Matthew Croasmun, Senior Lecturer and Program Director at Yale University will visit Southport to share several foundational components of “Life Worth Living,” the wildly popular undergraduate course that he directs at Yale.

Croasmun will offer a one-day, interactive workshop designed to help participants begin to answer the big questions that arise when we consciously consider what shape a life worth living might look like for each one of us. He will address such vital questions as: Who do we answer to? How does a good life feel? What should we hope for? How should we live? What should we do when we fail? What is the role of suffering in a good life?

The program will provide participants with jumping-off points, road maps, and habits of reflection for discerning where our lives hold meaning and where things might need to change.

This mini retreat is drawn from the coursework of the “Live Worth Living” humanities course that Matthew co-teaches for Yale undergraduates. For 12 years students have annually engaged with visions of seven modern figures and foundational texts that influenced them: Abraham Joshua Heschel and the Tanakh, the Dalai Lama and the ancient Buddhist sutras, Mohandas Gandhi and the Bhagavad Gita, Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Bible, Robin Wall Kimmerer and North American Indigenous wisdom, A. Helwa and the Quran, and Oscar Wilde and expressive individualism.

These in-class explorations and discussions gave rise to the creation of a national bestseller, Life Worth Living: A Guidebook to What Matters Most: a collection of wisdom texts and questions that helps readers define and create a flourishing life for themselves.

The workshop is open to all. There is a $40 fee for the event, which includes a lunch on Saturday. Copies of his book Life Worth Living will be on sale during the event. Registration is required.