Aging with Wisdom: Reflections, Stories and Teachings

by Olivia Ames Hoblitzelle, Larry Rosenberg (Foreword by)

Overview

“Olivia Hoblitzelle is a very wise woman and this book is a reflection of her deep experience with aging, illness, living, and dying. A combination of ancient wisdom, practical pointers,and tender stories, this is a book to cherish—a guide to a rich and challenging time of life.” —JOAN BORYSENKO, PH.D., Minding the Body, Mending the Mind

“...a wise and beautiful book shows how becoming an elder can be full with awakening and grace. Let this book be your companion through the season of letting go, and discover the ever-deepening love and mystery that is possible in our unfolding lives.” —TARA BRACH, Radical Acceptance and True Refuge

Drawing deeply on her own experiences as well as stories and studies about aging from other cultures, Hoblitzelle explores the ways that readers can nourish their inner lives and spirit even as their bodies’ age and facilities diminish. She offers seven guidelines to being attentive to the gifts that grow more valuable with age: spiritual orientation, practice of silence, practice of mindfulness, practice of stopping, finding the sacred in the commonplace, meditation, and the practice of gratitude. She also shares the stories of six “wayshowers,” individuals whose stories illustrate aging with compassion. This heartfelt book invites inspiring reflections on finding beauty in aging, facing death with dignity, and rejoicing in earthly blessings.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781939681713
Publisher:	Monkfish Book Publishing Company
Publication date:	11/21/2017
Pages:	224
Sales rank:	501,991
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.40(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Olivia Ames Hoblitzelle is a writer and dharma teacher. For over forty years she has devoted herself to spiritual practice, primarily Buddhist meditation, which has deeply influenced her professional life, in particular how to integrate psychology and meditation.

After practicing as a psychotherapist with individuals, couples, and groups, she taught in the field of Behavioral Medicine where she pioneered the integration of meditation, yoga, and cognitive therapy with traditional Western medicine. As a Teaching Fellow at the Mind/Body Medical Institute, she developed and taught training programs for health professionals in new approaches to health and healing through Harvard Medical School. During her career, she has introduced contemplative practices in a wide variety of settings: government agencies, businesses, hospitals, organizations, churches, and most extensively in school systems to both teachers and students.

Her first book, "Ten Thousand Joys & Ten Thousand Sorrows: A Couple’s Journey Through Alzheimer’s", is an award-winning book that has sold close to 15,000 copies and has been translated into four languages. As mentioned earlier, she has done extensive promotion; many talks, conference keynotes, book events, radio and TV interviews as well as written articles and other pieces (introductions, chapters, etc.) for books and periodicals.

As part of her commitment to contemplative life, Olivia has served on the boards of three organizations whose missions are to encourage Buddhist teachings and practices in the West: Insight Meditation Society, Trijang Buddhist Institute, and Dharma Friends. With her enduring commitment to peace and social justice, she was a founding board member and board chair of the Karuna Center for Peacebuilding. A lifelong educator, she was on the board of the Putney School and the Karuna School.

Now an elder with two grown children and four grandsons, she lives in Massachusetts and spends as much time as she can in Vermont where she grows vegetables, welcomes family and friends, and steeps herself in the glories of nature. She is also an artist committed to exploring the creative, spiritual, and healing dimensions of our lives. OliviaHoblitzelle.com

Table of Contents

Introduction

Part I Aging: Reflections, Stories, and Mysteries

Tectonic Shifts
A New Vision
Honoring the Life Cycle
ElderSpirit
The Cycle of Life
Archetypes of Aging
The Mind of Great Compassion
A Grandmother’s Gift
The Mystery of Time
A Wordless Encounter
Unbroken
All You Need

Part II Wisdom Treasures

Lighting the Way: Personal Weavings
The Sacred Circle
Know Your Refuges
A Jewel of Wisdom
Practices of the Heart
The Moments in Between
With Softness and Ease
Who Are You Now?
How to Dance in the Rain
Compassion for Yourself
Pure Perception
The Old Woman and the Starfish
Memorable Messages

Part III Passages: Dying Into Life

Life, Love and Death: Personal Weavings
Dhumavati: Goddess of Aging and Death
The Five Remembrances
The Ultimate Mystery
Between Realms
The Thin Place
Who Spoke?
The Gift of Death
Bleached Bone
A Gift of Life and Death

Part IV Wayshowers

Personal Weavings
Polly Thayer Starr For All Shall Be Well
Emerson Stamps Brought Here To Love
Stella Fox The Gift of Recognition
Alice O. Howell Living the Symbolic Life
Maud Morgan The Search For Freedom
Father Bede Griffiths Overwhelmed by Love

Conclusion

End Notes

Selected Bibliography

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“Inviting and encouraging, Aging with Wisdom offers great inspiration to all those who would like to use their later years to ripen spiritually, to awaken.” —Kathleen Dowling Singh, author of The Grace in Aging, The Grace in Dying

“Opens the door to aging’s wisdom and love in a beautiful and heartfelt way.” —Jack Kornfield, author of A Path with Heart

“This book is like a multi-colored jeweled necklace, each brief chapter distinctive in its brilliance, wisdom, and heart-moving content. It is honest about the tribulations of aging while inspiring each of us to find meaning as we move toward death and the light. Olivia’s stories and perspective are so exquisitely written; you will find yourself in tears and laughter, bringing you to face your own journey of aging in new ways.” —Natalie Rogers, author of The Creative Connection: Expressive Arts As Healing

“Olivia Hoblitzelle’s wise and beautiful book shows how becoming an elder can be full with awakening and grace. Let this book be your companion through the season of letting go, and discover the ever-deepening love and mystery that is possible in our unfolding lives. A treasure of a book.” —Tara Brach, author of Radical Acceptance and True Refuge

“Caution! Do not attempt to read this book rapidly. It is essential to pause and ponder after each brief reflection. For Olivia Hoblitzelle is a rare person and this is a rare book. The reader will be rewarded with a new paradigm to the challenge of aging with a treasure trove of inspirational insights and wisdom. A gem to be treasured!” —Rabbi Earl Grollman, author of 27 books including Living When a Loved One Has Died

“Olivia Hoblitzelle is a very wise woman and this book is a reflection of her deep experience with aging, illness, living, and dying. A combination of ancient wisdom, practical pointers, and tender stories, this is a book to cherish—a guide to a rich and challenging time of life.” —Joan Borysenko, New York Times Bestselling author of Minding the Body, Mending the Mind

“Once again Olivia generously shares with us her wise woman and spiritual elder perspectives on aging and sageing, with grace and wonder, loving-kindness, patience and humility. Her unequalled passion for exploring and cultivating the positive opportunities of aging without turning away from the gritty and painful parts of the process is an instructive inspiration to us all, an awakened vision which can transform our later years. Those of us who’ve walked this path long enough recognize what she’s talking about, helping us to more clearly perceive and internalize the mindscape and heartiness of the inner life. These are timeless and timely life lessons not to be overlooked, while simultaneously opening to the great mystery of existence, of love, and of being alone yet connected here together through birth, death, and onwards.”

—Lama Surya Das, Founder of the Dzogchen Meditation Center and Dzogchen Retreats, and author of Awakening the Buddha Within: Tibetan Wisdom for the Western World

“Powerful and deeply wise, Olivia Hoblitzelle’s voice in Aging with Wisdom rises to meet a growing cultural need: new ways to relate to aging. Olivia sheds light on a skillful relationship with aging by sharing from her own experience and by turning back toward the teachings of the Buddha. This is a wonderful book, much needed, and I highly recommend it to mature and young readers alike.” —Sharon Salzberg, author of Lovingkindness and Real Happiness

Editorial Reviews

09/11/2017
Drawing deeply on her own experiences as well as stories and studies about aging from other cultures, Hoblitzelle (Ten Thousand Joys & Ten Thousand Sorrows) explores the ways that readers can nourish their inner lives and spirit even as their bodies age and facilities diminish. Hoblitzelle stresses the reflective nature of the aging process: noticing how the body changes can provide space for reflection on life’s gifts and challenges, and aging often brings family members together, creating an opportunity to heal broken relationships. She offers seven guidelines to being attentive to the gifts that grow more valuable with age: spiritual orientation, practice of silence, practice of mindfulness, practice of stopping, finding the sacred in the commonplace, meditation, and the practice of gratitude. She also shares the stories of six “wayshowers,” individuals whose stories illustrate aging with compassion (Emerson Stamps reflects on his enslaved African ancestors while writing a memoir in his 80s, and Maud Morgan finds solace in the words of Jesuit priest Pierre Teilhard de Chardin: “The world is filled and filled with the absolute—to see this is to be free”). Hoblitzelle’s heartfelt book invites inspiring reflections on finding beauty in aging, facing death with dignity, and rejoicing in earthly blessings. (Nov.)

Publishers Weekly

"Drawing deeply on her own experiences as well as stories and studies about aging from other cultures, Hoblitzelle (Ten Thousand Joys & Ten Thousand Sorrows) explores the ways that readers can nourish their inner lives and spirit even as their bodies age and facilities diminish. Hoblitzelle stresses the reflective nature of the aging process: noticing how the body changes can provide space for reflection on life’s gifts and challenges, and aging often brings family members together, creating an opportunity to heal broken relationships. She offers seven guidelines to being attentive to the gifts that grow more valuable with age: spiritual orientation, practice of silence, practice of mindfulness, practice of stopping, finding the sacred in the commonplace, meditation, and the practice of gratitude. She also shares the stories of six 'wayshowers,' individuals whose stories illustrate aging with compassion (Emerson Stamps reflects on his enslaved African ancestors while writing a memoir in his 80s, and Maud Morgan finds solace in the words of Jesuit priest Pierre Teilhard de Chardin: 'The world is filled and filled with the absolute—to see this is to be free'). Hoblitzelle’s heartfelt book invites inspiring reflections on finding beauty in aging, facing death with dignity, and rejoicing in earthly blessings." —Publishers Weekly

Navigating the changes that come with age and the inevitability of death can be difficult, especially in cultures where the wisdom of elders is not typically revered. As a counter, Olivia Ames Hoblitzelle offers comforting and empowering reflections, readings, and lessons on growing older in her book, Aging with Wisdom. Hoblitzelle’s previous book explored her and her husband’s experiences after his Alzheimer’s diagnosis, through to his death six years later. This book widens those explorations of aging and death to include many other examples of people who chose to live their later years on their own terms. Hoblitzelle’s is a heartfelt, heartening guide to the later years. It shares approaches for opening up to the aging process, for finding beauty and grace in the inevitable decline and losses of old age, and for seeking gratitude, humor, and joy in the final stages of life. The time of life after children have grown up and left their childhood home is referred to in Hindu philosophy as the “forest monk” stage—when contemplation and a potentially more spiritual life can come forth after the busyness of career and child-rearing have calmed. This period should not just be seen in terms of loss, Hoblitzelle argues, but as a time when personal development can come to the forefront. As much as it is about living well, the book is also about dying well. It includes stories about people who have served as the author’s guides in her understanding of what it means to age with wisdom. It explores a variety of spiritual traditions and includes loving profiles of people who have served as wayshowers to the author as she navigates the challenges and opportunities of growing older. These stories should help readers to understand what’s happening in the final transitions of life and guide them to having a more meaningful and graceful experience of this time, whether with aging parents or family members or in their own lives." —Sarah White, Foreword Reviews

When Olivia Ames Hoblitzelle’s husband was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease, the couple decided they would weather his illness with all the wisdom they had gained as psychologists and teachers of meditation. “We approached it consciously and lovingly,” Hoblitzelle said, and “we became wiser.” She wrote about the end of her husband’s life in her book, “Ten Thousand Joys and Ten Thousand Sorrows: A Couple’s Journey Through Alzheimer’s.” With her husband’s death nearly 20 years behind her, Hoblitzelle has a new book out, “Aging With Wisdom,” in which the 80-year-old Cambridge resident, a longtime therapist, teacher, and speaker, counsels readers on “how to age gracefully, how to age consciously, and how to have a more open approach to death and dying than our culture does.” While the book is not a memoir, Hoblitzelle said, “it came out of a very personal place. I’ve always loved older people,” she added, laughing, “and now I am one!” Many cultures revere and honor their elders, Hoblitzelle said, but “our culture is all screwed up about age. It’s very harmful for older people. We know how much our perceptions of aging affect how we age.” “Obviously the body goes through its diminishment. But that doesn’t have to touch the spirit or the energy or the inner resilience.” With age comes “a kind of tectonic shift in the psyche,” she said. “We want to simplify; we want to cultivate our inner life more than we have; there’s a call to some of life’s deeper questions.” Meditation can nurture resilience, she said, and so can an awareness of what she calls the heroic aspect of aging. “The later years come along when our energy is declining; we don’t have the energy we had when we were 30, 40, or 50. I think it’s heroic to deal with what comes to us at a time when we’re increasingly impaired,” she said. “It’s all about how we live with the challenges that come to us.” —Kate Tuttle, Boston Globe, president of the National Book Critics Circle

From the Publisher