When fac­ing chal­lenges and strug­gles in life, many peo­ple turn to their faith to help them suc­ceed. The way I like to think of it is that on my own I can push through a strug­gle, but when I draw on my faith and spir­i­tu­al­i­ty I can pull through. Push­ing means I am uti­liz­ing only my own strength and exert­ing my own ener­gy to push away from a strug­gle. Pulling, by con­trast, means that even in the midst of a chal­lenge I am already con­nect­ing to some­thing on the oth­er side – some­thing greater and stronger – and in doing so I am draw­ing on that pow­er as I pull myself through the strug­gle toward some­thing better.

Spir­i­tu­al­i­ty means many things to many peo­ple. Some draw strength from their reli­gious faith, oth­ers find seren­i­ty in nature, and still oth­ers appre­ci­ate the val­ue of con­nec­tion – with a high­er pow­er, with oth­ers, and with them­selves. For many peo­ple spir­i­tu­al­i­ty is a jour­ney through life itself, com­plete with its own sets of ups and downs – peri­ods of long­ing and yearn­ing, and peri­ods of peace and inspiration.

My spir­i­tu­al­i­ty is strong­ly linked to my reli­gious faith. Being brought up in an Ortho­dox Jew­ish fam­i­ly means that reli­gion and spir­i­tu­al­i­ty have played a cen­tral role in my life from the time I was born. My family’s com­mit­ment to our faith in God and to the tra­di­tions set forth by our ances­tors influ­ence every deci­sion we make – from what food we eat to the ways in which we han­dle emergencies.

My child­hood is full of warm mem­o­ries relat­ing to Judaism – light­ing Hanukkah can­dles with my fam­i­ly beside a moun­tain of wrapped presents atop our piano, study­ing for my bat mitz­vah, and enjoy­ing the most pleas­ant and fun Passover Seders I have ever known. As a child and pre-teen I loved my Juda­ic stud­ies cours­es at school and even vol­un­tar­i­ly attend­ed class­es after-hours as part of my school’s extra-cur­ric­u­lar learn­ing pro­gram. Hav­ing been raised in accor­dance with my family’s faith, I had my spir­i­tu­al­i­ty spoon-fed to me as a child. As a teenag­er I longed to ​“be my own per­son” and ​“find my own way.” That was when I began to ques­tion my faith and where I belonged.

After high school I trav­eled to Israel, as is com­mon in Ortho­dox Jew­ish cir­cles, with the inten­tion of explor­ing and dis­cov­er­ing my own rela­tion­ship with, and place in, the Ortho­dox Jew­ish world. I spent a year and a half abroad. I learned a lot and I grew in my reli­gious obser­vance. I devel­oped a greater appre­ci­a­tion for the cul­ture and his­to­ry behind my faith.

When I came home from my study abroad pro­gram in Israel in the midst of a relapse, one of my – and my family’s – key con­cerns about my treat­ment was how I would be able to main­tain an Ortho­dox Jew­ish life. Would there be kosher food? Would I be able to observe the Sab­bath and hol­i­days? We con­sult­ed our rab­bi who advised me that I need­ed to fol­low my doc­tors’ orders – even if they seemed to con­tra­dict my faith – as my eat­ing dis­or­der was a mat­ter of life or death. In Judaism sav­ing a life takes prece­dence over all oth­er commandments.

Luck­i­ly, I found a treat­ment cen­ter that was not only a ter­rif­ic match for my phys­i­cal, men­tal, and emo­tion­al needs, but for my reli­gious and spir­i­tu­al needs as well. At Ren­frew all of my meals were brought in from a kosher restau­rant and then por­tioned out to meet my spe­cif­ic meal plan require­ments. Ren­frew was sen­si­tive to my reli­gious obser­vance and accom­mo­dat­ed me dur­ing every step of my treat­ment. My rab­bi walked me through the reli­gious aspects of treat­ment and helped me stay con­nect­ed to my com­mu­ni­ty and lifestyle even while I spent time phys­i­cal­ly removed from it.

Read the entire chap­ter here.