It takes a resolute person to maintain the spiritual strength they once had.
Life Beats Down on Spiritual Resilience
Older people experience so much loss as they age – loss of health, of independence, of mobility, of work that gave their life purpose and meaning. Loss of friends who have passed on or who are similarly unable to get out and about the way they used to.
Loss of church involvement: now they attend rarely if at all. So all those relationships and the enjoyment of working with others at church functions – all that is gone. The minister occasionally visits, but he’s a stranger and it’s hard to build a relationship with someone who hasn’t known you in the past.
They’ve lost the sense of being the hub of the family. All the kids are busy with their own families and careers; the older person begins to feel like they’re just one of many things on the kids’ to-do list. Hearing may be diminished which makes group activities more stressful, since they have to strain to hear at all. Prayer, which may have once been very meaningful, now feels like little more than muttering to that blank wall in front of them.
They watch the news, and how depressing and frightening it is.
Where is God? They grew up believing God is all-knowing and all-powerful, but He doesn’t seem to be very active in the terrible events of the world today.
They can’t see well to read the Bible easily, and since it’s such an effort, they don’t do it much. And when they try to remember Bible verses memorized as children, the verses seem rather hollow.
“I will never leave you nor forsake you.” Then why have I been abandoned to this lonely room? “I have engraved you on the palm of my hands.” So why doesn’t God remember me and bring me joy and hope again?
Yes, in so many ways life beats down one’s spiritual resilience.
They feel like the old Breton sailor adrift on an open sea, “O God, thy sea is so vast, my boat is so small.”
It’s that boat that we need to do something about, because that boat is your loved one’s spiritual resilience.
What Is Spiritual Resilience?
What in fact is spiritual resilience? It’s been defined as “the ability to sustain one’s sense of self and purpose through a set of beliefs, principles or values while encountering adversity, stress and trauma…”
Adversity, stress and trauma – that’s what aging people experience in spades. So what is going to sustain them as they live through the challenges of life at this stage?
Spiritual Resilience Isn’t a Given
It’s spiritual resilience that enables them to rise above, to live through their circumstances, by drawing on “internal and external spiritual resources”. Spiritual resilience isn’t a given, it isn’t something that some people are simply blessed with – like good genes. Spiritual resilience is an approach to life that needs to be maintained and nurtured as much as exercise is needed for muscle tone.
And this is where we can have a powerful impact on our loved one’s spiritual resilience, as we intentionally create ways to strengthen their spirit.
A powerful way to do that is through music, particularly hymn singing, because hymn singing strengthens the spirituality of seniors and of those who care for them, as well as improving the cognitive functioning of their brain.
“A group of researchers from the University of Toronto and Unity Health Toronto recently completed a study, published in November 2021 in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, looking at what happens to the brain when a subject listens to music they’ve known and loved for 25 years or more.” Old favourites stimulated the parts of the brain involved in cognitive and memory function. When listening to not so familiar music, these regions of the brain did not react in the same way.
Encouraged by the results of the first trial the team tested whether listening to familiar music could be used as therapy. Fourteen participants listened to an hour of familiar music for three weeks (all in the early stages of cognitive decline) and the data showed substantial improvement in the results of the Cognitive Assessment Test and the overall functioning of the brain.
(“How Your Favourite Songs Can Benefit Your Brain Function” by Elizabeth Chorney-Booth, Dignified Living, Fall 2022)
Organizations have sprung up around the world to provide music for dementia care. For instance, M4d Radio is based in the U.K. and makes music from the 50’s and 60’s available online around the clock. See https://m4dradio.com
Music Mends Minds is another group that was started by a couple in Los Angeles in 2006. Irwin, who suffered from Parkinson’s Disease and early Dementia, could still play the piano. His wife Carol enrolled him in the UCLA Alzheimer’s and Dementia Patient Care program. There he was able to play to an audience of students and adults -- and Irwin’s passion for music was reignited. He became more aware, energetic, confident, talkative and hopeful. Delighted with her husband’s progress, Carol started Music Mends Minds and organized a band of cognitively impaired people,; “The 5th Dementia”.
Now many years later Music Mends Minds is supported by Rotary International and has chapters all over the world. See https://www.musicmendsminds.org/
The science supports what I learned personally through many years of volunteering to sing in nursing homes, palliative care wards in hospitals, and long-term care facilities. Music has the power to awaken the spirit and the soul.
That’s why I created and continue to create Mp3s and Mp4s of the old hymns of the faith in lower keys, set to easy listening accompaniments, so any caregiver can bless themselves and their loved one with this spirit lifting music. Loaded on their phone or tablet they can take the music anywhere. You can find the hymns in the resource section of my website. See https://kingdomcaregiverscoach.com
“Spirituality Is Good For You”
Research has long shown that spirituality is good for one’s health, mental and emotional, as well as physical. So when one’s spiritual health diminishes, that will inevitably impact these other areas of health.
Thus paying attention to your loved one’s spiritual health is not just a nice thing to do, it’s essential to keep your loved one at their best mentally, emotionally and physically.
If you are new to the caregiving world or need to know you are not alone in your marathon of care, I have an eBook entitled: Successfully Navigate the Marathon of Care: A Christian Family Caregiver’s Guide, $12.99 USD available on my website.
You can also download the Complimentary Gift from my website:
The Marathon of Care: Five Winning Strategies to Finish Strong.
May you and your loved one be blessed as you sing.