Same Words, Different Meanings: Ethical Communication and Spiritual Language

Camille McDaniel (00:28)
Welcome back to Christ in Private Practice. It’s great to have you here for another episode. Thank you for everyone who has been traveling the road with me so far. It’s wonderful to have you back. And if you happen to be new, then welcome. I’m glad that you are here joining for another podcast episode. So we’re going to dive right in today, and we’re going to be talking a little bit about navigating ⁓ our faith with culture.

And we’re gonna do it ethically, and we’re gonna talk about clinical communication today, which is why our episode today is called Same Words, Different Meanings, Ethical Communication and Spiritual Language. So this episode actually came from a real interaction that occurred when I was ⁓ doing a couple of a couple of episodes back when I was doing the IFS episode, but

It made me reflect and kind of pause on how quickly things can be just misinterpreted and how we can be using one word and thinking two totally different things, depending or I say two two two totally different things. I guess it really depends on how many people are present in the encounter as to how many different interpretations may be present. So ultimately.

What was going on was that you know the episode that they were watching was on my YouTube channel for Christ in Private Practice. And while they were looking at, I guess, the episode, and they may have been just kind of looking around the YouTube channel just to see what else Christ in Private Practice was doing and offering and such. Well, they came to a part of the YouTube channel where there were a couple of meditations.

And ⁓ and so when they noticed that there was the word meditation on there, it totally took them in a different direction.

And ultimately led them to sharing their concerns. ⁓ and there were some ⁓ assumptions kind of being formed. ⁓ but thankfully, thankfully they were patient in allowing me to gently like push back on what they were assuming about that word and that word being on my YouTube channel. And that then brought us to some clarity, but you know, initially it ultimately could have just kind of gone.

It could have gone in the wrong direction and it could have left people with a sour taste in their mouth because they really believed that the word meditation was being used in a more new age way. ⁓ okay, and so that all really again, that all kind of like you know, it it was fixed and and you know it was dealt with. And I can share it because the person didn’t use like their real name for their sign-in, so you don’t really know.

know who this person is. And ⁓ and so the the bottom line of it was is that where you’re used to for some people using the word meditation and being very familiar with how ⁓ it is used in a secular way where you’re like emptying out your mind so that you know you can be clear of thought by emptying out all the negative things and you know inviting in

In whatever, whatever spiritual beliefs that you ⁓ happen to hold true. But that’s not what I was referring to when I was talking about meditating. I wasn’t talking about like just the deep breathing, the emptying out your mind, the being open to whatever comes through to you ⁓ know, to lift you up, to change you. I wasn’t really talking about that at all. and I would I refer to that as I was

⁓ talking or writing back and forth with them and just helping them to understand that I was actually using it in the way that the Bible uses it, you know, ⁓ when it talks about meditating on those things that are right, that are good, that are noble, like you know, it there’s a whole scripture in Philippians. And so I was I was saying I’m using the word in that way. I’m not encouraging anyone to totally empty themselves out, you know, to be filled with whatever they are kind of like attracting.

and manifesting to come in. I’m not talking about that.

⁓ I’m I wasn’t talking about only just really, you know, breathing and just focusing on what’s around you, but it actually had integration with scriptures. It was not talking about emptying your mind, but instead filling your mind up with his truth and his love and you know, his ability to help us wherever we are at, no matter what we are experiencing, and to really calm our internal systems down to really receive that wholeheartedly. So either way,

they said, you know, well, thank you for that. I’ll go back and I’ll check it out. But that then brought me to today’s episode and ⁓ and just kind of looking at, hmm

Okay, you know, what really stood out for me was not that we had the ⁓ the differing of views on what I was putting out there, but what really stood out to me was the language confusion and how that same word, one little word,

Totally different ⁓ meanings and that took the conversation in entirely different directions because there was a different interpretation based on people’s experiences and their faith and worldview and their you know ⁓ assumptions and culture and training, right? And that happens all the time in counseling, and so that’s why I thought, you know what?

I want talk to everybody about this and see what their thoughts are and see what their experiences are because this happens a lot. You know, for example, clients might say certain things like, I meditate, or I’m spiritual, ⁓ you know, I’m not religious, or I’m trying to protect my energy, or I’m practicing mindfulness. They might, you know, talk to you about their discerning something ⁓ in their life, or they’re discerning something in a person, or you know, many different things, but

Depending on our background, our training, our history, we might we might think things that the client is not intending. Because we might think, ⁓ I know exactly what they mean when they say that. But

Ethically and clinically, we really can’t assume shared meaning simply because we recognize familiar language. I’ve had that experience ⁓ a couple of times in my practice with the use of the word God and ⁓ and further exploration ⁓ uncovered that we actually we both knew the word, but we were using that word very differently. So

In today’s episode, we want to talk a little, I want to talk a little with you about how do we ethically navigate like spiritually loaded language and what do we avoid as far as assumptions and what you know how do we kind of remain curious and not reactive? And we want to make sure that we are, you know, doing things right and in order. So

One thing that we all, as mental health professionals, learned over time is that words are not.

always neutral. Rarely are they just neutral, but oftentimes they have a lot of meaning and ⁓ richness within them. Like they have culture behind them and they have history behind them and emotions and belief systems, you know, experiences that people encounter throughout their journey through life and community influences on how they use a a term or

understand a term when it’s used so that just like what I was talking about earlier with my experience on the YouTube channel, two people can use the exact same word and mean completely different things. So when we take the word ⁓ meditation, right?

For one person, meditation means quiet reflection and breathing exercises and slowing down your internal systems and learning how to be very present and in the moment. But then for another person, it might be that they think of spiritual practices and you know, emptying the mind and enlightenment and transcendence and so. For those who are Christian.

Meditation may mean reflecting intentionally on scripture or focusing on God’s truth in his word or just being still in the Lord’s presence and allowing him to search your heart and to meet you where you are and to provide for you in that moment, whatever your meaning, your needing. So different meanings, right?

⁓ for different people, even taking the word mindfulness.

Even the word mindfulness for some people, when you use it, they may be looking at it from a totally different perspective than somebody else. So one person uses the word mindfulness, and it could mean grounding and awareness and attention to the things that are going on within your body, like regulating yourself and being able to calm.

your your internal systems, your nervous system creating stabilization. But then there are others who connect mindfulness to an even broader spiritual system.

And maybe mindfulness ⁓ is attached to different philosophies. Some individuals who might be ⁓ Christians may feel very comfortable using the term because they understand it to mean one thing, and then there might be others who are uncomfortable because they understand the term to mean something else. And if we assume the meaning instead of really exploring ⁓ you know, what is really being presented.

Then we can risk misunderstanding people that we are speaking to, whether that happens to be our clients in session, or whether that happens to be colleagues that we are meeting with and networking with or at a training with. So this really, you know, this is really something to think about because there are a lot of terms actually that sometimes are misunderstood when you actually explore how a person was using it or

When a person explores how you’re using it. ⁓ Things like healing, submission, energy, or ⁓ discernment. There are a couple of terms. ⁓ Intuition and you know, faith, spirituality. You know, a lot of people have different ways that they see these terms and more. So the words can carry vastly different meanings depending on who’s using them. So

What we’re gonna do is we’re gonna take an an ethical look. Let’s let’s kind of look at this from, you know, an ethical implication point of view.

Because this is really where we can then make it like clinically significant, right? So because one of the biggest mistakes sometimes is just assuming understanding without getting any clarification. I’m sure it’s happened to you. People assume that you’re talking about one thing and only for everyone in the conversation to find out that’s not what you meant. And that has possibly happened for you.

when you’re listening to somebody else and you realize, ⁓ I thought you were talking about this other thing. Okay, now I’m tracking with you now that I understand, now that we’re on the same page again. ⁓ so

Ethical counseling is going to require us to be very curious before we come to any kind of conclusions, any kind of determination, right? We because we don’t wanna end up like projecting our understanding onto somebody and ⁓ and that causing us to then maybe agree with things where it turns out

you were agreeing with something you didn’t know you were agreeing with, or to reject something and then try to process it in a different way when it was like, ⁓ well, I thought you were referring to it in this way. And so well, I take that back. Let’s, you know, let’s process it in a different way. So we want to just be very curious.

About terms that sometimes we miss because we really feel like it’s been heard so many times. I know how they’re using it. Now, obviously, if you have been seeing a client long enough where there is a general understanding of these terms already, we have an operational definition, everyone is coming from the same point of view, then well, yeah, then you don’t really have to worry because you have already established understanding of the meaning. But if that’s

Not the case. We just want to be careful because we can easily think that because someone has said, yes, I would like my faith as a Christian to be integrated, that words that they say then fall underneath an understanding that is universal for someone who might be a Christian. So that’s where we’re going to just make sure that we take into account context.

We explore meaning. We make sure that we are looking at culture that enters into the room and their history and belief systems, you know, and their lived experiences. ⁓ because it’s especially important when we are discussing like spiritual and culturally loan loaded language, because we can then otherwise, like I said, we can hear one thing and they’re talking about something totally different, right? So

Even even examples that happen sometimes outside of faith integrated spheres and environments. There may be counselors, and I’ve actually I’ve seen this. So it’s not there may be. I actually have seen the conversations unfold where there was a counselor that ⁓ or counselors that were not faith integrated and they ⁓

By the conversation, didn’t have a faith in Christ. They had other belief systems. And so when that counselor had a client come into their space and that client starts discussing spiritual warfare and talking about how they feel like they’re under spiritual attack in certain areas of their life, the counselor immediately started to pathologize the experience. ⁓ they didn’t really know how to assess it. Or you may have somebody who, again, may not be integrating of

faith, they may not be of that same faith, but they start to hear language about like prayer and discernment or conviction. And then they kind of dismiss that because that’s not within their realm of understanding and they don’t really know exactly what to do with that. You might similarly, again, you may have

But well, not similarly, but you might have on the other hand, like a Christian clinician who is also integrating their their worldview, their framework, ⁓ their biblical framework into their counseling offerings. And they may hear words like, you know, what we just talked about, meditation, mindfulness, and and they may assume something, you know, whatever that assumption may be, because they haven’t really explored and got clarification. They’re just applying their own understanding. And both responses.

whether from the faith-based clinician or from the clinician who does not have a a Christian worldview but has another worldview, both of the responses in what I’m talking about can create ethical problems.

Because we have to remember that, like our code of ethics, requires us to be respectful of client worldview and ⁓ avoid value imposition, you know, it placing and projecting our values onto others. And one way to accidentally do that.

The quickest is by assuming that we both understand the terminology being used before we have actually got an operational definition locked in. And so I know code of most code of ethics, most codes of ethics will warn us to be careful about value and position and to make sure to take into account client worldview, everything from the ⁓ American Association or yeah.

Well, I’m thinking American Association of Christian ⁓ counselors, but

⁓ let me flip over to saying the like the ACA, American Counseling Association, or the NASW for social workers, or AAMFT for marriage and family therapists, and APA for the psychologists, and even I believe it’s CCPA for Canadian clinicians. You know, all of their codes of ethics will refer to it. So you when you’re looking at your code of ethics, you’ll see there’s that warning. And so it’s like, okay, how do we do this? And what we’re gonna do, what

we do is we establish meaning. So we don’t want to just assume that we know because we may not. Even even words that are used frequently, ⁓ you know, that’s that’s where we we kind of want to be careful because when you’re talking about words like spirituality and ⁓ and meditation and mindfulness, you know, there’s a lot that people may may mean with that.

Especially the word spirituality. Like spirituality, I I always ask, you know, what does that mean to you? Because that word has been used and changed and and flipped upside down ⁓ so many different ways. I have gotten different answers when I just clarify.

what that means for the client who is sitting before me. Sometimes it has to do with intuition. Sometimes it has to do with an ancestral, like, you know, ancestors and an ancestral connection. ⁓ Sometimes it has to do with like nature, you know, ⁓ and and sometimes it’s like energy or it’s just like purpose in life. There, there’s actually a lot of different ways that people have used that in addition to it for some people, meaning.

A relationship with God. So

We want to just be careful. And I feel like, and I I think I think some of you will agree with this, or many of you may agree with this, but I think social media has really contributed to kind of accelerating this blended language. Because you go online and you’ll just see so many different views and opinions and ways that language is used and integrated. And and so the you know, words are

they’re moving and changing rapidly you know and they’re they’re moving and changing across therapy spaces and self-help spaces and and wellness and religion and psychology and trauma and there they’re just so many ways that words are being used in different environments different spaces online influencers I mean there there’s just a lot going on

And our clients are absorbing the language and the meanings in all these different spaces. And sometimes they’re absorbing the the language.

Without even knowing fully how to define what they’re saying. And counselors are also absorbing a lot of language. And we might also be assuming, based on where we heard these things being used, we might assume that everyone is on the same page. Because we all recognize the vocabulary, but we may not necessarily be familiar with all of the different meanings underneath.

the word being used. So if we ⁓ put this into like just let me throw out an example. Let’s just make this real practical because I I like making things plain, right? And I think it’s already been made plain, but

I want to go ahead and just throw out some examples. So instead of assuming what something might mean, we’re gonna just we’re just gonna flip it into ⁓ an exploratory question. We’re gonna say, like, can you tell me what mindfulness looks like to you personally?

That’s one way that we can just interject it really smoothly into our sessions instead of, you know, kind of reacting. Or even the word that kind of got this ⁓ episode, this podcast episode started, you know, instead of us thinking that we know exactly what it means when we see the word meditation.

We want we want to find out if we can ⁓ find out if we’re you know talking to colleagues, but if we have our client right there in the room with us, then we wanna just ask, you know, when you use the word meditation, what does that practice involve for you?

Right? So all of that, or even like I talked about a little bit ago with the word spirituality, and you know what that means to those who are integrating Christian beliefs into their counseling work versus those who may not. So you just want to ask, like, you know, how would you describe your spiritual beliefs? What does spirituality mean to you?

That will be ⁓ you know, the same thing, even when sometimes people are like, you know, I think I’m going through spiritual warfare. ⁓ it’s like, well, what do you, what makes you believe that it’s spiritual warfare? What are you noticing? What are you experiencing that makes you say that? So just just again, so that we’re just getting some some clarity before we move forward and assuming, you know, what what that means so that way we don’t have any challenges. ⁓ again, whether we are talking

To each other as colleagues, or whether we are working with our clients in session. For

Those clinicians, you know, who are listening to this podcast, many of you are Christians, many of you are integrating your faith into the counseling room already, and many are ⁓ desiring to go in that direction and ⁓ and are taking steps to learn how to do that more and more every day. I think the this conversation is very relevant, ⁓ especially for this day and time, because

Many of us are trying to navigate language that is rapidly shifting. You know, sometimes the words are familiar and ⁓ we understand everybody’s on the same page of the meaning, but I really think that there’s just a lot going on. And it’s changing words, it’s changing understanding. Like I said earlier, people are getting words from so many different places and spaces, especially online and different social media areas and platforms.

platforms that we really just want to look at what does this person actually mean when they are saying this and what framework are they operating from? What are the assumptions that I might be making about this ⁓ this individual and is it is it ethical like you know is this is this clinically responsible so

We want to just keep that in mind no matter what we are ⁓ encountering so that we don’t assume the wrong things about our colleagues, about our clients, and and then move forward in the wrong direction. So that’s kind of what started this podcast episode. That’s what ⁓

That’s what I hope you understood why I was talking about this and and ideally allow us to then maybe make some changes as we move forward. And if we are not navigating words and meaning in that way, because there can be a big overlap, right? And we want to make sure that we are using wisdom and clarity.

That we are coming, you know, humbly because we just want to explore, we want to learn more, and we are taking careful assessments as we move forward in understanding what the meaning really is behind the words that our clients are saying or that our colleagues are using when we ⁓ encounter that. So

This is all about us growing and learning and talking it out as it comes up in our day-to-day lives and in our private practice settings. I hope that this has been an episode that allowed you to kind of think a little bit about your experiences in private practice with this or in communication with other colleagues.

And ⁓ and allows you to kind of go back, slow down, see if there’s any changes that need to be made. And if not, then to continue down the path that is working great ⁓ and that is clear for you and your clients. Until we meet again, I hope that you have a wonderful rest of your week and God bless.