Spiritual relationships: a concept analysis.

Spiritual relationships are connections to self or soul, to others, to a higher power, or to nature. All relationships have the potential to be spiritual. The depth or intimacy of the relationship is directly related to human being's individual personal knowledge of self or soul-searching. Grounded theory and phenomenological research studies validate that spiritual relationships play an important role in one's spirituality. Theoretical and operational definitions, attributes, and several cases (e.g., model, related, contrary, and metaphorical) of spiritual relationships are discussed. Attributes and consequences are identified.