Page 197 - Nursing: The Philosophy and Science of Caring

a d m i ni s t er ing s acr e d n u r s in g ac t s
affects the quality of sleep, especially in relation to psychological and
cognitive functioning. Ongoing research is occurring and needed in
this area to assist nursing, scientific, and psychological knowledge rel-
evant to this basic need.

Work is love made visible.
Kahlil giBran

signifiCanCe of tHe aCtivity-inaCtivity
need for Caritas NursiNg
• The activity-inactivity need is a human need that affects all
persons and experiences and events with which the nurse is
involved.
• This need provides maturation, mastery, competence, variety,
relaxation, and restoration.
• Inhibition of this need can thwart other human needs and cause
lower-order needs to dominate.
• The more basic needs require attention to avoid usurping energy,
allowing fuller actualization of other higher-consciousness needs
related to creative expression, affiliation, self-actualization, and so
on.
• Health changes and treatments related to illness, trauma, and life
crises frequently necessitate a change in one’s activity level. Any
change in activity is a subjective as well as an outer experience; it
can best be understood from the subjective inner-life worldview
of the experiencing person, not just by external observations
alone.
• The psychology involved in positively affecting the inactive
sickbed is opening the room to infinite depths of nature, place,
architecture, furnishings, and the room itself, related to the
larger universe that helps open the human heart to be set free
from imprisonment; to open one’s heartfelt longing for hope, for
feeling alive versus tied down, for turning outward rather than
inward (Martinsen 2006).
• The practice of caring includes helping another constructively
channel and balance energy among rest, sleep, and activity.

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