Parker J. Palmer, a sociologist-philosopher, activist, and Quaker, is widely published, with dozens of poems and 90+ essays. He gives workshops, lectures and retreats. He has received eight honorary doctorates and several national awards. (For his books I've read, click on his name.)

In this book Palmer speaks to “our yearning to live undivided lives – lives that are congruent with our inner truth” (the voice of our “inner teacher”) – in a world filled with many forces that can fragment and divide us. He begins by describing the soul – that life-giving core of the human self, which hungers for truth and justice, love and forgiveness. “The soul is generous: it takes in the needs of the world. The soul is wise: it suffers without shutting down. The soul is hopeful: it engages the world in ways that keep opening our hearts. The soul is creative: it finds its way between realities that might defeat us and fantasies that are mere escapes. All we need to do is to bring down the wall that separates us from our own souls and deprives the world of the soul’s regenerative powers.” That’s a huge all, but “When we catch sight of the soul, we can become healers in a wounded world – in the family, in the neighborhood, in the workplace, and in political life – as we are called back to our ‘hidden wholeness’ amid the violence of the storm.”

The wall above separates your inner and outer lives. It can separate these two sides of your life as if they were on opposite sides of a piece of paper – like what you get when you take a long rectangular strip of paper and connect its ends to make a flat ring with an inside and an outside – a divided life. Palmer uses a Möbius strip – where you give the long rectangular strip of paper a half-twist before connecting its ends – as a very apt visual analogy for a life that has only one side – an undivided life that has no such wall. (For one of many web links about Möbius strips, go to: http://www.physlink.com/Education/AskExperts/ae401.cfm.)

Mapping an inner journey that we take in solitude and in the company of others, Palmer describes a form of community that fits the limits of both our inner lives and our active lives. That kind of community – one that knows how to welcome the soul and help us to hear its voice – he calls a “circle of trust.” Most of this book describes the formation of a circle of trust – how to build one and what it takes to make one work properly. The chances for success depend upon the presence of a skilled, experienced facilitator. For over a decade now, the principles and practices given in this book have been proven in practice – by clergy, parents, educators, politicians, physicians, attorneys, community organizers, corporate executives, and many others who “seek to rejoin soul and role in their private and public lives.” Parker J. Palmer gives many examples of success. I highly recommend this book. I feel strongly that such “circles of trust” are a great idea.