An Existential Model of Flourishing Subsequent to Treatment for Addiction: The Importance of Living a Meaningful and Spiritual Life

Abstract

This study examined recovering alcoholics who were struggling to rebuild their lives 2 years after completing a professional treatment program for addiction. Sixty-eight British adults provided data describing whether or not their personal, interpersonal, and community (civic) functioning had improved from the period of maximum suffering before treatment to a point 2 years after being discharged. Results showed the magnitude of overall Quality of Life (QoL) improvement was significantly and positively correlated with the amount of meaning that respondents perceived to be present in their life at the point of 2 year follow-up. In general, the total QoL scale score was not related to whether or not respondents indicated they were striving for spiritual goals. Spiritual striving, however, was found to moderate the strength of the association between meaning making and the community/societal sphere of QoL. When a sub-sample of 26 spiritual strivers was examined, greater meaning making was found to be related to better personal well-being, interpersonal well-being, and (civic) functioning in society. However, among the 26 individuals who did not see themselves as spiritual seekers, greater meaning making was only related to QoL assessed at the personal and interpersonal levels of analysis. These findings are consistent with Viktor Frankl's notion that suffering can be a catalyst for a more fulfilling way of being—provided that people are able to see meaning and purpose in their suffering. The apparent adaptive consequences of perceiving self-transcendent meaning were particularly broad in scope within the spiritual seeking sub group, who may have experienced a sanctified sense of meaning in their life. A Broad Spectrum Model of QoL is proposed to describe the more generalized salutary effects of sacred (as opposed to secular) meaning.