The Human Spirit and Occupation: Surviving and Creating a Life

Abstract

The following life history, from a qualitative study, gives an insight into the strategies humans use to survive, accommodate, adapt and transcend hostile environments and a frightening world. The value and meaning of the occupations one man engaged in spanning 46 years of his life are explored. Occupations are examined that helped him survive captivity and severe abuse from infancy to adolescence, then through the process of recovery, and finally to participate in life as an adult. Life history and narrative analysis were used to identify a number of significant periods and themes in his life, as a boy, imprisonment; as a youth, abandonment and hiding; as a young adult, claming up, venturing out and healing; as an adult, panic and coming out; and then as a man, life began, filling bricks, and making a wall to stand on, creating a life and reclaiming England. Occupational pathways that traverse these periods and which develop over time are elaborated, along with the factors that motivated, facilitated or inhibited occupational engagement, occupational performance and life participation. The knowledge of our human vulnerability and the existence of inhumanity among humans are things we prefer not to think about. This article challenges the unthought known and provides valuable information on the place and meaning of occupation to human beings.

Key words:

• Child abuse
• Human adaptation
• Occupational science
• Occupational therapy
• Qualitative inquiry