Engaging older life in creative ways

Hello friends. “Aging as a Spiritual Journey” was my first major foray into the challenges and promise of growing older. I developed an interest in this area more than thirty years ago. On returning to Emory University, I started a graduate seminar on Jung and religion as well as a course on death and dying. From such experiences, it seemed natural to back up into a study of aging, which, for most of us, opens the door to our own mortality.

This study examined the social trend to push the elderly away from serious involvement in their communities and the wider world, and encouraged them to re-engage in life in newly creative ways.

This whole writing enterprise for me, including fiction, non-fiction, and poetry, has been about searching inwardly on the contemplative path to live more creatively and spiritually in the world. It has also been about clapping my hands in the spirit of William Butler Yeats in “Sailing to Byzantium.” Best, Gene.