R

osalie Schwartz, an 
84-year-old retired 
psychotherapist, always 
wanted to write a book. It was 
only a matter of putting pen to 
paper. Her plan was to share her 
life’s lessons with the world and 
other tidbits of wisdom she had 
picked up along the way. 
When the pandemic hit last 
March, Schwartz realized it 
was the perfect opportunity to 
finally get started on the project 
she always had in the back of 
her mind. Over the course of 
the past year, she put together 

her book, In the Blink of an Eye: 
A Personal Journey of Life and 
Lessons Learned. 
Throughout the 98-page 
book, which was released in 
February on Amazon in both 
paperback and Kindle format, 
the Metro Detroit-based writer 
gives forth what she calls “pearls 
of wisdom,
” little sayings that 
virtually anyone can live their 
life by. She has also decided to 
donate all proceeds to local food 
banks and community mem-
bers in need.
Quotes like “We have two 

ears and one mouth so that we 
can listen more than we speak” 
and “It’s hard to be a person” 
are connected back to Schwartz’ 
memories and life experiences, 
explaining how they correlate 
and what others can learn from 
her story. They pull from both 
her personal 
life and career, 
which Schwartz 
began later than 
most.
As her chil-
dren grew older, 
she made the 
decision to go 
back to school 
at the age of 40. 
“I fell in love 
with it,
” she 
recalls of her 
education at 
the University 
of Michigan. 
Previously, 
Schwartz didn’t 
have post-secondary education. 
“I had the best of both worlds. 
I was able to raise my children 
and then go back to school and 
back to work.
”
She received an undergrad-
uate degree in social work and 
built a career working in the 
public sector. For 20 years, she 
worked at an agency as a thera-
pist and later a program direc-
tor. Then, Schwartz transitioned 
into private practice for another 
20 years, retiring just two years 
ago at the age of 82.
“During the past many years, 
I thought to myself that when 
I had some time, I was going 
to write a book and share my 
experiences of life,
” Schwartz 
recalls. 
Helping people learn life 
skills was second nature for 
the retired psychotherapist, 
who helped counsel hundreds 
throughout her career. She even 
developed the term “pearls of 
wisdom” alongside her grand-
children, to whom she would 
send a different “pearl” each 
week as they attended college.

CONCERN FOR 
THE HUNGRY
Throughout the COVID-19 
shutdown, Schwartz made it 
a point to sit down and work 
on her book. She wrote for 
months until it was finally 
finished. Then, during a visit 
to Temple Israel, the syna-
gogue she attends, she noticed 
a long line of people in cars.
“I didn’t know what they 
were doing,” she explains. 
Schwartz spoke to her rabbi, 
who mentioned the line of 
cars was there for a food 
drive. Temple Israel members 
were dropping off food that 
would later be donated to dif-
ferent food banks in need.
Schwartz learned the drive 
happened monthly, which 
gave her an idea. “My heart 
was breaking when I watched 
television and saw all these 
people standing in line for 
food,” she says of the pan-
demic, which had tremen-
dous financial impact on 
many families, including in 
the local community. “That 
was a motivation for me to 
complete this book, so I could 
donate the proceeds to the 
food banks.”
Though Schwartz says it’s 
a smaller book, she notes she 
was anxious to complete it 
instead of taking more time 
to build it out further, which 
she believes she could have 
done. However, she wanted to 
help the community as soon 
as possible and already has a 
strong start on donations.
Since the book’s release in 
February, Schwartz has been 
collecting money (and will 
continue to do so with all 
future proceeds) that she aims 
to split between Yad Ezra, 
Gleaners Community Food 
Bank and Forgotten Harvest. 
In the meantime, she explains 
she’ll continue writing more 
life lessons. 
“That’s my plan,” she says. 
“It was a labor of love.” 

Life Lessons 
... Shared

26 | APRIL 8 • 2021 

OUR COMMUNITY

Retired psychotherapist pens advice 
book as a “labor of love.” 

ASHLEY ZLATOPOLSKY CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Rosalie Schwartz

