Thursday, 18 September 2025

SJ

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Here’s a summary / “wiki-style” profile of Stephen Jourdain (French: Stéphen Jourdain), based on available sources:


👤 Basic Info

Field Detail
Full name Stéphen Francis Élie Frantz Jourdain (Wikipedia)
Birth 8 January 1931, Neuilly-sur-Seine, France (Wikipedia)
Death 19 February 2009, Bastia (Corsica), France (Wikipedia)
Nationality French (Wikipedia)
Main occupation Writer, spiritual teacher; author of books on awakening and consciousness (Wikipedia)

🧭 Life & Background

  • Comes from a family with artistic/intellectual background: great-grandson of Frantz Jourdain, grandson of Francis Jourdain. (Wikipedia)

  • He reported having early inner experiences ("moments") from childhood — intense ruptures in perception, moments of non-ordinary awareness. (www.dharmaoverground.org)

  • At about age 16, he had what he calls a “radical awakening.” This was a turning point in his life — no longer simply rare experiences but a permanent change in perception. (Wikipedia)


📚 Work & Teaching

  • His writing focuses on awakening, consciousness, the “I” or sense of being, and cutting through psychological/spiritual conditioning. (Wikipedia)

  • He resisted spiritual formalism, ritualism, or overly “decorated” spirituality; he emphasized directness, irreverence, authenticity. (Wikipedia)

  • He produced many books, essays, interviews. Some of the better known works include Cette vie m’aime (for which he won the Prix Fénéon in 1962), Eveil, Radical Awakening (English translation), L’Irrévérence de l’Éveil, Une Promptitude céleste, etc. (Wikipedia)


🌱 Recognition & Style

  • Won the Prix Fénéon in 1962 for Cette vie m’aime (Wikipedia)

  • Known for a somewhat unorthodox, even rebellious posture in spiritual writing: not shy of paradox, of humor, of refusing pieties. (Wikipedia)

  • Lived part of his life in Paris (worked also in real estate for a time), later in Corsica (ran a rural guest-house). (Wikipedia)


🗣 Selected Quotes

  • “Je suis resté une heure ou deux éveillé, dans l’obscurité, œuvrant ‘l’éveil’ …” — reflecting his practice of remaining awake, of “doing” the awakening gesture. (Wikipedia)

  • “Je m’adosse fièrement à près de deux siècles d’emmerdeurs : de novateurs, de dévoreurs de modes intellectuelles et d’élans convenus.” — hinting at his lineage of challenging norms. (Wikipedia)


🎯 Themes

  • Awakening / enlightenment — sudden, radical, not gradual or earned.

  • The “I” — fundamental consciousness that underlies identity, ego, sense of self.

  • Conditioning / illusion — how mental, cultural, religious, psychological structures obscure direct awareness.

  • Irreverence — needed as part of the path; seriousness and reverence can trap the seeker.

  • Ordinary reality — the extraordinary is in ordinary life once awakening is recognized.


If you want, I can pull up a timeline of his works (publication years, translations into English etc.), or more detail about “the awakened adolescent” experiences he describes.


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