• first half of life. The cultures are washed by three rolling waves that were coming again and again: order -> disorder -> reorder. And back again. Besides these waves, Rohr is speaking about “the first half of life” and “the second half of life”. Using a Jungian vocabulary, the first half of life is: the morning full of rules, where the subjects are refusing of suffering, living in a first naiveté, or first simplicity. In a world where darkened lightness of the persona reigns. Here, the ego is all that matter, for he/ she is following an “either…or…” logic of thought. In short, this half of life has many names, and one among them is “Hell”.
• second half of life. This half of life is the evening of the day. Here, the subjects are accepting the suffering for they are only exceptions. In this half of life, not the ego, but the Self is ruling out, in a second naiveté, or second simplicity. This cannot be but just the “Heaven”, a place where the shadows are accepted in their lightened darkness and where the logic of inclusion and transcendence is expressed by the formula: “both… and…”.
• boundaries. The boundaries are well delimiting “the first half of life” from “the second half of life”. In this liminal place is to be found the most important things in this entire journey: the stone of where the traveler is stumbling on. Once stumbled, the first half of life ends, and begins the second half of life.

Map:

Resources:

Richard Rohr (2011: “Falling upward. A spirituality for the two halves of life”, AARP Digital Edition