Intro to the New Church Doctrines Journal #7

[Image Description: "WHEREVER LIFE PLANTS YOU, BLOOM WITH GRACE -UNKNOWN" in center-aligned white letters on a black letter board with beige wooden bordering. There is also a red flower board piece attached above "WHEREVER", a white unfilled flower board piece attached on the left side of "GRACE", a white filler with a tiny hole in the middle of it board piece on the right side of "GRACE", and a white flower with a small hole (bigger than the last described flower) in the middle of it board piece below "UNKNOWN." The letter board is standing on a flowered table cloth on a white bureau with a medium sized red vase of fake red roses and a fake light pink rose on the left side of the letter board. There is also a bright pink wall in the background.]



CONTENT WARNING #1: The religious/spiritual opinions on this blog post are mine based on my own experiences and do not reflect the opinions and experiences of everyone. Commentaries published on my First Former Buddy Club President influencer page represent diverse viewpoints. If you would like to submit a commentary, please contact me for more information. All perspectives and experiences are welcome here.


CONTENT WARNING #2: Also, I would like to mention that I am not a therapist and am sharing this content for educational purposes only. If you suspect that you need any professional help for your mental health, it is okay to get help and I highly recommend seeking help from a therapist or other mental health professional who is qualified to do so. In addition, keep in mind that everyone has mental health and no one experiences their mental health/disability journey the same. Every mental health/healing journey is different and what may help others may or may not help everyone. You never know what anyone is going through as everyone has some type of struggles you know nothing about and not all mental health struggles and traumas are experienced the same, visible, or disclosed so always be kind. All are welcome here.


In my first trimester at Bryn Athyn College, I was required to take a religion course along with eventually some other religion courses since it is a religious school. Bryn Athyn practices the New Church religion of Swedenborg so the required religion course that I took this trimester was Intro to the New Church Doctrines. For the class, one of the required assignments was to write daily journals based on readings from "You Can Believe!: An Introduction to the New Christianity" written by Grant Schnarr (The author was actually my professor for the class! He is a minister in the church!) and we students had to apply what we read to our lives. So, since some of the content mentioned in this short essay that I wrote is related to the content that I post on my disability advocacy influencer page, I have decided to upload it is a blog post. Here is Journal #7.


Prompt: "Journal Entry on '5 Goals for My Spiritual Growth.' What are your goals for your personal/spiritual growth? List five with a one or two sentence explanation of each."


1. Healing - While certain negative things that happened will always stay with me, I am capable of improvement and healing. To continue my healing, I will keep practicing as much mindfulness meditation and other types of self-care as possible.

2. Surrounding myself with as many positive people as I can - One of the reasons that I experienced negativities was because I was with the wrong people. Shortly after a difficult life event, I met some kind people who changed my life for the better, which is what has inspired me to continue to search for more positive influences.

3. Joining the New Church religion - Through attending Lower Moreland High School and starting school at Bryn Athyn College, I had the opportunity to meet people of the New Church religion and other religions. I have a lot of connections to the Bryn Athyn community so I have had some exposure to what their religion is like and that is how I have gained interest in learning more about the New Church religion.

4. Success in my career path and advocacy work - I am very passionate about my career path of becoming a Special Education teacher, specifically working in Life Skills Support. In addition, I am very passionate about the volunteering, social media influencer, and motivational speaking work that I participate in as a disability advocate.

5. Improvement in self-advocacy - One of my main self-growth goals that I have been working on is improving my self-advocacy skills. I am working on gaining the confidence to speak up and stand up to others.




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