The Hero Journey

One of my favorite books is Joseph Campbell's "The Hero with a Thousand Faces" - where he talks of the hero myth across cultures and traditions. As Campbell says, "Each of us has a Hero, a Sage, a mercenary, a Princess within. Each of these pulls and pushes as we journey through the story that is our life. We need all of these energies to pursue life's adventure."

The hero journey of myth symbolizes personal growth.

A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are there encountered and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his/her fellow people.

It involves going away from what Campbell calls "The Wasteland" - "a world where people live not out of their own initiative, but out of what they think that they are supposed to do. People have inherited their official roles and positions; they haven’t earned them…everybody leading a false life.. where the sense of the vitality of life has gone. People take jobs because they have to live, and then they find in mid life that the job does not mean a thing."

This is my favorite passage in the whole book - "we have not even to risk the adventure alone; for the heroes of all time have gone before us; the labyrinth is thoroughly known; we have only to follow the thread of the heropath. And where we had thought to find an abomination, we shall find a god; where we had thought to slay another, we shall slay ourselves; where we had thought to travel outward, we shall come to the centre of our existence; where we had thought to be alone, we shall be with all the world."