Transformation and subjectivity in spiritual emergence and emergency : a discourse analytic study

Discussions of spiritual emergence and spiritual emergency have often revolved around the difficulty of discerning spiritual experience from mental illness. This post-structural approach attempts to move beyond these dualisms to a socio-historically contextualized account of how spiritual emergence and emergency are constructed. A qualitative design was based on in depth, semi-structured interviews with 12 Australians – seven who identified as having experienced a spiritual emergence or emergency, four therapists who worked with the spiritually emergent, and one who identified as both. Participants constructed spiritual emergence and emergency as part of a transformative, meaningful movement of growth and evolution towards wholeness. The spiritually emergent self was constructed as dual – with a superficial self that could dissolve or shatter; and a true, essential self. An expanded sense of embodiment was associated with a reorientation to a more spiritual form of subjectivity. This study highlights problems with viewing spiritual emergence and emergency as individual conditions, and opens discussions of the multiple and contradictory subjectivities available to the spiritually emergent. Implications for treatment are suggested.