How to Find Yourself by Falling Upward

When you hear the word fall, you probably think of a downward motion.

Fall is almost always followed by down. Gravity, which causes objects to free fall, is intuitively understood as a downward force. Even our Fall season takes its name from the annual phenomenon of dead leaves falling down from trees.

Paradoxically, we can describe the journey of Deconstruction as falling upward.

Falling Upward, by Richard Rohr, provided a framework for understanding my deconstruction journey.

Rohr describes two halves of life – halves not of time, but of spiritual focus. The first focuses on ego work, while the second focuses on soul work. The two halves are separated by a traumatic but transformational fall.

This framework allowed me to focus on the work of Deconstruction rather than the phenomenon itself.

Let’s look at these three phases:

#1: Building Our Box

During the first half of life, we are building our box.

Our box represents our ego’s needs: identity, security, boundaries, order, safety, etc. We form our conceptual understanding of how the world works, and how to behave in that world. We choose our friends, our careers, and perhaps our life partner.

A place for everything, and everything in its place.

#2: Discovering the Limits of Our Box

Eventually, we encounter something our box cannot contain.

An anomaly. A contradiction. Some trauma requiring us to “think outside the box.” We fight and we struggle to make it fit, but we find the task impossible. The world simply doesn’t work the way we thought it did.

And so we fall upward.

#3: Filling Our Box

Upward to the second half of life, when we stop building and start being.

We stop trying to prevail. Rather than fear mystery and uncertainty, we embrace them. We stop wearing masks. Rather than hide our true self, we reveal it. Rohr calls this a second simplicity, a return to child-like innocence coupled with mature wisdom.

We rest knowing that God is found somewhere within the universe, giving it purpose and direction. And we learn to trust reality, rather than trying vainly to protect ourselves from it.