Spirituality is a part of psychological resilience!

Stating that spirituality must be now seen as a part of mental health, Psychiatrist Prof. Nevzat Tarhan said, “It enables the person to activate their belief system and to manage their routine lives in a healthier manner. Those who can take shelter to a higher value and powers can control feelings of the loneliness and fear. If a person does not have such feeling, that person starts the treatment with minus one.  In short, spirituality is a part of psychological resilience.”.


President of Üsküdar University, Psychiatrist Prof. Nevzat Tarhan made remarks on the impact of the spirituality on mental health.

While financial welfare is increasing, the spiritual welfare is decreasing on the contrary…

Prof. Nevzat Tarhan stated that in the research carried out recently, especially after the 2000s, it is remarkable that the spiritual welfare is not increasing in parallel to the increase in the financial welfare and Prof. Tarhan said, “Due to the increase in unhappiness and depression, a ‘Religious Freedom Day’ was announced in the USA in July 2008.  This implement started especially due the difficulties in treatment of patients coming from different culture. People were experience some labelling sometimes due to their cultural differences. It appeared due to this global religious and cultural discrimination.”.

Noting that the studies on brain approves the multiple intelligence theory, Prof. Nevzat Tarhan said, “It has been understood that there are various atmospheres related to social skills, emotional skills and logical skills. Notions such as emotional literacy and social literacy and notions such as social blindness, emotional blindness have emerged. Nature intelligence and moral intelligence concepts have emerged. That is, it is also defined as consciousness.”.

T cells effects the immune system

Noting that several studies has been carried out on people with this intelligence types, Prof. Nevzat Tarhan, said “David McClelland, one of the psychology professors at Harvard, has carried out studies with people who define themselves as spiritual or religious or having high morale and with people who define themselves less interested in spirituality. The general health status and immune systems of those people were compared. One group was showed a love movie and other group was showed a movie on the life of Mother Teresa. Later, blood cells of those people are examined. The activities of T cells which indicated that the immune system works well, were examined. At the end of the study, it was seen that the activities of T cells increased in the group that had watched the movie on Mother Teresa’s life. What does this mean?  For those who watched love movie, their T cells are weakening, however, for those who watched the other movie, they experienced the feelings of tranquility, deepness, relaxedness. These emotions increase T cell activity. The fact that T cells work well shows that the immune system works well.”.

Belief systems support immune system

Stating that belief systems impact people’s immune system as well, Prof. Nevzat Tarhan said, “Studies carried out also show that, too. Autonomic nerve system is not autonomic at all, that is not self-governing. It completely works with chemicals, commands and chemical messages on our brain.  If a person is in the state of ‘fight or flight’, if they have a constant anxiety that somethings will go wrong, if they feel in danger in every moment, whenever they have illness, they do not ask who created me, from which matter, I am created from inorganic matter. They do not call carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, azote to account for. They think that I will be demolished after I die’. If they think like that, their brain constantly releasing stress hormones and parasympathetic neve system cannot be activated. What does this mean? It means that the body cannot relax. People with morale can control this, that is, they reason ‘this life is not coincidental, these incidents are not happiness on their own’.  In other words, belief impacts positively on mental health. After a person took measures, nonresistance is important. For example, you are on the bus. You have to trust the driver otherwise you cannot sleep. In life, a person relaxes at the point when they trust the owner of this universe.  It is very important that a person thinks ‘There is a power knowing all and controlling all. That power can help me.’.”

Those who take shelter to a sublime power can manage the feeling of loneliness and fear

Stating that today, third generation metacognitive psychotherapy methods and metacognitive treatments aims for a person to discover their mental shelters, Prof. Nevzat Tarhan said, “Those who can take shelter to something, they can manage the feeling of loneliness and fear. If a person does not have such feeling, the person starts the treatment by minus one. They cannot progress in the treatment, they cannot manage the stress because a person has the feeling of control. The feeling of control can be described in this way; even this is also called as God complex. Some people want to control everything. They even control the breath of their child. They perceive as the God on surface. This is called as God complex. This is stealing role from God. The person says I am perfect and everybody have to be perfect. My child must be perfect, I have to know everything’ and when they do not know everything they get too excited and they feel panicked when they cannot control. Those who have a high control feeling cannot find peace.”.

The region of inclination to God in brain…

Prof. Nevzat Tarhan stated that there are three things when a sublime power is believed and Prof. Tarhan said, “There is value of consolations, value of meaning and also the value of inner peace when that person integrates with the creator. There are some experiments on Buddhist monks. We applied that on mevlevi dervishes.  Priests from Jerusalem were put into meditation in the 1990s.  The brain movements of the priests were examined. All of their desires were met and all of their needs were eliminated during the meditation and they were completely relaxed. When the feeling of integration with universe is caught, the brain releases greatly happiness hormones. During that, it was examined which region of the brain was working. That region is also called God region, well actually, it is not God region. It is the region of inclination to God for that person. When the person feels that they integrate with God, they feel great relaxation. However, if that person has God complex, they cannot relax and this person has higher continuous anxiety.”.

Feeling of spirituality gives peace to a person

Prof. Nevzat Tarhan said that that’s why spirituality gives peace to a person and said: “What spirituality makes a person gain is that all desires and needs are met, and the integrity with this universe. When a person does that, they live with consolation. Everything begins to make sense. ‘There is a meaning in universe, we did not come on the earth coincidentally’ they say, and they make sense of death which is the most important.”.

A person must know the limit of their own power

Noting that one of the human brain features is to imagine, Prof. Nevzat Tarhan said, “In a living being, the brain is only limited to eating, drinking, shelter and reproduce. However, the human brain is interested in abstract thinking, conceptual thinking. It imagines the symbolic thinking. Now, our dreams are limitless but our power is limited. There is a testing network in brain to determine the limit between dreams and strength. When this network is corrupted, they cannot differentiate between imagination and reality, however, this network works in healthy people. If this person has a high feeling of control, this network can be corrupted.  The person interferes with everything and they interfere with their mental health, as well.  That why, people must know their limit of power in this case to enable their spirituality.  When they start to understand their own helplessness, weakness and powerlessness, when they believe that there is an invisible power that knows and controls everything, these people make sense of life.”.

Spirituality must be seen as a part of mental health

Stating that spirituality not must be seen as a part of mental health, Prof. Nevzat Tarhan said, “Not seeing the spirituality as a part of mental health is the old approach. The fact that person can activate their belief systems enables that person to live their routine life in a healthier manner. In summary, spirituality is a part of psychological resilience.”.

Üsküdar News Agency (ÜNA)