Integrating two decades of hospice care and social science research, this heartfelt book offers practical lessons on the transformative possibilities of end-of-life caregiving.
Contemplative Caregiving is an indispensable guide for end-of-life caregivers and for anyone seeking to transform experiences of caregiving and grief. Rather than leading to burnout and despair, caring for those who are suffering and dying can enrich our lives with meaning and further our own spiritual growth and resilience. Whether you are caring for a loved one with cancer or dementia, grieving a sudden traumatic loss, or even serving time in prison, Contemplative Caregiving offers encouragement for showing up to the fullness of life in whatever those circumstances may be. Healing, compassion, and spiritual growth are available to us all, in this lifetime, right now.
Baugher's unique style of integrating social scientific research on caregiving and grief with teachings from Buddhist, contemplative Christian, and other wisdom traditions illuminates how we each can transform experiences of loss and suffering into a path of compassion. Contemplative Caregiving weaves together powerful stories from interviews with diverse hospice caregivers-Vietnam veterans, nurses, housewives, Catholic nuns, those convicted of murder-with the author's own journey toward wholeness in the face of grief and traumatic loss, including the murder of his own mother. Through rich storytelling, teachings on compassion, and skillful contemplative exercises, Baugher invites you to join him in exploring the healing power of contemplative caregiving.
JOHN ERIC BAUGHER, PhD, has been a contemplative educator, social science researcher, and end-of-life caregiver for more than two decades. He is the co-editor of Leading with Spirit, Presence, and Authenticity and Creative Social Change: Leadership for a Healthy World. Dr. Baugher consults and offers workshops internationally on spiritual care, grief and transformation, and contemplative learning.
Show moreIntegrating two decades of hospice care and social science research, this heartfelt book offers practical lessons on the transformative possibilities of end-of-life caregiving.
Contemplative Caregiving is an indispensable guide for end-of-life caregivers and for anyone seeking to transform experiences of caregiving and grief. Rather than leading to burnout and despair, caring for those who are suffering and dying can enrich our lives with meaning and further our own spiritual growth and resilience. Whether you are caring for a loved one with cancer or dementia, grieving a sudden traumatic loss, or even serving time in prison, Contemplative Caregiving offers encouragement for showing up to the fullness of life in whatever those circumstances may be. Healing, compassion, and spiritual growth are available to us all, in this lifetime, right now.
Baugher's unique style of integrating social scientific research on caregiving and grief with teachings from Buddhist, contemplative Christian, and other wisdom traditions illuminates how we each can transform experiences of loss and suffering into a path of compassion. Contemplative Caregiving weaves together powerful stories from interviews with diverse hospice caregivers-Vietnam veterans, nurses, housewives, Catholic nuns, those convicted of murder-with the author's own journey toward wholeness in the face of grief and traumatic loss, including the murder of his own mother. Through rich storytelling, teachings on compassion, and skillful contemplative exercises, Baugher invites you to join him in exploring the healing power of contemplative caregiving.
JOHN ERIC BAUGHER, PhD, has been a contemplative educator, social science researcher, and end-of-life caregiver for more than two decades. He is the co-editor of Leading with Spirit, Presence, and Authenticity and Creative Social Change: Leadership for a Healthy World. Dr. Baugher consults and offers workshops internationally on spiritual care, grief and transformation, and contemplative learning.
Show moreBlending personal insights from twenty-five years of hospice volunteering with contemplative social science research, this thoughtful and engaging book offers practical lessons about the transformative possibilities of compassionate end-of-life caregiving.
JOHN ERIC BAUGHER, PhD, has been a contemplative educator, social science researcher, and end-of-life caregiver for more than two decades. He is the co-editor of Leading with Spirit, Presence, and Authenticity and Creative Social Change- Leadership for a Healthy World. Dr. Baugher consults and offers workshops internationally on spiritual care, grief and transformation, and contemplative learning. To learn more, please visit johnericbaugher.com.
“We often imagine that when we care for another, we are the ‘giver’
and the one we care for is the ‘receiver.’ But in this important,
extensive, and deep exploration of the experience of hospice
volunteers, Baugher describes givers who feel like receivers—of
gratitude, patience, and wisdom drawn from a deep connection to
another human being at an ultimate moment. Having lost his mother
as an eighteen-year-old, at the hands of a murderer, yet later
bonding with fellow hospice volunteers who are themselves
imprisoned for murder, Baugher pioneers for us the very outer
frontiers of human empathy. A very important frontier, a very
important book.”—Arlie Hochschild, author of Strangers in Their Own
Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right, a finalist for the
National Book Award
“An inspiring and compassionate story of how to transform personal
suffering into the ground of mutually beneficial service. It is
possible to keep our heart open in hell. This book illuminates the
way.”—Frank Ostaseski, author of The Five Invitations: Discovering
What Death Can Teach Us About Living Fully
“Our families, hospitals, prisons, and whole society can benefit
from the vision of compassion offered by John Baugher. This is
truly a book for the heart.”—Thupten Jinpa, principal translator to
the Dalai Lama and author of A Fearless Heart: How the Courage to
Be Compassionate Can Transform Our Lives
“A dazzling study of human vulnerability and connection,
Contemplative Caregiving is wide-ranging in scope, profound in its
intimacy. Based on interviews with diverse hospice
caregivers—Vietnam veterans, nurses, housewives, Catholic nuns,
convicted murderers—Baugher conjures the transformative potential
of care in an array of moving and unexpected insights.”—Yasmin
Gunaratnam, author of Death and the Migrant and Researching Race
and Ethnicity
“Contemplative Caregiving is an invitation from author John Baugher
to discover with him the transformative potential of love. In both
living and dying, Baugher guides us exceedingly well.”—Sharon
Salzberg, author of Lovingkindness and Real Love
“There’s a lot more to the spiritual path than silent meditation,
and Contemplative Caregiving shows us how transformative
end-of-life hospice work (and other types of compassionate care)
can be. I was moved by the personal stories, many of them by prison
inmate volunteers, who have a lot to teach the rest of us. A book
not just to read but to cherish and share.”—David Loy, author of
Ecodharma: Buddhist Teachings for the Ecological Crisis
“Contemplative Caregiving provides the medicine of what is needed:
an awake heart-mind, receptivity, and community. Through sharing
his personal work, rich storytelling, and historical context, John
brings us on a journey to our true home—being in intimate
relationship with ourselves and others through service.”—Sensei
Koshin Paley Ellison, cofounder of the New York Zen Center for
Contemplative Care, author of Wholehearted: Slow Down, Help Out,
Wake Up, and editor of Awake at the Bedside: Contemplative
Teachings on Palliative and End-of-Life Care
“As someone who transformed my own hell through a deep dive into
hospice and contemplative caregiving, I am extremely inspired and
moved by Baugher’s book Contemplative Caregiving. Who better
to tell the story of so many transformed by giving and receiving
compassionate care at the end of life, including prison inmates,
than a man who has so deeply transformed his own unspeakable pain
by bringing dignity to the suffering of others. This is a book
about life and death, courage and compassion, and the
transformative power of love.”—Fleet Maull, PhD, author
of Radical Responsibility and Dharma in Hell
“A trenchant and groundbreaking book inviting readers to taste
the real, profound, unscripted, and liberating effects experienced
by someone generating and enacting compassion for another
person. This book can speak to all of us, whoever we are,
about ourselves, sounding an infinitely bright and uplifting note
in the otherwise mounting overture of despair and confusion in our
world today.”—Patrick Gaffney, editor of The Tibetan Book of Living
and Dying and Talent for Humanity
“Contemplative Caregiving is that rare book that deftly
combines empirically grounded social science with an unapologetic
vision to recognize and celebrate the dying and the people who care
for them. Through the lives and experiences of a diverse sample of
hospice volunteers—including prisoners—we come to see the truly
transformative power of listening to and caring for people at the
end of life.”—Clare Stacey, PhD, author of The Caring Self
“This book gives the reader an insider’s view of the ups and downs,
the joys and challenges, the promises and perils of end-of-life
caregiving. Here is an invitation to a spiritual practice that can
be powerfully transformative and life-giving, not only for those
who receive the gift of a caregiver’s compassionate presence but
also for the caregivers themselves. In contemplatively caring for
those who are dying, one may find therein the seeds of peace, hope,
a quiet joy, and heartfelt gratitude for this gift of being human,
in all it entails.”—Ruben L. F. Habito, guiding teacher at Maria
Kannon Zen Center, Dallas, Texas, and author of Living Zen,
Loving God and Healing Breath
“In this courageous book, John Baugher connects with the timeless
wisdom of spiritual traditions both East and West. Picking up the
mantle from Dame Cicely Saunders, Thich Nhat Hahn, and other
visionaries, Contemplative Caregiving weaves together story
and teaching with practical exercises to empower us to extend
compassion to ourselves and all others without exception. An
invitation to hope and healing in these troubled times.”—Matthew
Lee, PhD, director of empirical research, Human Flourishing Program
at Harvard University, and author of The Heart of Religion
“In this beautiful and moving book, we learn what it means to see
caregiving as a path of redemption and transformation rather than a
source of stress and burnout. The journeys described here are
messy, rich, painful, and transcendent. Contemplative
Caregiving is an absorbing read and an indispensable guide to
all of us who live in this mortal world.”—Leslie J. Blackhall, MD,
MTS, section head, palliative care, Tussi and John Kluge Chair,
University of Virginia School of Medicine
“A work of courage and deep vulnerability that can inspire
leaders in any field in moving beyond models of heroic action
toward authentic, relational encounters with self and others. I
invite all who pick up this book to see their own life’s journey
reflected in its pages and to draw on the creative spaces within
themselves to further a more compassionate
twenty-first century.”—Éliane Ubalijoro, PhD, board member,
International Leadership Association; professor of practice, McGill
University
“In Contemplative Caregiving, Baugher bears witness to how
deep listening and acceptance can transform suffering into
compassion for ourselves and others, now and at the end of life.
Insightful and practical, this book is essential reading for those
preparing for chaplaincy and ministry.”—Cheryl A. Giles, Francis
Greenwood Peabody Senior Lecturer on Pastoral Care and Counseling;
faculty, Buddhist Ministry Initiative, Harvard Divinity School; and
co-editor of The Arts of Contemplative Care: Pioneering Voices
in Buddhist Chaplaincy and Pastoral Work
“While this elegant work will be of particular value to hospice
volunteers, Baugher’s wisdom will resonate with anyone who finds
themselves caring for someone at the end-of-life.”—Publishers
Weekly
“Baugher removes the drudgery from caregiving to offer readers
greater goals on which to focus. Recommended for all caregivers and
anyone about to enter that space.”—Library Journal
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