On the Brink of Everything
written by Parker Palmer
reviewed by Steve Finger
Quaker teacher, author and activist Parker Palmer is now 85 years old. In 2018, he published this book, which he claimed would be his tenth and last. After majoring in philosophy at Carleton College in Minnesota, he earned his PhD in sociology at U.C. Berkeley. From there he became a community organizer and activist on the East Coast. Eventually, he gravitated to Quakerism, serving for many years as Dean of Studies and as Writer in Residence at Pendle Hill Retreat Center near Philadelphia. He later founded the Center for Courage and Renewal, where teachers, physicians, ministers, and other professionals can go for personal study and renewal.
On the Brink of Everything: Grace, Gravity and Getting Old is a memoir, not of Palmer’s chronological achievements, but of his lifelong struggle to live a life of meaning and service, often in the face of psychic adversity. It is no secret that he has struggled with severe, recurrent depression. In this book, he recounts lessons learned, sometimes the hard way.
The book is divided into eight parts, each addressing a particular topic: aging, the importance of reaching out to the young, getting real, illusion and reality, work and vocation, staying engaged with the world, staying engaged with one’s soul, and where we go when we die.
A “brink” suggests a cliff or high point. Palmer notes, “I’m frequently awestruck as I stand on the brink of the rest of my life, including the part called death, which I sometimes think I can almost see from here.” The prospect of one’s death, he admits, can be scary. “There’s no antidote for the gravity that takes us to the grave,” he notes. “But there is a countervailing force called ‘levity.’” Levity is “a kind of humor that eases the burden of life’s gravitas.”
Notwithstanding the diminishments of getting old, the author celebrates the upside of aging, for example, no longer being able to multitask, which gives him time to ponder a single thing or idea. Or having given up taking on big projects, which allows him to enjoy the world as it unfolds around him.
Erik Erikson, who published the first study on the stages of life, termed the final stage Ego Identity vs. Despair, where the elderly take stock to determine if their lives have had meaning. Palmer maintains that this is a fool’s errand, a road to nowhere, a trick the ego plays on us. We simply cannot know, he says, if our lives have meaning or not.
In the book’s final chapter, “Over the Edge: Where We Go When We Die,” Palmer thankfully fails to answer the question. He notes that Quakers have little to say about the hereafter, or if they do, he didn’t get the memo. But he does have something to say about death:
I learned long ago how much I do not know, so I won’t be shocked if death has surprises in store for me. But amid all my not-knowing, I’m certain of two things: when we die our bodies return to the earth, and Earth knows how to turn death into new life. When my own small life ends in some version of wind and fire, my body will be transformed by the same alchemy that keeps making all things new . . .
I am delighted to report that On the Brink of Everything is filled with powerful poetry, some by Palmer himself. He marvels at how poets can poignantly touch the heart of things in few words. The book is peppered with witty aphorisms, such as his Midwestern dad’s warning about getting too full of yourself: “Remember, today’s peacock is tomorrow’s feather duster.”
For me, this book was not a one-sitting, cover-to-cover read. I read bits and pieces many mornings over weeks and months. Sometimes a passage would spark my journal entry for the day. Franciscan father Richard Rohr describes Parker Palmer as a “true elder” in our culture which needs them. I recommend On the Brink of Everything. Like me, you may find yourself returning to it time and again.
Steve Finger is a graduate of Western Friend’s Board of Directors. He and his wife Vickey recently moved to Ohio from their longtime home in Flagstaff, AZ.