Ten Thousand Joys & Ten Thousand Sorrows by Olivia Ames Hoblitzelle

Ten Thousand Joys & Ten Thousand Sorrows by Olivia Ames Hoblitzelle

"Ten Thousand Sorrows & Ten Thousand Joys offers a vision of lives well-led, and of love in the thick of crisis and loss. Beyond inspiring."-Daniel Goleman, author of Emotional Intelligence

"This beautiful book is unlike any other personal account of living with Alzheimer's disease that I have ever read . . . it offers patients and families practical insights into how they can live their lives more fully amidst the heartbreak of a mind-robbing illness."- Paul Raia, Director of Patient Care and Family Support, Alzheimer's Association, Massachusetts Chapter

"A story of courage, love, and growing wisdom in the face of Alzheimer's."-Joseph Goldstein, author of One Dharma, Founder / Director of Insight Meditation Society

In this profound and courageous memoir, Olivia Ames Hoblitzelle describes how her husband's Alzheimer's diagnosis at the age of seventy-two challenged them to live the spiritual teachings they had embraced during the course of their life together. Following a midlife career shift, Harrison Hobliztelle, or Hob as he was called, a former professor of comparative literature at Barnard, Columbia, and Brandeis University, became a family therapist and was ordained a Dharmacharya (senior teacher) by Thich Nhat Hanh. Hob comes to life in these pages as an incredibly funny and brilliant man who never stopped enjoying a good philosophical conversation-even as his mind, quite literally, slipped away from him. And yet when they first heard the diagnosis, Olivia and Hob's initial reaction was to cling desperately to the life they had had. But everything had changed, and they knew that the only answer was to greet this last phase of Hob's life consciously and lovingly.

Ten Thousand Joys & Ten Thousand Sorrows provides a wise and compassionate vision for maintaining hope and grace in the face of life's greatest challenges.

(This memoir was originally self-published as The Majesty of Your Loving.)

Olivia Ames Hoblitzelle is a dharma teacher and writer. She has devoted herself to spiritual practice, principally Buddhist meditation, for over forty years, and it has had a profound impact on her professional life, particularly how to blend psychology and meditation. She lectured in the field of Behavioral medicine after working as a psychotherapist with individuals, couples, and groups, where she pioneered the integration of meditation, yoga, and cognitive therapy with traditional Western medicine. She designed and taught training programs for health professionals in novel approaches to health and healing through Harvard Medical School as a Teaching Fellow at the Mind/Body Medical Institute. Throughout her career, she has brought contemplative practices to both teachers and students in a number of settings, including government agencies, corporations, hospitals, organizations, churches, and, most notably, school systems.

Ten Thousand Joys & Ten Thousand Sorrows: A Couple's Journey Through Alzheimer's is her first book, which has sold nearly 15,000 copies and been translated into four languages. She has given several presentations, conference keynotes, book events, radio and television interviews, as well as authored articles and other pieces (introductions, chapters, etc.) for books and journals, as previously indicated. Olivia has worked on the boards of three organizations dedicated to promoting Buddhist teachings and practices in the West: Insight Meditation Society, Trijang Buddhist Institute, and Dharma Friends, as part of her commitment to contemplative life. She was a founding board member and board chair of the Karuna Center for Peacebuilding because of her unwavering commitment to peace and social justice.

She served on the boards of the Putney School and the Karuna School during her career as an educator. She resides in Massachusetts with her two grown daughters and four grandchildren and spends as much time as she can in Vermont, where she produces vegetables, greets family and friends, and soaks up the beauty of nature. She's also a visual artist interested in the creative, spiritual, and therapeutic aspects of our existence. OliviaHoblitzelle.com is a website dedicated to Olivia Hoblitzelle.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9781585428274
ISBN 10	1585428272
Title	Ten Thousand Joys & Ten Thousand Sorrows
Author	Olivia Ames Hoblitzelle
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	Penguin Putnam Inc
Year published	2010-09-30
Number of pages	352
Prizes	Winner of Nautilus Award (Aging Gracefully) 2011
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.