Joseph Campbell was America’s best-known mythologist and Meade deserves the title today. Through storytelling and metaphor, the author helps us through a spiritual labyrinth filled with beauty and insight, showing how meaning is essential to the human soul.

This 2021 book takes the idea of Mindset and personalizes it with a compelling personal tale of a father who realizes he’s stuck and starts to learn a beginner’s mind by observing how open his young daughter is to learning something new. Highly recommended.

An American surgeon and journalist, Gawande addresses end-of-life care, hospice care, and also shares his reflections and personal stories. He suggests that medical care should focus on well-being rather than survival. Particularly meaningful for caregivers.

Another MEA guest faculty member who is based in the UK, Carl was one of the leaders of the slow food movement and he’s now applied his mastery to the slow life movement, the idea of loving and appreciating every moment of our increasingly-lengthened lives. A nice mix of personal story and science-based evidence.

A powerful biography and guide to embracing death without fear by the Ex-Chairman and former CEO of KPMG who quit his job to settle his accounts (positively) with friends and family, and write a book about his last 100 days and making it the best time of his life.

Stephen Jenkinson writes prolifically on what it means to be an elder in the modern world, but with fascinating historical framing. His books are dense, yet his message is like water in the desert for those who believe that the cult of youth doesn’t serve us.

The daughter of intellectuals Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson is a force to be reckoned with. This is the follow-up book to Composing a Life in which Mary Catherine introduces the idea of the “midlife atrium,” which was an inspiration for why we created MEA.

‍How To Build a Well Lived Joyful Life. Great subtitle. These two Stanford Design School professors have built a bustling business on the basis of this popular book. Applying design thinking principles to one’s life makes so much sense. A lot of MEA wisdom here.

‍Redefining Aging, Transforming Aging, Re-Imagining Life comes from an exquisite writer who popularized the word “elderhood.” Aronson’s book focuses on how the medical world needs to get smarter about understanding the body, mind and spirit of older adults.

Hollis is a well-respected author and devotee to Carl Jung’s work. Chip believes that Jung’s observations on midlife are more accurate than any other well-known psychologist so you can imagine this modern book is a compelling read for those aged 50+.

‍A Revolutionary Approach to Growing Older. Listen to the Rabbi! This book, while it occasionally moves in the new-age direction, is a worthwhile read about how wisdom can serve us (and serve others) so that our extra years are assets, not liabilities.

This is one of the most popular books ever written on the subject of midlife. Bob also created The Halftime Institute which has some similarities to MEA, although its focus is with an exclusively Christian lens.

Marc is one of the wisest observers of aging and intergenerational collaboration we know, and a great friend to MEA. His book reminds us that life is not about finding the fountain of youth, it’s about inviting others to bathe in the fountain with you.

This book is all about the unexpected pleasures of aging written with almost an encyclopedia kind of efficiency, but a heartfelt way of expressing it. If you have a friend who thinks that getting older is a curse consider giving them this book.

We love Barbara’s writing style. So readable and accessible. Makes you want her to become a close friend. The beauty of this book is you see her discovery and evolution around her mindset about her age and how much more she has available to her after 50 than she thought.

This 2020 New York Times bestseller by an MEA Online guest faculty member reminds us there are four variables when it comes to transitions: personal vs. societal and voluntary vs. involuntary. Bruce gives a great outline of the seven approaches to addressing the three stages of any transition and helps us see that, on average, it takes 4 years to digest a transition.

Chip’s favorite book of all time chronicles the journey of Frankl, a Jewish psychologist, who believed meaning is the fuel of life, as he survives the horrors of a Nazi concentration camp, where his theory (logotherapy) was tested and proved accurate.

Chip met Master Huang at Esalen and admired his sage advice. Huang co-authored this eastern-minded perspective on mentoring and Chip reports that it’s the best book he’s ever read on the subject, where they describe mentoring as "a two-way circular dance.”

There may be no more important book in the MEA library than this one given how much of our curriculum is based upon helping people move from a fixed to a growth mindset. Highly recommend pages 254-262 on The Journey to a Growth Mindset four-step overview.

Great advice from one of the world’s most respected leadership coaches. Jerry has been giving advice to senior leaders for decades, but in this revealing, authentic personal story, he talks about how he needed to take his own advice regarding his life and career.

Dr. Bill is a guest faculty member and sort of famous leader in the movement of changing nursing homes in the U.S. He’s a prolific author and even does concert tours based upon his “Changing Aging” theme. This is my favorite of his many books.

Shelley is an MEA SabSesh alum and guest faculty member. Her book was required reading for everyone who came to her SabSesh as it tells the story of how this former Chief Marketing Officer of Harley-Davidson found her soul and where it led her. An inspiring read.

Featured in Wisdom@Work, Karen is a “non-techy” woman in her 60s who succeeded at both Google and Twitter. A guest faculty member at MEA, Karen helps underline the basics of how to use your network to build your career, even if (like her) you’re an introvert.

No book better outlines the personal and sociological implications of the fact that a child in the developing world today has a 50/50 chance of living to 100. So many policy implications for governments and corporations. And possibly life-altering for us all.

‍The Hudson Institute founder has been grooming leadership coaches for more than three decades. In his best book, he deftly describes what we go through during midlife and why having a better understanding of these years will help us to find our roadmap.

One of the best known authors in the self-help, new-age world, Hendricks book on transitions covers well-known territory but with a gentle sense of encouragement almost as if he has become your personal life coach.

We love MEA guest faculty Marci and Encore.org. This practical, how-to guide is both inspiring and easy to follow. Chip has given it to many folks who are approaching 50 with trepidation as it helps us to see how many paths are still available in midlife and beyond.

An MEA guest faculty member, Frank offers death as an organizing principle for life. The founder of one of the first Zen hospices in the US, he became intimate with death and two key questions people ask at the end of life: Was I well-loved? Did I love well?

A friend of MEA, Jonathan is an expert chronicler of modern life. There is no better book that outlines the gap between our positive personal relationship with aging and the negative societal narrative of aging. Read this to feel renewed and reinspired.

We love Barbara as she’s been on our MEA guest faculty since the beta period in early 2018. She has popularized the idea that we go through an adult adolescence in midlife when we experience physical, emotional, and hormonal changes and this slim but mighty book outlines how we can feel a greater sense so meaning and purpose during this time.

The Remix: How to Lead and Succeed in a Multigenerational Workplace is a fresh perspective on how the various generations think and how they can create an intergenerational potluck with each age group bringing their best to the table. A great book at any age.

Sara is a Harvard professor with an indigenous wisdom. Her focus here is ages 50-75, fitting many MEA alums’ age. Part self-help, part sociological history, part science-based evidence, Chip found it compelling as it captured his interest on so many levels.

The title of this book stresses some people out, but with the proper scientific research backing her up, this academic makes a strong case for how stress can enliven us and move us out of our comfortable, sometimes apathetic, existence...especially in midlife.

While his book called simply “Transitions” is more famous, this book is more personal and gives a sense of philosophy and spirituality around how to master a transition. I love how he suggests change is situational and circumstantial while transition is spiritual and psychological.

There is no fiercer ageism activist in the world than our MEA guest faculty member Ashton Applewhite. This book (and TED talk) is perfect for anyone who wants to learn more about how to raise our consciousness on the last socially-acceptable form of bias.

Ken became a gerontologist in his 20s during the hippie era. His friends thought he was nuts. But over the past 50 years, he’s become one of the world’s best chroniclers of the Boomer Age Wave. For those who like stats and data on retirement, this book is chock full.

Chip had a hard time reviewing his own book, but his experiences at Airbnb did inspire MEA. The four steps to becoming a Modern Elder still resonate: Evolve, Learn, Collaborate, Counsel. Follow them and younger people will lean in to what you have to say.

This is a heady, intellectual read, but also one that is prescriptively valuable. Check out this TEDx talk by the author as it will help you understand just how much our identity is defined by our work and, thus, leaving a job or career can feel like a divorce.

Stephen’s personal writing style feels as if you’re on a personal journey with him. This book is filled with insights and observations that may become your mantras given how succinct and valuable they are. Introduces yoga as more than an exercise. It’s a way of life.