What is Your Spiritual APGAR score?
APGAR was the first measurement of your life the moment you were born.
Once you left the warm sanctity of your mother’s womb, you took a big breath and began to cry.
If you didn’t, rest assured you got a slap on your bottom to get you started. You were demanding and maybe a bit poopy.
What else could you possibly do? There you were—suddenly cold, surround by great light, many voices and no rhythm of your mother’s heartbeat to bring you comfort.
You were immediately reactive to your own needs in this new environment that could only be described as hostile—and this was good!
How you looked and how you reacted gave the doctor an immediate read on how fully you were living in that moment.
Do you know what your spiritual APGAR score is? Is it possible to determine how fully alive you are spiritually in the same way babies are evaluated at birth?
And if your score is low, what is the danger? Can you do anything about it?
The meaning of APGAR
Let’s take a brief look at the what these letters stand for:
- A-Appearance: How did you first appear? Skin color showing a bluish hue? All four limbs present? Facial features normal? And lots of other more subtle aspects of your body give an immediate picture of your health.
- P-Pulse: Did you have a measurable pulse that was steady or skipping? Slow or racing?
- G-Grimace: Even though life has been suddenly thrown upon us, we are expected to smile, or at least stretch those pouty lips a bit with a bit of stimulation from the doc.
- A-Activity: How active you were when you were born was a significant detail to record. Some babies suffer from the results of anesthesia given to mom, and some may have something else going on that leaves them flaccid and quiet. This isn’t normal.
- R-Respiration: And of course if you weren’t breathing when you were first born, emergency measures were immediately on hand to stimulate you to inhale, to supply extra oxygen if needed, and to evaluate why this wasn’t happening.
When I began musing about the importance of the APGAR score for newborns, I naturally began to reflect on how that might apply to my spiritual life….something which is ‘newborn’ every moment.
And yes, there are theologies that talk about being ‘born again’ in Christianity. This reflection works regardles of your religious beliefs.
Appearance
Do I go through my day with no signs of enthusiasm, as if nothing is lighting up my presence? Are there any signs of joy in the midst of sorrow?
Does hope shine through in spaces of testing and difficulty, or inner energy to tackle the day? Is the only thing on my mind going back to bed or getting on social media? Where is my heart focused first thing in the morning?
It seems I may need a bit of intervention for my spirit as well as my body first thing in the morning.
Sometimes that is a simple inhale, exhale and pause. Sometimes a more drastic intervention is necessary. But not bothering to take a moment to observe the state of my soul is a threat to living a full heart-led life
Pulse
The second evaluation for living fully is that of a pulse. I can make an assumption that if I got out of bed and all the way to the shower my heart is beating sufficiently to sustain my life.
My physical life that is.
I am not exactly sure the best method to measure the heartbeat of my soul.Would I count the excitement I feel at a beautiful sunrise?
Does my heartbeat quicken at the sight of a sleeping dog?
What is it exactly that drives me to live fully from a place of love?
I have gone through devastating seasons of depression, or its less difficult cousin, ennui. Seasons in which I couldn’t seem to move forward or backward.
My spiritual pulse score doesn’t much register at these times. Time for intervention!!
Grimace
The ability to either grimace, or to smile, is significant to know if a baby is healthy or not, but it is also a big measure of our spiritual health.
Do you find yourself completely pan-faced as you go about your daily activities?
Cooking with a scowl, reading a good mystery with a slack jaw, or watching the news without a grimace at images of countries devastated by bombs?
I have done all of these things, unaware of how my facial expressions reveal my engagement with life. Hint: zoom meetings are a great place to check out your APGAR score for yourself!
Activity
The second A, activity, reminds me to look at my willingness to connect to nature, holiness, the realm of creativity and my involvement with serving others.
This is a constantly moving value, but without intention and commitment, it can slip right off my radar. Some days I am barely living.
Respiration
And the final element, R reminds me how often I take my breathing for granted, never pausing long enough to inhale, exhale and feel the presence of the divine in between.
It is such a simple and yet overlooked practice that would keep me in top spiritual health if I could just remember to breathe as a spiritual practice!
What is Your APGAR Score?
I don’t know how you fare when you apply these measurements to yourself, but my score is a moving number. It is much more stable when I apply it to my body. Today I know I am alive. Physically. I breathe, walk, talk, and write blog posts.
But spiritually, I vacillate between a healthy score of 5 and frequent landings on 2 or 3 or 4.
My goal is to be fully alive in body, soul and spirit. I thank the creators of the APGAR score for showing me where I could use some intervention.
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