“I feel sometimes as if I were a child who opens its eyes on the world once and sees amazing things it will never know any names for and then has to close its eyes again,” says the narrator John Ames in Marilynne Robinson’s novel Gilead.
As Ames recognized, we are born permeable to the world’s wonders. Young children seem tilted toward awe and predisposed to feel amazed. As we age, we grow in our ability to conceptualize our place in this vastness—and begin discovering our connectedness to everything that surrounds us.
Like learning to distinguish right from wrong, spirituality is a natural part of children’s development. Scholar Eugene Roehlkepartain calls spirituality “our connectedness to ourselves, each other, the world around us, and the Sacred or Divine.” The late psychologist Peter Benson and his colleagues defined spiritual development as the process of growing one’s “capacity for self-transcendence.” Or here’s another way to say it:
spiritual development is the way we make room within ourselves for something beyond ourselves.
Some people grow this capacity by participating in a religious community. Others foster spiritual development by spending time outdoors or encountering art. In some instances, this kind of spiritual expansion is thrust upon us, as with major life events like birth or death. “It’s really just the way in which we find connectedness, a sense of meaning, a sense of purpose,” says Maryam Abdullah, a developmental psychologist and Parenting Program Director of the Greater Good Science Center (GGSC).
With her team at GGSC, Abdullah translates the science of character virtue into practical resources for educators and parents. Lately, Abdullah’s work has focused on research about spiritual development in children. She’s interested in how spirituality manifests in kids, as well as how caregivers can cultivate this kind of development. One of the biggest markers of spiritual development in kids, says Abdullah, is a sense of awe. And the way parents can nurture spiritual development is the same: through experiences of awe.
Everyday Awe
Writing about the birth of his daughter, psychologist and GGSC co-founder Dacher Keltner said, “It ripped me open and all of life was different. At that moment I thought: that feeling that I had early as a child that brought such humanity to my life and to other people’s lives—that feeling I had when I met my own child for the first time—I’ve got to study it.” So began his decades-long inquiry into the science of awe.
Keltner defines awe as “the emotion we experience when we encounter vast mysteries that we don’t understand.” And this emotion, Keltner discovered, is very, very good for us. Awe activates the vagus nerve, prompting relaxation and lessening anxiety. It generates a sense of joy and curiosity about the world around us. Maybe most importantly, awe shifts focus outward, increasing our capacity to care for people and issues beyond ourselves. In both children and adults, experiencing awe helps shape us to be people oriented toward others and the world beyond us.
Because awe helps us feel connected to something larger than ourselves, it’s closely linked to spiritual development.
For parents who want to nurture their children’s spiritual formation, focusing on awe is a good place to start.
Children are notoriously curious about the world around them. Parents can encourage this capacity simply by following their children’s wonder, and then building on it, says Abdullah. “I think parents have a natural way of being struck by what their children are all struck by.”
By noticing what a child wonders about, parents can help them understand how a subject is connected to a larger story beyond what they can immediately intuit. Following a bee’s pollinating path in the park can open conversations about ecology and care for the natural world. Witnessing a friend offer a hug can open conversations about forgiveness and compassion. Kids love to ask why, Adullah says. “If we follow those strings of why, sometimes we can help our children see how they are connected to something much, much bigger than what they’re experiencing in that moment.”
As she sifted through research on spiritual development in children, Abdullah was surprised to discover how commonplace it can be. We don’t have to go far to access awe. One of the most frequent ways children experience wonder is in “the everyday ways that people are kind and courageous in uplifting one another.” Kids are uniquely attuned to these ordinary kindnesses and unabashed about pointing them out. “They don’t have any reservations talking about how wondrous it is to experience the kindness of others,” she says.
Interpersonal interactions offer an ordinary way for parents to help their kids deepen the awe that already comes naturally. “I think sometimes we feel like we might need to go far away to be nurtured spiritually,” says Abdullah. “But we don’t have to go far away, and we are the source of that [nurturing] for one another in our everyday lives.”
Growing Hand-In-Hand
At its best, encouraging a child’s spiritual development is a mutual endeavor, a collaboration between parent and child. After all, children are the ones who often lead adults further down the road to wonder.
Abdullah says that mutual learning and humility are key to the process of spiritual development. Parents who nurture their children’s spiritual capacity are open to hearing their children’s point of view and learning alongside them. “There’s this sense of, ‘I’m open to going on this path of thinking with you.’ It’s very exploratory, and you’re doing it hand-in-hand, as opposed to one person professing to know all the answers.”
A parent watches to see which stone their child chooses to place next on the path. Then together they take a step forward. This mutuality is a gift for both caregiver and child; as a child develops their own spirituality, parents deepen theirs as well.
“One of the blind spots in much of the past scientific research on values and moral development is that it focused almost exclusively on how parents ‘transmit’ values to children,” writes Eugene Roehlkepartain. “In reality (and as newer research is showing), it is more accurate to think about ‘exchanging’ values or, perhaps, a give and take in shaping values.”
Unlike children, adults are often buffeted by the relentless demands of to-do lists and responsibilities. But by paying attention to where the kids in our lives find wonder, we can return to our own sense of awe and connection. “When we are able to pause and follow those curiosities that our children have, we [allow] ourselves to think beyond the immediate pressures of life,” says Abdullah. “By nurturing our children, we nurture ourselves.”
Ultimately, supporting our children’s spiritual development prepares them for their own adulthood. By encouraging experiences of awe—and therefore increasing their capacity for self-transcedence—we help kids build inner resources for navigating the world.
Our lives are marked by both ease and hardship. Particularly during times of hardship, spirituality offers a tether of connection to something beyond ourselves. It keeps us from feeling isolated and disconnected. And this connectedness, says Abdullah, engenders a sense of compassion when we witness the suffering of others. “Spiritual development grounds both adults and children into being present to notice the hardship that someone else is experiencing. And [it gives us] the capacity to be someone who helps ease hardship for another person as well.”
Annelise Jolley is a journalist and essayist who writes about place, food, ecology, and faith for outlets such as National Geographic, The Atavist, The Rumpus, and The Millions. Find her at annelisejolley.com.
