Book description
Most of us living in this complex and time-pressured era have moments
when we wish we were living simpler, more meaningful lives. Sometimes
these wishes are fleeting desires, but for many today the search for a
life of greater simplicity and meaning has developed into a deep
longing. There are many routes to simplicity. This book focuses on and
provides direction to the gimmick-free spiritual path followed by
Quakers. For over three centuries Quakers have been living out of a
spiritual center in a way of life they call "plain living."
Their accumulated experiences and distilled wisdom have much to offer
anyone seeking greater simplicity today. Plain Living is not about
sacrifice. It's about choosing the life you really want, a form of
inward simplicity that leads us to listen for the "still, small
voice" of God. This book goes beyond the merely trendy to make the
by now well-worn Quaker path to plain living accessible to everyone.
Quaker author Cathy Whitmire has served for decades in many leadership
roles in the Quaker community, including supervising community
empowerment projects in New England for the American Friends Service
Committee. She is an Alternatives to Violence trainer, and has
nonviolent communication and mediation training. Whitmire received a
master of divinity degree in 1987 from Harvard Divinity School. She has
served as a Protestant chaplain and pastoral counselor on a psychiatric
unit of an inner-city hospital in Boston. She attended the Shalem
Institute's program in spiritual direction in 1997 and also writes,
provides spiritual direction, and leads peace and nonviolence workshops
and retreats. The mother of a grown son and two stepsons, Whitmire lives
with her husband, Tom Ewell, in a home overlooking Puget Sound in
Washington. PARKER J. PALMER is a writer, teacher and activist whose
work speaks deeply to people in many walks of life. He is founder and
senior partner of the Center for Courage & Renewal. His books
include "A Hidden Wholeness," "Let Your Life Speak,"
"The Courage to Teach," "The Active Life," "To
Know as We Are Known," "The Company of Strangers,"
"The Promise of Paradox," "The Heart of Higher
Education," and "Healing the Heart of Democracy." He
holds a Ph. D. in sociology from the University of California at
Berkeley, as well as ten honorary doctorates, two Distinguished
Achievement Awards from the National Educational Press Association, and
an Award of Excellence from the Associated Church Press. In 1998, the
Leadership Project, a national survey of 10,000 educators, named him one
of the thirty most influential senior leaders in higher education and
one of the ten key agenda-setters of the past decade. In 2010, he was
given the William Rainey Harper Award (previously won by Margaret Mead,
Marshall McLuhan, Paulo Freire, and Elie Wiesel). "Living the
Questions: Essays Inspired by the Work and Life of Parker J.
Palmer," was published in 2005. In 2011, the Utne Reader named him
as one of "25 Visionaries Who Are Changing Your World"--people
who "don't just think out loud but who walk their talk on a daily
basis." (See the Oct-Nov 2011 print or online edition.) He lives in
Madison, Wisconsin.
