BY LOIS WADSWORTH
Start Asking Questions
Keep asking what matters.
ON THIS JOURNEY WE CALL OUR LIFE: LIVING
THE QUESTIONS by James Hollis. Inner Circle Books,
2003. Paperback, $16.
I
call it serendipitous when the right book
for me to read at a particular moment
comes my way. So it is with Jungian
writer and analyst James Hollis’ latest book,
On this Journey We Call Our Life. Since last
spring, I’ve been learning to write memoir,
personal narrative. As it turns out, the process
is actually one of self-discovery. As I dis-
cover how to write about my life many years
ago, its deeper meaning reveals itself. So
when I picked up On This Journey, I was
only momentarily surprised that Hollis writes
about a similar process.
Hollis is a lucid thinker and writer, who
tackles the contemporary issues that arise in
the second half of life with clarity and insight.
He challenges the reader to live the life psy-
che wishes you to live, even though it may
not necessarily be the happy, secure, enter-
tained and adjusted life we think we want. He
notes “the paradox that feeling good may be a
very poor measure of the worth of one’s life.”
He asks relevant, soul-searching questions
appropriate to a time after the basics of living
a stable, independent life have been met. In
other words, when you have become a re-
sponsible adult.
The first chapter’s title and question is:
“By What Truths Am I Living My Life?” To
access the ideas in this chapter, Hollis sug-
gests that when we can “relinquish our fan-
tasy of control through understanding, and
accept that we are a mystery, that some large
life courses within us with its own goal, then
we live closer to the heart of things.”
In this chapter, Hollis investigates the
complexes, what Jung called “splinter psy-
ches,” that manifest their authority over us
when we are “stuck” — stuck in a job, a rela-
tionship or a situation. With its historical
roots deep in the unconscious, the complex
resists change and growth and thwarts our
best intentions. But Hollis offers practical
ways to make the complex conscious and di-
minish its power over our lives. This is one of
the goals of analysis.
Each chapter asks multiple questions of
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the reader and suggests ways to explore
them, but Hollis doesn’t answer the ques-
tions. Like nearly everything worth knowing
about, the process is the point. Begin examin-
ing your life deeply. Start by asking questions
and searching for answers in your dreams,
the patterns in your personal history. Don’t
expect immediate results. Just commit to the
journey and go. Keep asking what matters.
As Hollis notes, “We always remain a
mystery to ourselves, so we have a life-long
agenda for growth and development.
Whoever is bored has not yet awakened to
the large drama that courses within.”
The Eugene Friends of Jung presents a lec-
ture by James Hollis, “The Eden Project,”
based on his book of the same title, at 7 pm on
Thursday, Dec. 4 at the William Knight Law
Center, UO. Hollis is a dynamic, interesting
speaker and a down-to-earth human being. ew
Book Notes Nov. 26 - Jan. 1, 2005: Congratulations to Oregon Book Award winners
Cai Emmons (His Mother’s Son), fiction; Rita Ott Ramstad (The Play of Dark and
Light), poetry; Tracy Daugherty (It Takes a Worried Man), short fiction; Barbara S.
Mahoney (Dispatchers and Dictators), general nonfiction; Chris Chester (Providence
of a Sparrow), creative nonfiction; Eric Kimmel (Three Samurai Cats), children’s litera-
ture and Heather Vogel Frederick (The Voyage of Patience Goodpeed), young adult
fiction. …National Book Award winners: Shirley Hazzard (The Great Fire), fiction;
Carlos Eire (Waiting for Snow in Havana), nonfiction; C.K. Williams (The Singing), po-
etry; Polly Harvath (The Canning Season), young people’s literature. …Oregon Book
Award nominee Alan Siporin (Fire’s Edge) speaks at 1 pm on 11/29 at Barnes and Noble.
…Novelist, memoirist Tobias Wolff (Old School) speaks at 7:30 pm on 12/02 at Arlene
Schnitzer Concert Hall, Portland. Tickets, 505.227.2538. …Poet Clemens Starck
(Traveling Incognito chapbook) reads at noon 12/04 at the OSU bookstore, Corvallis, and
at 7 pm in Borders Books, Salem. …Richard D. Blackstone (Nuts and Bolts of
Spirituality) speaks at 7 pm on 12/03 at Hilyard Community Center. $5. …Floyd Skloot
reads from his memoir In the Shadow of Memory at 7 pm on 12/04 at the UO Bookstore.
…Jungian analyst and writer James Hollis speaks at 7 pm on 12/04 at the Knight Law
Center. $5 Eugene Friends of Jung, $8 non-members. …Authors and Artists Fair runs
from 7 - 10 pm on 12/06 at Eugene Downtown Library. Known participants at press time
include writers Kate Wilhelm, Carola Dunn, Jan Eliot, Jim Cloutier, Maryanna
Vollstedt, Joyce Mixer and ceramicist Betsy Wolfson. Wine, dessert and big raffle!
4 TH & BLAIR • 342-7503 • M-Sa. 8 AM -10 PM • Su. 10 AM -9 PM
2003 Oregon Book
Award Winner Floyd Skloot
“In the Shadow of Memory”
Combining the author's skills as a poet and novelist, this book
finds humor, meaning, and hope in the story of a fragmented
life made whole by love and the courage to thrive.
Reading and Book Signing
7 p.m. Thursday, December 4 •• FREE
Knight Library Browsing Room
UNIVERSITY OF OREGON
BOOKSTORE
UO Bookstore.com
NOVEMBER 26, 2003 23