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Named a Best Book of 2016 by Real Simple and Southern Living
"Illuminating, unflinching and ultimately inspiring... A book to treasure.” –People Magazine
"A poetic and philosophical and brave and uplifting meditation on how important it is to make peace and meaning of our lives while we still have them.” --Elizabeth Gilbert, bestselling author ofEat Pray Love
A hospice chaplain passes on wisdom on giving meaning to life, from those taking leave of it.
As a hospice chaplain, Kerry Egan didn’t offer sermons or prayers, unless they were requested; in fact, she found, the dying rarely want to talk about God, at least not overtly. Instead, she discovered she’d been granted an invaluable chance to witness firsthand what she calls the “spiritual work of dying”—the work of finding or making meaning of one’s life, the experiences it’s contained and the people who have touched it, the betrayals, wounds, unfinished business, and unrealized dreams. Instead of talking, she mainly listened: to stories of hope and regret, shame and pride, mystery and revelation and secrets held too long. Most of all, though, she listened as her patients talked about love—love for their children and partners and friends; love they didn’t know how to offer; love they gave unconditionally; love they, sometimes belatedly, learned to grant themselves.
This isn’t a book about dying—it’s a book about living. And Egan isn’t just passively bearing witness to these stories. An emergency procedure during the birth of her first child left her physically whole but emotionally and spiritually adrift. Her work as a hospice chaplain healed her, from a brokenness she came to see we all share. Each of her patients taught her something—how to find courage in the face of fear or the strength to make amends; how to be profoundly compassionate and fiercely empathetic; how to see the world in grays instead of black and white. In this poignant, moving, and beautiful book, she passes along all their precious and necessary gifts.
- Sales Rank: #14588 in Books
- Brand: Riverhead Books
- Published on: 2016-10-25
- Released on: 2016-10-25
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.31" h x .75" w x 5.38" l, .71 pounds
- Binding: Hardcover
- 224 pages
- Riverhead Books
Review
“Funny, honest, and self-deprecating…On Living adds to the understanding of end-of-life issues in an important and accessible way…If there is one thing death teaches us, it’s how to live.” –New York Times Book Review
"Illuminating, unflinching and ultimately inspiring, [On Living] presents “the spiritual work of dying” as a profound process with undeniable elements of beauty. A book to treasure.” –People Magazine
"This isn’t a self-help book, but in its own way it inspires and instructs. Ms. Egan, a hospice chaplain, has a down-to-earth, never-preachy style.” –The Wall Street Journal
"On Living... is about what makes us human." –Houston Chronicle
"A poetic and philosophical and brave and uplifting meditation on how important it is to make peace and meaning of our lives while we still have them.” –Elizabeth Gilbert, bestselling author of Eat Pray Love
“Egan... works as a hospice chaplain, supporting the spirits of those who are dying. In this book, she compassionately describes and distills what she has learned in their service.” —Boston Globe
“Equal parts memoir and meditative text on the nature of life — and the many faces of faith —….this beautiful book will speak to parts of your heart that you didn't even realize were hurting. What's more: It might help heal them.” —Refinery29, Best New Books to Read This Month
“A unique gem of a book... Wise without being preachy, warm without being cloying, Kerry Egan offers a delightful, humorous, and ultimately joyful perspective on what it means to be alive.” —Chicago Review of Books
“Egan’s evocative and eloquent book reminds us that we are defined by the stories we tell, and those stories often reveal how life can be “beautiful and crushing” at the same time.” --BookPage
“In Egan’s narrative, hope takes many shapes… It’s the kind of wisdom that might comfort someone experiencing a pain, suffering loss, or facing death. While belief systems may be filled with arguments and theories, Egan’s perspective is more forgiving, softer, and grayer…By showing how she sits with death, Egan helps reveal what we might be afraid to face.” –Christian Century
“Good dose of humor…beautiful... raw and vulnerable.” –Hannah Creager, Williamsburg Hospice
“This is one of the best books I have read all year: moving, inspiring, beautifully written…It is a book well worth exploring.” –America Magazine
"In her sophomore outing, Egan masters the art of imparting critical life advice without coming off as preachy—a difficult feat…Egan’s empathetic tone is a comfort for both the healthy and the dying—whom, she opines, are not polar opposites…As the title suggests, this is not just a book about dying. It’s one that will inspire readers to make the most of every day.” —Publishers Weekly (starred)
"Powerful...in this quick read, Egan takes readers on an emotional journey through many unforgettable lives." —Booklist
“[Egan’s] anecdotes are often thought-provoking combinations of sublime humor and tragic pathos… A moving, heartfelt account of a hospice veteran.” –Kirkus Reviews
“A unique gem of a book... On Living is anything but mournful. In fact, it’s one of the most hopeful and insightful books I’ve read in years. Wise without being preachy, warm without being cloying, Kerry Egan offers a delightful, humorous, and ultimately joyful perspective on what it means to be alive.” —Abby Geni, author of The Lightkeepers
“I know from experience what a blessing hospice can be for patients and their families. Kerry Egan’s insightful book is a blessing as well. A born storyteller, she allows us a glimpse into a little-known world, where ordinary people face death with wit, humor, sadness, and regret. Egan reveals that the job of a chaplain is mostly to listen to them as they work out how to set things right with those they love, and find meaning in their lives.” —Kathleen Norris, author of The Cloister Walk, Amazing Grace, and Acedia and Me
“When I forget the importance of kindness, when I forget to listen, when I no longer recognize the comfort of a quiet presence, when no words will help, when I lose sight of what is most important, I will want On Living within arm's reach, always. I love this book.” —Abigail Thomas, author of A Three Dog Life and What Comes Next and How to Like It
“It's a brave thing to walk into the rooms of the dying with no props--to sit down, open your heart and your mind, and be present to whatever comes up. But that's exactly what chaplain Kerry Egan does, and in On Living, she reveals some of what she has learned. What does come up? Anger, love, regret, secrets, stories, and insights, well-told and well-felt." —Victoria Sweet, author of God’s Hotel
About the Author
Kerry Egan is a hospice chaplain and a graduate of Harvard Divinity School. Her hospice work has been featured on PBS and CNN, and her essays have appeared in Parents, American Baby, Reader’s Digest, and CNN.com, where they have been read more than two million times. She and her family live in Columbia, South Carolina.
Most helpful customer reviews
62 of 64 people found the following review helpful.
To the Fullest
By carilynp
Kerry Egan’s ON LIVING is exactly what the title says, a memoir about how to live. While she is a chaplain and works with people who are typically in hospice care and leaving this world, in this magnificent book, she shares incredibly moving stories from patients who made an impression on her, whose words prompted her to talk about, not how you can die gracefully, but how you can live meaningfully.
This is a book for everyone. Whether you have lost someone important to you or not, this book explains the virtues of not waiting for that last breath you are going to take and telling those you love what you wanted to say when you should have said it, not trying to say you’re sorry to someone whose health is failing when it is too late, and learning the power of forgiveness, which Egan says to do second, “while there is still time to do the actual work that’s involved in seeking and granting forgiveness and arriving at some reconciliation.”
The stories that she shares are vastly different as are the people with whom she spent time with. Egan also opens up about a very difficult time that she went through, which allowed her to see things from another perspective, not just as the chaplain providing comfort but wishing that she had someone to console her, understand what she had gone through.
An important message that Egan is trying to convey is that dying people are just like us, “they just happen to be doing something we’ve never done. To die is a verb, like to jump, to eat, or to laugh. It’s something people do, not who they are.”
ON LIVING is comforting, it is a shining light, it is the grandparent’s words that you heard when you were too young to appreciate them, it is the sage whispers that remind you, this is how I want to live.
21 of 22 people found the following review helpful.
An urgency for life
By Ray F
On Living is Kerry Egan’s recounting of stories told to her by hospice patients during her years as a chaplain. I found it readable and engaging in relating the wisdom and healing Ms Egan found from listening to what people with little time left had to say. Their stories are sometimes heart-rending, sometimes tragic, sometimes funny, but never morbid. While it will make the open-minded reader think about confronting death, this book, as the title indicates, is really about confronting life.
Ms Egan is unflinchingly honest in relating the experiences of her patients and of her work trying to help them. She shows us people struggling to cope with incapacity and life’s impending end. She also shows us her brush with psychosis that prompted her hospice work. These dark passages are balanced, however, with commentary informed by her Harvard Divinity School education and the enlightenment she takes from her patients’ tales. Indeed, her knack for squeezing meaning from experience infused her first book, Fumbling (her story of hiking the 500 mile Camino de Santiago in northern Spain), and kept me reading this one.
Though it concerns dying, On Living does not dwell on death. It shows those who are dying as carrying on, as well as they can, to their last day. Many take comfort from religion, but some don’t. Very often, their concerns are mostly for those they will leave behind. Where they are different from people not in a hospice, Ms Egan tells us, is that they know their time is short. So all they do and say takes on an urgency that we should mark.
Ms Egan’s chapters are essays on themes relating to the experiences of one or more patients. She tells the dying person’s story and relates it to her own life. Very often, she makes a quick identification with a patient’s views. For instance, when one impressed upon her that since life is all shades of gray, we shouldn’t get hung up on rules. Following that maxim led to her being reprimanded for bending her job’s rules. While some might judge her unfavorably for such an episode, I see in it an intellectual honesty and empathy that must make her a great chaplain. It certainly makes her a compelling writer.
There are also in this book (as in Fumbling) paranormal highlights. I think they enhance the subject matter. They are described in her incidents with the “medicine woman” and with her “guardian angel.” Such passages are powerful because they come from someone not given to supernatural themes. They don’t detract from her central purpose but rather support it and emphasize life’s wonder. Such wonder is, perhaps, more readily seen when dealing with distress, such as dying.
Ms Egan says:
"There’s nothing stopping you from acting with the same urgency the dying feel."
Feeling that urgency is, I think, this book’s central message. Such feeling creeps upon us as we grow older, if we’re honest with ourselves. We can dread it or let it spur us to a greater appreciation of life. This theme leavens the stories and central narrative of On Living and makes it a worthy resource for inspiration and personal growth.
There is a continuum in Ms Egan’s two books. From Fumbling to On Living, we see the maturation of the young Camino pilgrim into the experienced, enlightened, hospice chaplain. Even so, the young seeker is still there, searching out the truth of life in her daily pilgrimage with a desire to share her insights with the world.
I highly recommend On Living as an inspirational and thoughtful read. Don’t let the hospice stories aspect put you off. The book’s title accurately describes its theme; this is not a funeral dirge. I do suggest, though, that you read Fumbling as well, so as to appreciate Ms Egan’s personal evolution.
The stories in this book remind us that we’re all facing certain death. You can take that as morbid, or let it prompt you to act with an urgency for life.
26 of 29 people found the following review helpful.
A Literary Hug
By stacy
Great book and a quick read. I was expecting a book about working as a hospice chaplain to be potentially dark. But to the contrary, it was full of love, kindness, and warmth. I can see why Elizabeth Gilbert recommended - it's good for the soul.
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