Jim Sherblom

Are you a transcendentalist? How does an American transcendentalist live in the 21st century? Over a six-decade journey I matured from a naïve small-town Baptist youth to a spiritual mystic living transcendentally in Concord, Massachusetts. Now as a Concord transcendentalist author I offer books, retreats and workshops that help others to find their unique Way.

You were born to be a humble and joyful child of GodPart memoir, part philosophical history, and part manual for living, Spiritual Audacity will guide you from black and white to color, from formless to form, from dark to light, and from curious to enlightened.

I learned to say YES when spiritual adventure is offered.
As a venture capitalist and early investor in biomedicine, I sought to bring positive change to the world. But at the height of my career, I felt an inner calling to become a student of divine mystery. My second memoir, Spiritual Pilgrim describes that pilgrimage of spirit.

Hidden Sunrise

by jimsherblom

Traveling in the high Himalayas is as remarkable for what is seen as for what remains unseen. This is a magical and obscure place which continually challenges one’s faith and imagination. After a few days spent exploring around Kathmandu our bus ascends the switchback trails, clinging to the mountainside, and semi-paved roadway, to rise in elevation nearly a mile above the valley to Club Himalaya Nagarkot in the Bhaktapur district. I’ve come to experience the mountain sunrise so have requested a guest room with a large glass sliding door looking out onto a small balcony facing due east. We look down upon the small ravine in which this village sits, and across the expansive Kathmandu valley beyond to the Himalayan mountain range in the far distance. That night there is rain and lightning on the mountains so I now have limited expectations for the coming of the dawn. But I leave the curtains and the glass slide open for first light. The morning birds begin to sing just after 5:15 am when it still...

Nepal and Bhutan

by jimsherblom

My first book SPIRITUAL AUDACITY: Six Disciplines of Human Flourishing took twenty months to go from concept through eleven drafts to published author. It has been on the market for about seven months now and seems to have found its audience, exceeding my admittedly modest expectations. But before it was even published i had the genesis for my second book. Over the last eighteen months Spiritual Pilgrim: Mystic Journeys of Pilgrimage has gone through thirteen drafts. Today I sent the final manuscript to my publisher for proofing and interior design with a planned launch date of September 2018. Hurrah! Having spent 18 months reflecting, remembering, dreaming, and writing about spiritual pilgrimages, it feels like time for me to go into the mystic once again and embrace the divine mystery on its own terms. I’ve just scheduled my Uber to pick me up in twelve hours and take me to Logan airport to embark on a pilgrimage to Nepal and Bhutan. We will begin by visiting the Swayambhunath and Boudhanath, and Pashupatinath temples in Kathmandu. Then off to the...

April 19, 1775

by jimsherblom

This is the tale of intrigue you perhaps never heard behind the battle that morning of April 19, 1775. Rebellious English colonists had been preparing for this day for months. On February 1st the Second (illegal) Massachusetts Provincial Congress, with John Hancock presiding, called for the rebellion’s growing military supplies to be gathered and stored in Concord. By March 9th General Gage, Massachusetts’ Military Governor, had a complete list of quantities and types of weapons stored there, and where exactly each item was hidden. Many weapons were stored on the farm of Colonial Militia Col. James Barrett. On March 20th Gage sent two British soldiers in disguise to Concord to meet with those citizens loyal to king and country to plan the route for a military excursion to destroy the weapons and military supplies. They dined and spent the night with Daniel Bliss, a prominent lawyer and son of the former minister of the village church, First Parish in Concord. Concord had been turned into an armed camp, with fourteen pieces of cannon, a...

Talking and Walking Transcendentally

by jimsherblom

On the cold and drizzly afternoon of Sunday, April 15, 2018, Rev. Dr. Jim Sherblom lectured about “Transcendentalism in the 21st century” to a packed, standing room only, crowd at the new Walden Pond Visitor Center. He spoke about experiencing reality bounded by our senses alone, or guided by reason, intuition, and ultimately unknowable mystery. Jim then led the crowd on a journey of the imagination along the Old Carlisle Road in Estabrook Woods, into the wildness of the Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge, paddling along parts of the Assabet, Sudbury, and Concord rivers, and finally from Concord village along the Emerson-Thoreau Amble to Henry David Thoreau at Walden Pond. Along the way Jim indicated where archeologists have found artifacts from indigenous people in the fields of the Old Manse, and along the Reformatory Branch Trail where there was a campground of the Nipmuc tribe of the Algonquin nation (yielding Concord’s oldest artifacts at 11,000 years old). Their imaginative amble crossed over Nashawtuc Hill, walking in Tahatawan’s footsteps, and out to Egg Rock, before...

Gratitude for Suffering

by jimsherblom

Three weeks ago, I was preparing to lead a church workshop on the power of mental framing in determining how we respond to suffering. Borrowing a Buddhist concept, I framed it as becoming aware of the inextricable links between dukkha (suffering) and sukkah (joy). I didn’t know how I would illustrate this reconciliation of spirit, then a forty-foot tree fell towards our house from thirty feet away. Over thirty years ago Loretta and I bought this house surrounded by tall trees. For three decades they have grown taller. About thirty feet from our house is a marshy area that had become super saturated in the early spring thaw. Then a particularly heavy and wet snow was more than that old tree could bear. It was torn out by its roots and toppled directly towards the bed in which I was sleeping. The suffering is a big tree fell on our house and startled me awake. The joy is it crashed off our roof and fell just outside my bedroom. The suffering is that it...