As I was reading Kevin McClone’s elegiac The Road to Joy, I was struck by how similar the author’s background and mine were. He worked in a hospice. So did I. He was a chaplain. So was I. He is a Christian. So am I. He likes to tell stories and write. So do I. It should come as no surprise then, that his book found a sympathetic and enthusiastic audience in me. Our shared vision is well expressed on pp. 70-80 where he writes: “Many become ‘wounded healers’ where they share with others who experience similar wounds their own experience, strength and hope. How can my experience help others?”

The book is organized into eight chapter that describe eight paths (not the Buddhist Eightfold Way) to joy:

• Discover Your Calling
• Discovering the True Self
• Embracing Healthy Intimacy
• Integrity
• Grace Comes through the Wound
• Simplify, Simplify
• Embrace Solitude
• Joy: Coming Home to Fullness of Life

Each chapter concludes with an Action Plan that can help readers move down the path just described. Some of this advice repeats familiar bromides, e.g., “Take care of yourself,” and some seem superficial, e.g., authenticity as embracing who we really are. These are indeed good things but actually to do them requires more than passing mention if they are to be part of a realistic action plan. Having read many if the texts McClone quotes, I was able to fill in the blanks and would encourage other readers to do likewise.

At the outset McClone writes: “Reflecting on my own life, those moments of deepest clarity, meaning and transcendence have happened when I am truly present in the here and now to what is most real and when I seek to respond in love.” (p.6). This expression sets the reader’s expectation that the book is about clarity, meaning, transcendence and love, he does not disappoint us.

McClone shares his alcohol addiction with us early on. As a chaplain for our local chapter of Calix (a group of Catholic alcoholics in the 12-step AA program, who identify their Higher Power as Jesus Christ) I could easily sense the resonance between the wisdom of the 12 Steps and that of which McClone writes. I learned some new phrases that I will likely share with my folks and discovered some new resources that sound like they will be very helpful.

McClone introduces us to his late wife, Grace almost immediately. She loved life, lived it to the full, and was a source of great love and encouragement to him. Among the many things his wife did was to accompany him through the discovery and healing process of AA. Many a recovering alcoholic would tell you that it doesn’t always turn out that way. Grace had to have been a person of great faith, who loved her husband very much. As the book progresses and we hear more about her, it dawned on me that writing this book was quite likely an integral part of the author’s grieving process. As a hospice chaplain, I could see someone recommending that he do exactly that. The book in its entirety is nothing less than a testament to his wife’s love, his own deep faith and the hard work of forging a new life in the face of staggering loss.

McClone describes the alcoholism in his family in some detail. At one point he and his siblings planned, with considerable trepidation, an intervention targeting his father. Apparently it worked, yet the wounds inflicted by alcohol are sown early and run deep. McClone himself needed help to get free of his own addiction. The chapters on discovering our true self, integrity and the grace accorded to wounded healers will ring true with anyone who has ever struggled with recovery from an addiction.

I was struck by the triad McClone quote from the work of Claudia Black, who is an expert on children of alcoholics: “Don’t Talk. Don’t Trust. Don’t Feel.” This triad characterizes family life for alcoholics, leading to a “…’closed family system’ where silence, denial, rigidity, and isolation become the norm.” (p. 22). The dimensions of the problem in society writ large become alarmingly apparent in light of the observation of Trappist monk and abbot, Fr. Thomas Keating, who said in his book Intimacy with God that he estimated that this “anyone” represented 98-100% of the American population! Once again, McClone describes his debt to Grace, who saw right through his family’s issues and provided the prayer, encouragement and direction he needed.

In his chapter on discovering the true self, McClone relates the experience of another alcoholic who described his thoughts of suicide, and later said that if he had followed through, he would’ve killed the wrong person. I had to put the book down for a moment just then, for as I read it, I recalled having spoken with people who had either contemplated suicide or actually attempted it. How I wished I’d had that expression on hand when speaking with some of them! An alcoholic will try to kill the real person whose trauma appears to be too much to bear, while the one who really needs to die is the false self, created with the assistance of alcohol, who stands in the way of achieving the Identity, Integrity and Intimacy that constitute a joyful life (p. 28)

In Chapter 4, McClone refers to Erik Erikson’s Life Cycle Completed when describing the integrity that allows one to enter the end stage of one’s life with a sense of peace, gratitude and accomplishment. I got the impression that he believed this to be the rule rather than the exception. I may be mistaken about that impression, but my own experience tells me that very few get to the end of their lives without expressing regrets or wishing things had been otherwise. Even J.R.R Tolkien (author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogy) wrote an apology to his children about having been a dilatory father. It took them completely aback, and they remonstrated with their father, but that's indeed the way many see their lives in retrospect. 

The chapter on simplification draws heavily upon Thoreau, for reasons that are clear to those who have read Walden. I found his dual claim that both consumerism and minimalism were on the rise a bit confusing. Perhaps it’s six of one or a half dozen of the other, but you can’t have it both ways! Readers would we well-directed to Vance Packard’s classic The Hidden Persuaders to learn hos insidious the temptations to materialism actually are and how they’re implemented.

I agreed wholeheartedly that one must get to know the poor up front and personally to get to know them as persons and learn from them. Arm’s-length or drive-by Christianity is really not enough, as good as it may be at some level. Memorizing Mt 7:21 is a good way to keep the reason for the necessary distinction in mind.

As McCone wrote about solitude and detachment, I was reminded of an old saying that silence is not about the absence of noise; it’s about the absence of ego – specifically of the false self variety. We may all be alone together in life, but solitude invites discovery, both of what’s in me and what’s in you.

The final chapter concerns joy, and the action plan summarizes much of what has been said in the rest of the book. Each plan item merits rich elucidation, and fortunately many resources are at hand to help with that. I found it useful to have read many of them beforehand.

In his concluding remarks, McClone writes:

“Following the pathways of solitude and simplicity allow for letting go of what is not essential and focusing on what matters most in life. In the stillness, I connect to the God within and I discover that less is more and through emptying myself, I become full. In letting go, I receive in full (p. 115).

It is indeed as St. Peter Chrysologos remarked – we will not be allowed to keep what we do not give away.

I heartily recommend this short book to absolutely everyone. The extensive bibliography contains many more treasures that will prove invaluable to those who pursue McClone's action plans.

 

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the author and/or publisher through the Speakeasy blogging book review network. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR,Part 255.