Life Lessons from Elders
A conversation with New York Times journalist and author John Leland.
About the Event
What are the keys to growing old with purpose and joy? How can our wisdom and resilience deepen even as our physical body may decline?
Join us for a conversation with John Leland, New York Times journalist and best-selling author of Happiness Is a Choice You Make: Lessons from a Year Among the Oldest Old.
Leland began a series of articles for the Times in 2015 chronicling the lives and wisdom of six New Yorkers over age 85 through the end of their lives. The series offers powerful lessons from elders on how to approach aging with meaning, resilience, and joy. During our conversation, we’ll explore these lessons and how people in midlife and beyond can benefit from them.
Who's Speaking
Erica Berger
John Leland
New York Times Reporter & Best-Selling Author
In his 40 years in journalism, John Leland has gone from chronicling youth culture to writing about the “oldest old.” A graduate of Columbia College, he worked as a senior editor at Newsweek and editor-in-chief of Details magazine before joining The New York Times in 2000, where he is a reporter in the Metro section. In 2015, he wrote a year-long series following six people age 85 and up, which became the basis for his book “Happiness Is a Choice You Make: Lessons from a Year among the Oldest Old,” a New York Times bestseller. As he wrote in the Times, “No work I have ever done has brought me as much joy and hope, or changed my outlook on life as profoundly.” He is the author of two previous books: “Hip: The History” and “Why Kerouac Matters.”
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