Gregg Levoy

About

Gregg Levoy is the author of Vital Signs: The Nature and Nurture of Passion (Penguin), and the bestselling book Callings: Finding and Following An Authentic Life (Random House)----rated among the "Top 20 Career Publications" by the Workforce Information Group. He was also the "behavioral specialist" at USA Today.

As a lecturer and seminar-leader, he has presented at the Smithsonian Institution, American Counseling Association, Environmental Protection Agency, Microsoft, National Conference on Positive Aging, National Career Development Association, and others, and been a frequent guest of the media, including ABC-TV, CNN, NPR and PBS.

A former adjunct professor of journalism at the University of New Mexico, and former columnist and reporter for USA Today and the Cincinnati Enquirer, he has written on the subject of passion for the New York Times Magazine, Washington Post, American Health, Omni, Psychology Today, Reader’s Digest, and many others. He lives in Asheville, NC, and his website is www.gregglevoy.com.

Books by Gregg Levoy

Recent Posts

When the Search for a Sense of Purpose Turns on You

There are benefits and drawbacks to a sense of life-purpose. It can become a form of striving and stress. How do you navigate a call to relinquish the driving force of purpose?

How Limits Aid Growth

Limitations can clearly impede growth and there are real limitations in the world—poverty, discrimination, and disability—but limitations can also induce growth.

The Key to Handling Over-Talkers: Speak Up Rather Than Avoid

Personal Perspective: Most of us know how it feels to be on the receiving end of someone over-talking. Here are some tactics for taking care of yourself in these situations.

The Cure for Loneliness Is Solitude

Personal Perspective: Sitting with loneliness can change it from loneliness to aloneness to solitude, from negative to neutral to positive.

Winging It: The Importance of Spontaneity

Personal Perspective: We don’t just crave familiarity and predictability but also their opposites—spontaneity, novelty, discovery, surprise, and passion.

Listening to Your Symptoms Is Listening to Your Soul

A Personal Perspective: Symptoms—physical or behavioral—are one of the languages the soul uses to get through to you, to convey something about itself. Listen to the messages.

The Value of Looking at Long-Distance Views

Personal Perspective: Here are the health-giving benefits of taking in long views, panoramic vistas, and wide open spaces.

In Retirement, Don’t Rush to Redesign Your Life—Listen to It

Retirement can pack quite a punch in terms of your sense of identity, purpose and meaning. But don't rush to redesign your life. Take time to listen to it.

The Upside and the Downside of the Comfort Zone

Safety and security are vital, but only up to a point. Here's how to know when you've reached that point.

Why It's So Hard to Ask for Help

The key to a successful request for help is telling others exactly what you need. If you don’t specify, they're likely to try to diagnose what sort of help you seem to need.