FM-AA-CIA-15 Rev.

0 10-July-2020

Study Guide in GE1: Understanding the Self Module No. 9

STUDY GUIDE FOR MODULE NO. 9

CHAPTER II: UNPACKING THE SELF

A. THE SPIRITUAL SELF
MODULE OVERVIEW

Spirituality influences the individual through acts of faith. This module provides a view on spirituality
and religion. The concept of soul based on the different ethnolinguistic groups and the rituals and
ceremonies as part of religion.
The search for meaning of life and the ways of discovering its meaning as presented by Victor
Frankl is also discussed in this module.

MODULE LEARNING OBJECTIVES

1. Explain the practice of religion and the belief in supernatural.

2. Differentiate Spirituality from Religiosity
3. Examine the different concepts of the soul
4. Define one’s own meaning of life.

LEARNING CONTENTS (title of the subsection)

The song “Who Am I” by the Casting Crowns states “… not because of who I am, but because of
who you are.” Who is greater than us in reference to our identity as a person? Is there really a God,
the Ultimate and Sacred? Can we not understand our human being apart from God? Who is God?
Who is the self in relation to God? What is the spiritual self? What is spirituality? Why are there
many religions? Are the religious practices necessary to define our spiritual self?

These are some of the questions that a man has in relation to the Spiritual Self.

Revelation is God’s manifestation of His love for us. He takes the initiative of revealing His
existence. We experience Him in so many ways. We see God as the source of life, faith, hope and
love. We experience God in creation. Whenever we witness the beauty of nature around us, we feel
God’s greatness. We experience God through the love of people who are parts of our life. We are
beings by, with, in and for others. The love of our parents, siblings, special relationships are signs of
presence of God who truly loves. We call this mediated love. We experience God’s love because
God makes use of others to reach out to us.

We see God in positive and negative experiences. We see God in our victories, successes, joys,
laughter and achievements and all other forms of goodness. Even when we experience pain,
defeats, failures, illnesses and even death, God is present. God is close to the people suffering.
God’s will is not suffering but as long as we are alive, there are challenges that we have to face.
God’s will is for us to overcome them and learn from them.

We see God in our church or the religious community we belong. We encounter God in the
sacraments, in table fellowship, in prayers and liturgy. We encounter God in different forms of
religion because these are paths towards God. For Christians, God is alive in Jesus because He is
the fullness in God’s revelation. The bible is a sacred book that contains the interplay of revelation
and faith. Christians come to know God through the mystery of incarnation when God become one

PANGASINAN STATE UNIVERSITY 1

 FM-AA-CIA-15 Rev. 0 10-July-2020

Study Guide in GE1: Understanding the Self Module No. 9

with us in Jesus, the revealer. Moslems see God as Allah. Hindus see God as Brahma. Buddhists
see the sacred through the enlightenment of Siddhartha Gautama. World religions and different
Christian denominations exist because of their connection to God and His revelations. All these
religions connect to God, the Sacred or the Ultimate in different forms of worship.

THE NINE SACRED PATHWAYS

The book, Sacred Pathways, written by Gary Thomas presents the nine sacred paths to connect
with God. These are the following

1. Naturalists: Loving God Out of Doors

 You feel closer to God when surrounded by the beauty of nature: the sunrise in a
beautiful mountain, the sunset by the sea, flowers in the garden, the birds, the trees
and butterflies. You see Him in the things He has made, and worship Him in the
cathedral of His creation.
2. Sensate: Loving God with the Senses
 You love to worship God in ways that engage your senses of sight, smell, sound.
Beautiful sanctuaries, scented candles, gentle touch of a nun, incense, Christian art,
and religious instrumental music are appealing to you.
3. Traditionalists: Loving God Through Ritual and Symbol
 You may be drawn to the Book of Common Prayer, liturgy, and observance of the
church calendar, the sacraments, the ancient songs, and creeds of the Church.
4. Ascetics: Loving God in Solitude and Simplicity
 You love to be left alone to pray and tend to live a simplified and quiet life free of
distractions that would hinder your worship to God.
5. Activists: Loving God through Confrontation
 You are spiritually nourished by fighting for the right. You gravitate toward social or
evangelical causes, drawing near to God through such things as prayer walks, food
pantries, crisis pregnancy centers, marches, etc.
6. Caregivers: Loving God by Loving Others
 You serve Christ by serving others. In preparing meals, counseling, volunteering at a
shelter, tending the sick, or opening your home, you feel closest to God.
7. Enthusiasts: Loving God through Mystery and Celebration
 Thomas calls you a cheerleader for God. You love to just follow the spirit’s leading,
celebrate God’s mysterious ways, and exude gladness and wonder.
8. Contemplatives: Loving God through Adoration
 You see God as the lover of your soul. You seek to practice His presence
continually, and crave alone any time to gaze on His face and lose yourself in Him.
9. Intellectuals: Loving God with the Mind
 You feel closer to God when you learn something new about Him. You may sense
God closest in study and meditation on Scripture, apologetics, theology, and creeds.

God constantly reveals Himself to us in His presence, absence, and even in silence. We are
challenged to be attuned with this God to know ourselves better. Apart from this God, we are
nothing. We see God in different faces, and we respond to God in many different ways.

PANGASINAN STATE UNIVERSITY 2

 FM-AA-CIA-15 Rev. 0 10-July-2020

Study Guide in GE1: Understanding the Self Module No. 9

FINDING AND CREATING MEANING

We see God in sorrow and in happiness. When life is easy and comfortable we thank God. Then we
enjoy life and sometimes forget about Him. When we suffer and confronted with problems,
tragedies, miseries, and challenges, we remember God again. Why does God allow suffering? Is
God a punishing God? Why do good people suffer? Shall we thank God for the sufferings and trials
in our life?

Victor Emil Frankl (1959) introduced logotherapy, which is the pursuit of one’s meaning in life. This
theory is founded on the belief that human nature is motivated by the search for the purpose of life.
Being the founder of logotherapy, his belief was influenced by his personal experience of suffering
and loss in Nazi concentration camps. As a survivor, he introduced the concept of tragic optimism.
This is manifested when a person is genuinely optimistic even in the face of miseries, chaos and
extremely negative circumstances. In logotherapy, this is represented by the “tragic triad” which
consists of pain, guilt and death. Frankl further explained that the human person is motivated by a
will to meaning. This is an inner pull to find meaning in life. Basic principles of logotherapy include
the following:

1. Life has meaning under all circumstances, even the most miserable ones.
2. Our main motivation for living is our will to find meaning in life.
3. We have freedom to find meaning in what we do, and what we experience, or at least in
the stand we take when faced with a situation of unchangeable suffering.

According to Frankl, we can discover this meaning in life in three different ways:

a. By creating a work or doing a deed

b. By experiencing something or encountering someone
c. By the attitude we take toward unavoidable suffering and that everything can be taken
from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms – to choose one’s attitude in
any given set of circumstances.

PANGASINAN STATE UNIVERSITY 3

 FM-AA-CIA-15 Rev. 0 10-July-2020

Study Guide in GE1: Understanding the Self Module No. 9

THE COFFEE BEAN STORY

What has life taught you through your actions, decisions, encounters with people, and attitudes in
the most tragic or most challenging event in your life? Did you end up bitter or better? Here is an
inspiring story of the carrot, egg or coffee: which are you?

A young woman went to her mother and told her about her life and how things were so
hard for her. She did not know how she was going to make it and wanted to give up. She was tired
of fighting and struggling. It seemed as one problem was solved, a new one arose.
Her mother took her to the kitchen. She filled three pots with water and placed each on a
high fire. Soon the posts came to boil. In the first she placed carrots, in the second she placed
eggs and in the last she placed ground coffee beans. She let them sit and boil, without saying a
word.
In about twenty minutes she turned off the burners. She fished the carrots out and placed
them in a bowl. She pulled the eggs out and placed them in a bowl.
Then she ladled the coffee out and placed it in a bowl. Turning to her daughter, she asked,
“Tell me what you see.”
“Carrots, eggs, and coffee,” she replied.
Her mother brought her closer and asked her to feel the carrots. She did and noticed that
they were soft. The mother then asked the daughter to take an egg and break it. After pulling off
the shell, she observed the hard-boiled egg. Finally, the mother asked the daughter to sip the
coffee. The daughter smiled, as she tasted its rich aroma the daughter then asked, “What does it
mean, mother?”
Her mother explained that each of these objects had faced the same adversity: boiling
water. Each reacted differently.
The carrot went in strong, hard and unrelenting. However, after being subjected to the
boiling water, it softened and became weak.
The egg had been fragile. Its thin outer shell had protected its liquid interior, but after
sitting through the boiling water, its insides became hardened.
The ground coffee beans were unique, however. After they were in the boiling water, they
had changed the water.
“Which are you?” she asked her daughter. “When adversity knocks on your door, how do
you respond? Are you a carrot, an egg, or a coffee bean?”

From the story, who are you? Are you the carrot that seems strong, but with pain and adversity do
you wilt and lose your strength?

Are you the egg that starts with a malleable heart, but changes with heat? Did you have a fluid
spirit, but after a death, breakup, financial hardship or some other trial, have you become rigid and
stiff? Does your shell look the same, but on the inside are you biter and tough, disconnected from
spirit with a hardened heart?

Are you like the coffee bean? The bean actually transforms the hot water, the very circumstance
that brings it pain. When the water gets hot, the coffee releases its fragrance and flavor. If you are
like the coffee bean, when things are at their worst, you get better and change the situation around
you. When the hour is darkest and challenges are their greatest, do you elevate yourself to another
level?

PANGASINAN STATE UNIVERSITY 4

 FM-AA-CIA-15 Rev. 0 10-July-2020

Study Guide in GE1: Understanding the Self Module No. 9

How do you handle adversity? Are you a carrot, an egg, or a coffee bean? You may have started as
a carrot or egg, but the beauty of life is you can consciously choose who to be.

Here’s hoping you choose to be coffee.

The happiest of people don’t necessarily have the best of everything;

they just make the best of everything that comes their way.

Possibility Thinker’s Creed

By Robert Schuller

When faced with a mountain I will not quit.

I will keep on striving until I climb over, find a pass through,
tunnel underneath, or simply stay and turn the mountain into a gold mine.

THE CONCEPT OF SPIRIT OR SOUL

In understanding the spiritual self, we have to know the role of the Spirit of a Sacred or of a God.
But even in this contemporary time, we are still influenced by the world view on the presence of
spirits. We may be introduced to modern ways of looking at things in colleges and universities, but
when we reach our own places we go back to the beliefs shared with the elders in our family and
community. We cannot totally separate our identity from these beliefs because these beliefs shape
the Filipino personality. We need to go back to the spirit world to understand this part of our spiritual
self.

1. The Soul According to the Indigenous Filipino.

Even before the coming of the colonizers in the Philippines, our ancestors believed in
animism. It is a belief that everything has life or spirit. Until now, the concept of soul or spirit
of a person is present in different regions and ethnic groups in the country. For the
Tagalogs, soul or spirit when the person is alive is known as kaluluwa; by the Ilocanos
kararua; by the Pangasinenses kamarerua; by the Bagobos, gimokud; by the Bukidnons,
makatu; and the Ilonggos, dungan.
The dungan or soul of the Ilonggos, according to Alicia Magos (1986), is not normally
seen by the human eye. Sometimes, however, it comes out of the body and takes on a
visible form, such as that of an insect (a housefly or a moth) or a small animal, like a lizard.
That is why grandmothers are always telling their grandchildren to eat even just a little
before going to bed for id the child’s dungan gets hungry at night, it might go to the pot of
rice in the kitchen and be mistaken for an insect and be killed.
Magos gave the characteristics of dungan. The dungan is the essence of life and
existence. It is a spirit that is unseen, which gives animation and vitality to a person. Without
it, a person gets sick and dies after the loss. The dungan is also ethereal. It is something
light or airy since it goes with the air or wind. The dungan is an entity with a free will; it can
leave the body voluntarily when the person is asleep and quite involuntarily when it is
attracted by any other spirits.
How does the dungan enter the human body? Magos further explains that prior to the
entry and habitation in the human body, the dungan was believed to inhabit the region above
the surface of the earth together with the other dungans. Before it enters the body, the
dungan takes a special interest in the unborn child being which it has chosen to enter. After

PANGASINAN STATE UNIVERSITY 5

 FM-AA-CIA-15 Rev. 0 10-July-2020

Study Guide in GE1: Understanding the Self Module No. 9

a child’s delivery, the dungan which is lodged inside the baby’s body is believed to be
incomplete or not fully intact. The child’s dungan is weak at birth. The dungan stays inside
the body most of the time where it grows proportionally with the body. Since it is weak the
dungan should be protected, nurtured and cared for because it can be made sick or
weakened by others with a strong dungan. When the dungan travels outside the body it can
be stolen, or held captive. When this happens, it greatly affects the body leading to sickness
or physical ailments.

RITUALS, CEREMONIES, RELIGION

It is in the belief of spirits and supernatural powers that rituals and ceremonies are formed. For
example, many rituals are performed to welcome, nurture or return the dungan back to the human
body. What are rituals and ceremonies? Do you practice some rituals or ceremonies upon waking
up, when leaving home, when taking an examination, when you want more money or win the heart
of somebody? Why do we perform such rituals?

Rituals and ceremonies are a series of actions performed according to a prescribed order. Rituals
can be secular or religious, personal or communal. Flag ceremony, celebration of events, and
sacraments are examples of rituals. According to Emile Durkheim (1965), the reference or object of
a ritual is the belief system of a society, which is constituted by a classification of everything into the
two realms of the sacred and the profane. This classification is taken as a universal feature of
religion. A.R. Radcliffe Brown points out the primary functions of rituals:

a. give expression to the collective sentiment of the society

b. contribute to social cohesion or unity
c. maintain the social system through time

LEARNING ACTIVITY 1

Watch the Bollywood movie PK (2014) and make a movie critique. Be guided by this article
on how to write your paper [Link]

LEARNING ACTIVITY 2

Song of Ddication

Choose a song that best describes your relationship with God. Write the lyrics in the box
provided below and answer the questions that follow.

PANGASINAN STATE UNIVERSITY 6

 FM-AA-CIA-15 Rev. 0 10-July-2020

Study Guide in GE1: Understanding the Self Module No. 9

1. Why did you choose the song to describe your relationship with God?
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
2. Do you feel the presence of God in your life? Explain.
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
3. When you are writing the lyrics of the song, what did you feel?
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
4. Do you believe in God? Why or why not?
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
5. If you are singing this song, do you find yourself crying or being emotional? Why or
why not?
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________

SUMMARY

We have a spiritual self that is connected to the Spirit of a God, of a Sacred or Divine. We may have
different beliefs and practices and we use different paths to connect with the Ultimate. Our
experience with God is revealed in many ways. The most challenging one is when we are
confronted with the reality of pain and suffering. Viktor Frankl explains that we can find meaning in
life even in the midst of miseries by creating a work or doing a deed, by experiencing something or
encountering someone, and by our attitude toward an unavoidable experience.
Even in the modern times we are still influenced by the early worldview about the spirit or soul. This
explains the various rituals and ceremonies that is shared within the community.

REFERENCES

[Link]

PANGASINAN STATE UNIVERSITY 7