjective benefits. When I’m looking to understand myself as a human, and how I fit in to the long chain of human culture that reaches back thousands of years, religion is a deeply valuable part of that story.” Brian Greene, theoretical physicist and author of Until the End of Time: Mind, Matter, and Our Search for Meaning in an Evolving Universe
Spirituality gives you a sense of awe and a numinous connection to the wonder and energies of life.
A new spiritual language/semiotics: consciousness
A new spiritual language and semiotics are emerging as the culture, technology and social structures are rapidly changing as well as human consciousness. Unfortunately, people are still ready to die or kill others because of a religious book. ‘God’, religious and even spiritual language (‘soul’, ‘spirit’) is heavily loaded and can trigger people. ‘Consciousness’ and ‘awareness’ are the new modern terms that mean ‘spirit’, ‘soul’ or ‘God’ or ‘Devine’. Consciousness is the ‘hard problem’ in science, and it seems like it is a science with its methods that can fully understand what it is and how it works. Consciousness is the essence of what it is to be ‘you’ with all your subjective experiences that are witnessed in your meta-consciousness awareness when you’re conscious of being conscious. The answer to the existential question, “Who am I?” is: consciousness. When the Buddha was once asked, “Who are you?” He said, “That’s the wrong question.” So the student asked, “What’s the right question?” Buddha said, “What are you is the correct question.” So, the student said, “Ok, what are you?” Buddha said, “Consciousness.” Enlightenment is consciousness. Spirit is consciousness. God is consciousness. We are conscious human beings connected to and parts of a larger Consciousness.
What is consciousness?
DK’s (Dorling Kindersley) definition of consciousness: “Consciousness is the ability to respond to stimulation.” can be applied to anything because of its simplicity (Occam’s razor) and is dependent on its state and the stimuli. So, for example, the consciousness of a rock responds to pressure, heat, cold, vibration and so on to its surroundings. The infinite cosmic or universal or non-dual consciousness is latent with all possibilities, depending on its state and its stimuli. Human consciousness is also infinitely multifaceted and always evolving, developing and becoming more self-conscious based on the stimuli and its ensuing response. It can be claimed that nature is conscious, including animals, plants and more.
“I regard consciousness as fundamental. I regard matter as derivative from consciousness. We cannot get behind consciousness. Everything that we talk about, everything that we regard as existing, postulates consciousness.”
Max Planck, Nobel Prize-winning physicist and the originator of quantum theory
Consciousness has dimensions. Although consciousness is singular, it’s not an event; it’s a continuum, a spectrum. It’s like white light travelling through a prism with its component colours separated into a brilliant rainbow spectrum. There are at least six basic states of consciousness: awake, dreaming, lucid dreaming, deep sleep, witnessing and non-dual oneness.
Philosophers and other scholars tried to unravel what consciousness or self is. For example, Søren Kierkegaard (Danish philosopher and author) suggests a puzzling analysis of the self “A human being is spirit. But what is spirit? Spirit is the self. But what is the self? The self is a relation that relates itself to itself or is the relation’s relating itself to itself in the relation; the self is not the relation but is the relation’s relating itself to itself.” Essentially, what is trying to say is that you have or you are a relation to the divine or greater life and that the cultivation of that relationship is one of the purposes of spiritual development.
The next logical level from spirituality (which was preceded by religion and spirituality) is consciousness. Science has finally started to study it as opposed to religion and spirituality, which have dominated the subject. It will be the same process as with mindfulness, which replaced mediation as an acceptable and desirable mode of getting peace of mind because it was scientifically validated.
Consciousness is like the light spectrum – it has many dimensions and a full spectrum.
Is spirituality a pursuit of particular kinds of higher feelings or states?
Some researchers suggest five types of spiritual feelings or states which are: eudaimonic, aesthetic, ecstatic, sublime and unitive.
Eudaimonic feelings in spirituality are about the pursuit of happiness, human flourishing or prosperity, joy and freedom as well as overcoming suffering.
Aesthetic feelings in spirituality evoke experiences of profound beauty, peace and harmony.
Ecstatic feelings are exceptionally intense states such as bliss and rapture that are usually experienced during trance states.
Sublime feelings give you a sense of awe and numinous connection to the wonder and energies of life as well as unity awareness of everything there is.
Unitive feelings are feelings of non-dual oneness and unity consciousness with everything there is.
What is the difference between spiritual development and personal development?
Spiritual development
Spiritual development is about ‘waking up’ and developing as a ‘being’ and your consciousness and awareness of different states of consciousness, ie awake, dreaming, deep sleep, witnessing/nondual awareness and nondual oneness.
Personal development
Personal development, on the other hand, is about ‘growing up’ and developing as a human through different stages of human development or structures of human consciousness which are archaic, magic, mythic, ethnocentric, world-centric and kosmo-centric. Both paths of waking up and growing up are essential because, in this way, we can experience the full spectrum of consciousness in being a human being. In the context of growing up, spirituality can be appreciated more and deepened. For example, spirituality experienced at the mythic structure stage of human development is usually coloured by religious context and is less deep, as opposed to experiencing it at the world-centric stage, which is more inclusive, deeper and more embracing.
In other words, spiritual development is about discovering who you are as a being (i.e. a full spectrum consciousness) and personal development is about creating yourself and becoming a fully functioning super-human. Human being = being (spiritual) + human (personal).
Spiritual intelligence for creative thinking, learning and performance
There are over 3300 papers (Koenig, 2012) on the benefits of spirituality for wellness, resilience, performance and creativity. There is thorough and rigorous research demonstrating the health and well-being benefits of religion and spirituality – benefits for physical and mental health and benefits for the broader community.
The opening sentence of the Education Reform Act of 1988 states, “The curriculum for a maintained school (must be) a balanced and broadly based curriculum which — promotes the spiritual, moral, cultural, mental and physical development of pupils at the school and of society.” Education (Schools) Act 1992 suggests that “The Chief Inspector for England shall have the general duty of keeping the Secretary of State informed about … the spiritual, moral, social and cultural development of pupils at those schools.” Ofsted School Inspection Handbook (January 2015) lists the word ‘spiritual’ 20 times: “Before making the final judgment on the overall effectiveness, inspectors must also evaluate: the effectiveness and impact of the provision for pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development.” (Paragraph 128)
“Bring something incomprehensible into the world!”
Giles Deleuze, French philosopher
Spirituality is defined as a sense of connection and relating to a bigger life and affirms life’s purposes. When we have this connection and way of relating, our performance is greatly improved. In Maslow’s hierarchy of needs which is one of the best-known theories of motivation, Abraham Maslow suggests that our actions are motivated by higher values such as self-actualisation and spirituality. In the theory of multiple intelligences (Gardner, 1983; Perkins, 1991) spiritual intelligence is an important way of processing information along with other intelligences such as kinesthetic, mathematical, linguistic, logical, perceptual, cognitive, reflective, musical, social and others.
Creativity is defined as the ability to relate and connect imaginative ideas to create something new. Albert Einstein summed up this by saying, “Imagination is more important than knowledge.” because imagination creates knowledge.
Discover how to use your spiritual and soul intelligence to be more creative and resourceful, learn better and keep creating yourself and becoming the best you can be so you can thrive personally, professionally and socially.
Your Spiritual Health Programme – download it by clicking on the image above
Your Spiritual Health Programme
To have a taste of Your Spiritual Health Programme – download the editable pdf and go through it. You can edit it and add your insights, etc. Or you can book your spiritual health mentoring session with Jan, who will take you through it in person, in London, or remotely via Skype/Whatsapp/FaceTime/Zoom, etc.
“Grounded in reliable physiology and psychology ‘Your Spiritual Health Programme’ is relevant to all those involved in health care.”
Professor David Peters MD, Clinical Director, Centre for Resilience, Westminster University
Spiritual Intelligence Programme
Spiritual Intelligence Programme is open to schools and educational bodies as well as individuals to use spiritual intelligence and spiritual literacy to become more creative and resourceful, learn better and become the best you can be so you can thrive personally, professionally, and socially.
During the Spiritual Intelligence Programme, you’ll learn how to
• develop your spirituality further
• boost your emotional wellbeing
• improve your physical and mental health
• connect to the good things in life
• enhance your spiritual intelligence for creative thinking, learning and performance
Spirituality & Mental Health: Understanding Extreme Spiritual States & How to Care for Them
There is a history of spiritual states being misdiagnosed as mental illness. There are also cultural challenges. What is normal behaviour in one culture can be abnormal in another? Bliss, ecstasy, despair, shaking, quaking, visions, retreat, asceticism, talking with spirits, a gift of tongues, hearing voices (“5-15% of people hear outside voices. About 1% of people with no diagnosis of mental illness hear more persistent, recurring voices.” said researchers Charles Fernyhough and Simon McCarthy-Jones of Durham University, UK). All these may be acceptable in someone’s home culture but frightening or risky in another. Spiritual Companions Trust has published a booklet called Spirituality & Mental Health: Understanding Extreme Spiritual States & How to Care for Them. This booklet asserts that to understand and interpret extreme or unusual spiritual states, it is necessary to be culturally inclusive. It is also necessary to appreciate both psychological and spiritual dynamics. If we look up a definition of the word ‘psyche’ we will find: soul, mind, spirit. Both spirituality and transpersonal psychology explore who we are.
Spiritual Health Mentoring Sessions
- 60 min sessions
- Person-centred and soul-centred approaches as well as evidence-based (4000+ studies on benefits of spirituality)
- Discuss confidentiality and purpose of Spiritual Health Mentoring
- Overview of Spiritual Health Mentoring
- Set up a schedule for weekly meetings onsite in central London (South Kensington) or online via Skype/Whatsapp/FaceTime/Zoom
- During the sessions, we cover the key aspects of Spiritual Health such as connection, peace of mind and care and compassion. What do you do to connect and maintain your spiritual life? How do you self-manage and find peace of mind? How are you of service in the world?
- Meditation/mindfulness session is included
- Suggest spiritual health practices
- How to monitor and boost your spiritual health
- Suggest coherent breathing patterns based on your unique HRV (heart rate variability)
- Entrain your biology with spiritual practices
- Provide customised prompts and reminders for your spiritual practices
- Show progress in your spiritual development
- Deepen your spiritual practice with advanced functions and mentoring
- Provide feedback and suggest how spiritual practices can best fit your personal and professional lives
- Provide background knowledge about spiritual health, enlightenment and spiritual intelligence
- Setting up a sacred space for spiritual practice
- You’ll receive a hard copy of Your Spiritual Health Programme
- Fee: £200/60-min session
- Venue/location: in Chelsea, London SW3 or at your location in London or remotely via Skype/Whatsapp/FaceTime/Zoom
- Book your session now: call/text/Whatsapp Jan on +44 7956 288574 or email
Spiritual Health Programme workshops
I offer short (3-hour) and one-day Spiritual Health Programmes. For further info, please email me or call/text on +44 7956 288574
Tapping, EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique)
Tapping or EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique) is one of the simplest, easiest and most effective techniques for releasing stress, trauma and anxiety as well as managing your emotions and stress. Tapping can also be used as a way of clearing any blocks to spiritual development and enlightenment. Read more about the tapping EFT sessions I offer in London
About Jan, your spiritual health mentor
Jan Cisek is a spiritual health mentor, spiritual companion, and meditation instructor with over 40+ years of experience in spirituality and wellness and works in Kensington and Chelsea, London and remotely online via Zoom/Skype/Whatsapp/FaceTime, etc. Jan has a diploma in Practical Spirituality & Wellness, the first UK, Ofqual accredited vocational diploma course in this evidence-based discipline. He has a certificate in counselling skills. Jan is also an environmental psychologist (MSc) specialising in creating sacred spaces for working and living. Contact Jan
To have a taste of Your Spiritual Health Programme – download the editable pdf and go through it.