Book Review - FALLING UPWARD, A Spiritually for the Two Halves of Life, by Richard Rohr.

Fr. Richard Rohr, director of the Center of Action and Contemplation in Albuquerqe, which he founded, is the author if over twenty books and an internationally known speaker and retreat director. In this book he uses the term "Two Halves of Life" introduced by Carl Jung, and he elaborates on each of these halves with countless descriptions of each. He claims that no one can reach the "Further Journey" without undergoing the first journey, with its falling, stumbling, learning, growing, conversion and discovery of the True Self.

In the first half of life we build a "container" or self-identity ; in the second we fill it with what it was meant to hold. Much of this is encountered rather than planned, as the future is an unknown mystery and adventure to the "first-half traveler." Our life is meant for returning to God the "blueprint" we were given, with our own personal stamp. Without doing this, our life has little meaning. Fr. Rohr says that finding our True Self in the first half of life depends on the time allotted to us, and how we use our freedom. And some of us may never find our True Self. He uses Homer' The Oddesy, with the trials, falls and errors he endures as he returns home from the Trojan War, symbolic of our life's journey. No one can escape the falls, trials and suffering that are an inevitable part of the first life. In fact, these become the building blocks for a satisfying second life.

The author uses the trampoline as a symbol of the falling down and falling upward that is a part of all human life, and he points out that often the farther we fall down, the farther we can fall upward. He also speaks of Christianity and Scripture and our relationship with God throughout the book and gives endless descriptions of persons still in the first half of life and those who have "made it" into the second half, where life's problems, dilemmas and difficulties are now resolved by falling upward into a larger "brightness." You will find the book insightful and thought-provoking.