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A Generation’s Worth ~ Author talk & reading at Bookworks ~ Albuquerque, New Mexico
July 13, 2023 @ 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm
“Life does not feed life, life is on the receiving end of life, always. It’s death that feeds life. It’s the end of life that gives life a chance. That’s a hard, grown-up kind of comfort.” Stephen Jenkinson
Stephen will be in New Mexico with A Night of Grief & Mystery (July 13) but first he’s coming to speak to you who gather at Bookworks in Albuquerque on Thursday July 13th.
Die Wise – A Manifesto for Sanity and Soul is Stephen Jenkinson’s award-winning book about grief, and dying, and the great love of life.
A wise death is everyone’s right. The idea makes no sense in a culture that doesn’t believe in dying, or in limits or endings, at all. Here’s the revolution: Dying can be – and must be — the fullest expression and incarnation of what you’ve learned by living.
How you die is the proving ground, the cradle, and the grave for every conviction you may have about justice and mercy, about the meaning of life, about what love should look like and what it should do.
Grief is the radical etiquette needed by a death phobic, grief illiterate time. It’s a skill, in the same way that love is a skill, something that must be learned and cultivated and taught. Dying is not the end of wisdom, and wisdom is not exhausted by dying. Dying well is a spiritual obligation, and a moral obligation. If you love somebody, if you care about the world that’s to come after you, if you want somebody to be spared the lunacy of what you’ve seen, you’ve got to ‘die wise.’ Especially in the wake of a pandemic.
Come of Age: The Case for Elderhood in a Time of Trouble ~ In his landmark provocative style, Stephen makes the case that we must birth a new generation of elders, one poised and willing to be true stewards of the planet and its species.
Come of Age does not offer tips on how to be a better senior citizen or how to be kinder to our elders. Rather, with lyrical prose and incisive insight, Stephen Jenkinson explores the great paradox of elderhood in North America: how we are awash in the aged and yet somehow lacking in wisdom; how we relegate senior citizens to the corner of the house while simultaneously heralding them as sage elders simply by virtue of their age. Our own unreconciled relationship with what it means to be an elder has yielded a culture nearly bereft of them. Meanwhile, the planet boils, and the younger generation boils with anger over being left an environment and sociopolitical landscape deeply scarred and broken.
All of Stephen’s books can be purchased here or downloaded (some only available via us at Orphan Wisdom)
MORE ABOUT STEPHEN JENKINSON ~ culture activist, worker, author, founder of The Orphan Wisdom School ~
Jenkinson teaches internationally and is the creator and principal instructor of the Orphan Wisdom School, co-founded the school with his wife Nathalie Roy in 2010, convening semi-annually in Deacon, Ontario, and in northern Europe.
He has Master’s degrees from Harvard University (Theology) and the University of Toronto (Social Work).
He is the author of Reckoning (co-written with Kimberly Ann Johnson (2022), A Generation’s Worth: Spirit Work While the Crisis Reigns (2021), Come of Age: The Case for Elderhood in a Time of Trouble (2018), the award-winning Die Wise: A Manifesto for Sanity and Soul (2015 and translated into Hebrew and Turkish), How it All Could Be: A workbook for dying people and those who love them (2009), and Money and The Soul’s Desires: A Meditation (2002).
He was a contributing author to Palliative Care – Core Skills and Clinical Competencies (2007).
Live recorded teachings include Homecoming: The Haiku Sessions (2013), (Angel and Executioner: Grief and the Love of Life – (2009).
Stephen Jenkinson is also the subject of the feature length documentary film Griefwalker, a lyrical and poetic portrait of his work with dying people. (National Film Board of Canada, 2008, dir. Tim Wilson and since translated into eight languages). Lost Nation Road is a shorter documentary on the crafting of the Nights of Grief and Mystery tours (2019, dir. Ian Mackenzie).
Read more about Stephen at orphanwisdom.com/about