Cheryl A. Giles
In this article, Dr. Giles focuses on the consequences of living a “divided life.” She talks about how, these days, we all “strain under the burden of more demands and less time for living and being present to our inner journey.” She describes wholeness as “the courage to let go of the divided lives that we have constructed and to open our hearts to right action which is informed by our “inner teacher,” as, “the consequences of living a divided life, is inner and outer chaos.” Dr. Giles affirms that an authentic life, as described by spiritual leaders from Buddha to Parker Palmer and beyond, is the courage to open our hearts to others.
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Author bio |
Cheryl A. Giles is a licensed clinical psychologist. She is currently the Francis Greenwood Peabody Professor of the Practice in Pastoral Care and Counseling. Her work includes mentoring and supervising psychology interns, postdoctoral fellows, and divinity students at Boston Medical Center, where she is Clinical Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at Boston University School of Medicine. In 2004, she received the “Outstanding African-American Making History Today” award from Boston Renaissance School. Dr. Giles’s primary research interests are identifying the role that trauma and health care disparities play in developing healthy adolescents and exploring the spirituality of GLBT youth. In 2006-07, she was awarded a faculty grant from the Divinity School’s Center for the Study of World Religions to examine the impact of medical ethics in pastoral care across religious practices. Dr. Giles is a consultant to the Massachusetts Department of Social Services (DSS) and a board member of the Unitarian Universalist Urban Ministry. |