Critical Reflection Spirituality And Professional Practice

This book explores the concept and facilitation of critical reflection and its implications for professional practice. It draws on the author’s own extensive experience to demonstrate how reflective processes involving metaphor and imagery, as well as critique, can be used not only to understand and articulate key values underpinning professional practice and to generate new theoretical models, but to explore one's own worldview, including the ultimate question: 'Who am I?’. The author incorporates practical examples of reflection-through-writing and other reflective techniques which illustrate how ideas about critical reflection, transformative learning, authenticity and spirituality are intricately entwined within theories and practices of adult learning and professional development. The book highlights the importance of understanding the relationship between personal worldviews, values and professional practice. It draws on the concepts of vocation and professional psychological wellbeing to consider what it means to act authentically as a professional within an audit culture. The book will be invaluable for practitioners, academics and students interested in critical reflection, educational inquiry, autoethnography and the use of the self in and as research, the nature and use of metaphor, and the development of worldviews.

Critical spirituality is a way of naming a desire to work with what is meaningful in the context of enabling a socially just, diverse and inclusive society. Critical spirituality means seeing people holistically, seeking to understand where they are coming from and what matters to them at a fundamental level; the level that is part of the everyday but also transcends it. What is important in critical spirituality is to combine a postmodern valuing of individual experience of spirituality with all its diversity with a critical perspective that asserts the importance of living harmoniously and respectfully at an individual, family and community level. Human service professionals currently wrestle with the gradually increasing expectation to work with spirituality often without feeling capable of undertaking such practice. Some work with people experiencing major trauma or change such as palliative care or rehabilitation where people ask meaning of life questions to which they feel ill equipped to respond. Others work with individuals, families and communities experiencing conflict about spiritual issues. Increased migration and movement of refugees increases contact with people for whom spirituality is central. Such experiences raise a number of issues for existing professionals as well as students: what do we mean by spiritual? How does this relate to religion? How do we work with the spiritual in ways that recognise and value difference, without accepting abusive relationships? What are the limits to spiritual tolerance, if any? This book explores these issues and addresses the dilemmas and challenges experienced by professionals. It also provides a number of practical tools such as possible questions to ask to assess for spiritual issues; to see spirituality as part of a web of relationships.

The steady increase in economic, social, environmental and political hardships experienced by many around the globe has led, in recent years, to a corresponding growth in the importance ascribed to finding meaning in life, and to addressing the bigger questions. As deliverers of care and assistance to people across many different faiths and cultures whose lives are impacted directly by these hardships, current and future social workers must learn to apply concepts of spirituality in their own professional practice. In this unique and inspiring book, a diverse group of authors draws deeply on their own experiences of spirituality in practice, providing a fascinating and often moving exploration of how meaning is derived in a variety of different contexts. Topics discussed include: - Mindfulness, meditation and the practice of Falun Gong - The interaction between spirituality, social justice and professional practice - The role of spirituality in the provision of palliative care - Indigenous spiritualities, interconnectedness and human-animal bonds - The role of spirituality in providing hospitality and acceptance in practice. Enriched by a wealth of case studies and a strong focus on critical reflection throughout, Practising Spirituality is an important and thought-provoking read for students and practitioners across the full range of health and social care disciplines – from social work and counselling to nursing, youth work and beyond.

Many students and practitioners are familiar with critical reflection but struggle to make space for it in their everyday practice. This book provides an accessible and practical introduction not only to doing critical reflection, but to being critically reflective. - It demonstrates how reflective capacity can be developed in different practice contexts and applied productively to supervision, teamwork and interprofessional working. - It outlines the different theoretical underpinnings and methods of critical reflection, exploring the use of visual images, writing techniques and group meetings. - It is rich with engaging case studies and questions for the reader that will help them to make critical reflection an integral part of their everyday practice. This book is an ideal guide to dealing with challenge and change across a range of social and healthcare services, including social work, nursing, youth and community work, counselling and allied healthcare professions.

Critical reflection helps professionals to learn directly from their practice experience, so that they can improve their own work in an ongoing and flexible way – something essential in today’s complex and changing organisations. It allows change to be managed in a way which enables individuals to preserve a sense of what is fundamentally important to them as professionals. It is particularly important as it can also help make sense of some fundamental issues, and so also has implications for how we live our lives. However, more systematic research on critical reflection is needed to help us understand what works best for professionals in different settings. This timely work explores how critical reflection is researched, evaluated and used as a research method itself, with the aim of improving how it is taught and practised in a rigorous and transferable way. Developing a more comprehensive and multi-disciplinary view of the current state of critical reflection and the research directions which need to be taken, the book is divided into four parts. It: - Provides an overview of different perspectives on critical reflection and stimulates dialogue between them - Establishes some common platforms from which to develop further research directions - Identifies the major issues in evaluating critical reflection teaching, and main methods for doing so - Contributes to social science methodological innovations by exploring how methods based on critical reflection can be used for researching professional practice - Contains contributions from academics who are internationally known and highly experienced in different aspects of critical reflection. Researching Critical Reflection is an important reference for all students, practitioners, and researchers – including in the areas of education, management, health and social work – who engage with critical reflection to develop their practice.

This book provides an accessible overview of the influential Fook/Gardner Critical Reflection framework for students, researchers and professionals. It then presents a wide range of illustrative case studies from a variety of different health and social care settings, demonstrating how it can be used in effective and innovative practice around the world.

‘Almost before I had begun this wonderful book, I was hooked’ STEPHEN COTTRELL ‘Robyn Wrigley-Carr has produced a masterpiece of insight and wisdom’ CLARION JOURNAL ‘Nourishment for the soul on every page’ AYLA LEPINE, CHURCH TIMES ‘Wrigley-Carr illustrates how Underhill wonderfully unites reflection and prayer’ DANA GREENE Beloved spiritual writer Evelyn Underhill believed that God does not just come to us at special times, but is always coming to us. But how do we recognise his coming and make ourselves open to it? In Music of Eternity, the Archbishop of York’s Advent Book 2021, Robyn Wrigley-Carr shares a series of meditations exploring the nature God’s comings. Skilfully weaving together Underhill’s writings with the psalms and short prayers, she shows how, as Christians, we can embrace God’s coming and be transformed by them in order to better love others. Full of rich warmth and encouragement, these Christian meditations will help you make the most of the Advent season and more able to connect with God at all times. Set out in four parts to take you through Advent and with questions for reflection, the Archbishop of York’s Advent book can be used as a study for individuals or small groups to prepare for Christmas. Music of Eternity will help you find space to deepen your relationship with God, and to understand what Evelyn Underhill called the ‘many-sided truth of God’s perpetual coming to His creatures’.

Critical spirituality is a way of naming a desire to work with what is meaningful in the context of enabling a socially just, diverse and inclusive society. Critical spirituality means seeing people holistically, seeking to understand where they are coming from and what matters to them at a fundamental level; the level that is part of the everyday but also transcends it. What is important in critical spirituality is to combine a postmodern valuing of individual experience of spirituality with all its diversity with a critical perspective that asserts the importance of living harmoniously and respectfully at an individual, family and community level. Human service professionals currently wrestle with the gradually increasing expectation to work with spirituality often without feeling capable of undertaking such practice. Some work with people experiencing major trauma or change such as palliative care or rehabilitation where people ask meaning of life questions to which they feel ill equipped to respond. Others work with individuals, families and communities experiencing conflict about spiritual issues. Increased migration and movement of refugees increases contact with people for whom spirituality is central. Such experiences raise a number of issues for existing professionals as well as students: what do we mean by spiritual? How does this relate to religion? How do we work with the spiritual in ways that recognise and value difference, without accepting abusive relationships? What are the limits to spiritual tolerance, if any? This book explores these issues and addresses the dilemmas and challenges experienced by professionals. It also provides a number of practical tools such as possible questions to ask to assess for spiritual issues; to see spirituality as part of a web of relationships.