SPIRITUAL AGING STUDY AND SUPPORT GROUP ON SUBSTACK
Adapting a combination book club and support group model, The Spiritual Aging Study and Support Group (SASS) on Substack is studying and discussing Spiritual Aging: Weekly Reflections on Embracing Life. To join in on Substack, follow the Stay Connected link on the CarolOrsborn.com home page: HERE
Each weekly post has its own chat thread where members engage in conversation about the subject matter of that week’s Study Guide.
CLASSICS IN THE FIELD OF CONSCIOUS AGING: VIRTUAL STUDY GUIDES
On the Brink of Everything by Parker J. Palmer
Visionary educator and octegenarian Parker J. Palmer has just published his tenth book On the Brink of Everything: Grace, Gravity and Getting Old.
“Age brings diminishments, but more than a few come with benefits. I’ve lost the capacity for multitasking, but I’ve discovered the joy of doing one thing at a time. My thinking has slowed down a bit, but experience has made it deeper and richer. I’m done with big and complex projects, but more aware of the loveliness of simple things: a talk with a friend, a walk in the woods, sunsets and sunrises, a night of good sleep.”
To access the online conversation, click HERE
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The Grace in Aging by Kathleen Dowling Singh
Kathleen Dowling Singh’s The Grace in Aging: Awaken As You Grow Older. Singh, of blessed memory, is a Dharma practitioner and psychotherapist, who understands how and why we fall for letting our wounds define us. Then she’s written a whole book about what can come next, if we’re willing to do the courageous work of truth-telling, humility, forgiveness and radical leaps of faith that true spirituality asks of us. It is, as Dowling puts it, a matter of awakening—even from the dream of our own serious and well-intentioned introspection.
To access the online conversation, click HERE
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Living Between Worlds, Finding Personal Resilience in Changing Times by Dr. James Hollis.
This important and timely book guides us to consider just how did we get to this crossroads in history? And will we make it through―individually and as a species? Dr. Hollis points the way to grow large enough to contain what threatens to destroy us. James Hollis, Ph. D. is Executive Director of the Jung Center of Houston, TX, a practicing Jungian Analyst and author of eleven books including the classics Finding Meaning in the Second Half of Life: How to Finally, Really Grow Up and What Matters Most: Living a More Considered Life.
To access the online conversation, click HERE
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John C. Robinson’s Mystical Activism: Transforming a World in Crisis. Covid-19 is but a wake-up call for sweeping social, political and spiritual changes as our generation of elders are being called to a radical transformation of consciousness.
To access the online conversation, Click HERE
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Still Here by Ram Dass.
Beloved spiritual teacher Ram Dass’ stroke forced him to face his worst fears. But while there were painful losses, there were also unexpected gifts. In Still Here: Embracing Aging, Changing, and Dying he teaches that the greatest blessing was the wearing away of the effects of his Ego—the attachment to how others perceived him, to expectations about what kind of life he deserved, even to what we had thought was the meaning of life, itself.
As Ram Dass describes it: “Behind the machinations of our brilliant, undependable minds is an essence that is not conditional, a being that aging does not alter, to which nothing can be added, from which nothing is taken away…This is not an abstract concept; it is as real as the breath moving in and out of your body, and real as the spirit that animates you. The greater your mindfulness, the more you will come to know this truth, and to rest in it when painful thoughts threaten to hide it from view.” (p. 49.)
To access the online conversation, click HERE
Please support our local independent book stores, and to order your book club books from Parnassus Books, click HERE
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Prisms: Reflections on this Journey We Call Life by James Hollis
“Late essays” about the second half of life by James Hollis, Ph. D., leading Jungian Analyst and author of sixteen books including the classics Finding Meaning in the Second Half of Life: How to Finally, Really Grow Up and What Matters Most: Living a More Considered Life. This culminating work suggests that instead of being driven by the search for happiness, one asks the seminal question: “What wants to enter the world through me?
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ADDITIONAL BOOK SUGGESTIONS POSTED IN OUR ARCHIVES
Journal of a Solitude, May Sarton
Are You Still Listening? 1969 Stories and Essays, Brent Green and 8 authors including Carol Orsborn
The Three Secrets of Aging, John C. Robinson
The Gift of Years, Joan Chittister
The December Project, Sara Davidson
Living an Examined Life, James Hollis
The Spirituality of Age, Robert L. Weber and Carol Orsborn
Upstream Mary Oliver
The Force of Character, James Hillman
Aging: An Apprenticeship by Nan Narboe
Additional Sources of Inspiration and Quotes
Complete Bibliography taken from Spiritual Aging: Weekly Reflections for Embracing Life
Achenbaum, W. Andrew. Crossing Frontiers: Gerontology Emerges as a Science. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1995.
Anonymous, One Day at a Time in Al-Anon. Virginia Beach, VA: Al-Anon Family Group Headquarters, Inc., 2000.
Anthony, Bolton. Second Journeys: The Dance of Spirit in Later Life. Chapel Hill, NC: Second Journeys Publications, 2013.
Atchley, Robert C. Spirituality and Aging. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009.
Bierman, Harold, and Donald Schnedeker. Insights for Managers from Confucius to Gandhi. New York: Modern Library, 1938.
Blondin, Sarah. Heart Minded: How to Hold Yourself and Others in Love. Boulder, CO: Sounds True, 2020.
Broyard, Anatole. Intoxicated by My Illness: And Other Writings on Life and Death. New York: Fawcett, Columbine. 1992.
Campbell, Joseph. The Hero with a Thousand Faces. San Rafael, CA: New World Library, 2008.
Chittister, Joan. The Gift of Years: Growing Older Gracefully. New York: BlueBridge, 2008.
Chodron, Pema, Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living. Boston: Shambhala Publishing, 1994.
Cobb, John B., Jr., and David Ray Griffin. Process Theology: An Introductory Exposition. Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1976.
Ellis, Havelock. Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1. New York: Random House, 1942.
Erikson, Erik H. The Life Cycle Completed: A Review. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1982.
Fowler, J. W. Stages of Faith: The Psychology of Human Development and the Quest for Meaning. New York: Harper & Row, 1981.
Frankl, Viktor. Man’s Search for Meaning. Boston: Beacon Press, 1962.
Freed, Jann E. Breadcrumb Legacy: How Great Leaders Live a Life Worth Remembering. New York: Routledge, 2023.
Goldman, Connie. Who Am I: Now That I’m Not Who I Was: Conversations with Women in Mid-Life and the Years Beyond. Minneapolis: Nodin, 2009.
———. Wisdom from Those in Care: Conversations, Insights, and Inspiration. Minneapolis: The Partners in Caregiving Project, 2018.
Green, Brent, with Carol Orsborn, David Cogswell, Richard Adler, Bob Moses, Jed Diamond, Greg Dobbs, and Robert William Case. 1969: Are You Still Listening? Denver, CO: Brent Green & Assoc., 2019.
Gunn, Robert Jingen. Journey into Emptiness: Dogen, Merton, Jung, and the Quest for Transformation. Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 2000.
Hillman, James. The Force of Character and the Lasting Life. New York: Random House, 1999.
Hoblitzelle, Olivia Ames. Aging with Wisdom: Reflections, Stories, & Teachings. Rhinebeck, NY: Monkfish Publishing, 2017.
Hollis, James. Finding Meaning in the Second Half of Life: How to Finally, Really Grow Up. New York: Gotham Books, 2005.
———. Living Between Worlds: Finding Personal Resilience in Changing Times. Boulder, CO: Sounds True, 2020.
———. Swamplands of the Soul: New Life in Dismal Places. Scarborough, Ontario: Inner City Books, 1996.
Huxley, Aldous. The Doors of Perception: Includes Heaven and Hell. New York: Harper, 1954.
James, William. The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature. New York: Collier, 1961.
Jung, C. G. Memories, Dreams, Reflections. New York: Vintage Books, 1989.
Lamott, Anne. Almost Everything: Notes on Hope. New York: Riverhead Books, 2018.
Lew, Alan. This is Real and You Are Completely Unprepared: The Days of Awe as a Journey of Transformation. Boston: Little, Brown, 2003.
Lustbader, Wendy. Life Gets Better: The Unexpected Pleasures of Growing Older. New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin, 2011.
Kapur, Kamla K., The Privilege of Aging: Savoring the Fullness of Life. Vermont: Park Street Press, 2024.
Kroeber, Theodora. Ishi in Two Worlds: A Biography of the Last Wild Indian in North America. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2011.
Kuner, Susan, Carol Orsborn, Linda Quigley, and Karen Stroup. Speak the Language of Healing: Living with Breast Cancer without Going to War. Foreword by Jean Shinoda Bolen, MD. Berkeley, CA: Conari Press, 1997.
Laarman, Peter. “Among School Children.” Reflections: Test of Time/The Art of Aging. New Haven, CT: Yale Divinity School, 2013.
Larkin, Geri. “Close to the Ground: The Secret of Abiding Joy.” Spirituality + Health (Nov./Dec. 2015) and online.
Lin Yutang. The Wisdom of Confucius. New York: Random House, 1938
Merton, Thomas. Echoing Silence: Thomas Merton on the Vocation of Writing. New York: New Seeds, 2008.
———. No Man Is an Island. New York: Image/Doubleday, 1955.
———. The Seven Storey Mountain: An Autobiography of Faith. New York: Harcourt, 1948.
———. The Silent Life. New York: Dell, 1957.
Metzger, Bruce M., and Roland E. Murphy, eds. The New Oxford Annotated Bible. New York: Oxford University Press, 1991.
Moody, Harry R., and David Carroll. The Five Stages of the Soul: Charting the Spiritual Passages that Shape Our Lives. New York: Anchor Books, 1997.
Niebuhr, Reinhold. Quoted in AA Grapevine: The International Journal of Alcoholics Anonymous (January 1950): 6–7.
Nouwen, Henri J. M., and Walter J. Gaffney. Aging: The Fulfillment of Life. New York: Image Books, 1976.
O’Donohue, John. To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings. New York: Crown Publishing, 2008.
Orsborn, Carol. Angelica’s Last Breath. Nashville, TN: Fierce with Age Press, 2018.
———. The Art of Resilience: 100 Paths to Wisdom and Strength in an Uncertain World. New York: Three Rivers Press (Random House), 1997.
———. Fierce with Age: Chasing God and Squirrels in Brooklyn. Nashville, TN: Turner Publishing, 2013.
———. How Would Confucius Ask for a Raise: One Hundred Enlightened Solutions for Tough Business Problems. New York: Avon, 1994.
———. The Making of an Old Soul: Aging as the Fulfillment of Life’s Promise. Amherst, MA: White River Press, 2021.
———. Nothing Left Unsaid: Words to Help You and Your Loved Ones through the Hardest Time. Berkeley, CA: Conari Press, 2001.
———. Older, Wiser, Fiercer: The Wisdom Collection. Nashville, TN: Fierce with Age Press, 2020.
———. Solved by Sunset: The Self-Guided Intuitive Decision-Making Retreat. New York: Harmony, 1996.
Otto, Rudolf. The Idea of the Holy: An Inquiry into the Non-rational Factor in the Idea of the Divine and Its Relation to the Rational. London: Oxford University Press, 1958.
Palmer, Parker J. On the Brink of Everything: Grace, Gravity & Getting Old. Oakland, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2018.
Pevny, Ron. Conscious Living, Conscious Aging: Embrace and Savor Your Next Chapter. New York: Atria Books/Beyond Words, 2014.
Ram Dass. Still Here: Embracing Aging, Changing, and Dying. New York: Penguin Books, 2000.
Rhiannon, Felice. A Vibrant Life: Yoga in the Middle Years and Beyond. Victoria, Canada: Trafford Publishing, 2008.
Robinson, John C. The Three Secrets of Aging: A Radical Guide. Winchester, UK: O-Books, 2012.
Rohr, Richard. Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2011.
Roof, Wade Clark. A Generation of Seekers: The Spiritual Journeys of the Baby Boom Generation. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1994.
Sarton, May. At Eighty-Two: A Journal. New York: Norton, 1996.
———. Journal of a Solitude. New York: Norton, 1992.
Schachter-Shalomi, Zalman. From Age-ing to Sage-ing: A Revolutionary Approach to Growing Older. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997.
Scott-Maxwell, Florida. The Measure of My Days: One Woman’s Vivid, Enduring Celebration of Life and Aging. New York: Penguin Books, 1968.
Shapiro, Rami. Recovery—The Sacred Art: The Twelve Steps as Spiritual Practice. Nashville, TN: SkyLight Paths Publishing, 2009.
Sheehy, Gail. New Passages: Mapping Your Life Across Time. New York: Random House, 1995.
Singer, Isaac Bashevis. The Family Moskat. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2007.
Singer, Michael. The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself. Oakland, CA: New Harbinger, 2007.
Singh, Kathleen Dowling. The Grace in Aging: Awaken as You Grow Older. Somerville, MA: Wisdom Publications, 2014.
Storr, Anthony. Solitude: A Return to the Self. New York: Free Press, 1988.
Thibault, Jane Marie, and Richard L. Morgan. Pilgrimage into the Last Third of Life: 7 Gateways to Spiritual Growth. Nashville, TN: Upper Room Books, 2012.
Thurman, Howard. Disciplines of the Spirit. Richmond, IN: Friends United Press, 1963.
Tolstoy, Leo. Childhood, Boyhood, Youth. New York: Penguin Classics, 2012.
———. The Death of Ivan Ilyich. New York: Bantam Classic, 2004
Traherne, Thomas. Centuries of Meditations. Grand Rapids, MI: Christian Classics Ethereal Library, 1908.
Underhill, Evelyn. The Mystic Way: The Role of Mysticism in the Christian Life. London: Forgotten Books, 2013.
Weber, Robert L., and Carol Orsborn. The Spirituality of Age: A Seeker’s Guide to Growing Older. Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions, 2015.
Wieseltier, Leon. Kaddish. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1998.
Whitman, Walt. Specimen Days and Collect. Philadelphia, David McKay, 1882–83. [AU: I believe this is the correct Whitman source per https://whitmanarchive.org/criticism/reviews/days/anc.00110.html]
Wilhelm, Richard, trans., and Cary F. Baynes, trans. The I Ching: Or Book of Changes. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1967.
Yalom, Irvin D. Staring at the Sun: Overcoming the Dread of Death. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2008.
Yudron, Gaea. “Full Moon, Summer Solstice: Contemplating the Archetypes.” Sage’s Play (June 20, 2016).
Zweig, Connie. The Inner Work of Age: Shifting from Role to Soul. Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions, 2022.
