The Hero’s Journey
The work of Joseph Campbell is a fascinating exploration of the stories humanity has been telling itself across time. Campbell did extensive work on the commonalities between myths through centuries of human experience and across cultures, which he referred to as the “The Hero’s Journey.” I highly recommend his book, The Power of Myth, along with his other works.
Lately, having faith has me all turned around and upside down, but in a good way. My experience with it is making me more accepting and loving of myself. I feel more prepared for the future, even the hardships, because many things have happened I did not expect, even in the last thirty days or so, and I have learned a great deal with a lot less pain thanks to having faith. All of this has me wondering how humanity managed to conflate God, Good, Love, Peace, Worship, and Prayer with perfectionism and purity.
In reality, most religions include stories one if not many heroes who make perilous journeys that challenge and define their faith. Campbell found a common story structure and archetypes throughout time and culture, but those apply to religious texts as well. Humanity has been telling the same stories to itself since the dawn of our kind, about bad and good, about heroes facing hardship. But I’m not sure the endgame for any of those heroes or for any of us should be or ever was about purity or perfection.
Which brings me back to my own experience. I have long worried about what other people think of me and it has only caused me suffering. I have been trying to get things right while denying parts of myself for far too long, and all my reading on mental health modalities of varying kinds suggest that this is one of the fundamental underpinnings of dysfunction. Denial of the true self. Incongruence between our beliefs about how things should be versus the reality of who we are. Preoccupation with the past or future as an escape from a self we may not love enough.
In reality, I think the hero’s journey applies to all of us. We are not supposed to be perfect nor are we supposed to stay the same. Religion and its preoccupation with purity has done us all a disservice (no offense, guys). We spend far too much of our lives trying to get it right by other people’s standards, staying safe, being normal, trying to avoid judgment or otherwise living in a box we believe we belong in according to our culture. But that isn’t how it should be at all.
I don’t think I could’ve arrived at this bravery or conclusion without faith. I think I had to spend some real time believing in Good, and once that started, I felt comfortable and safe enough to start loving and accepting myself in the here and now, exactly as I am. Now that I’ve allowed myself a little bit of that kind of love, I feel safe and brave and supported enough to move beyond the confines I have imposed on myself by our culture. I feel ready to be real. I want to walk on hot coals as an adventure and testament to my faith. I want to face the dragon, whatever that might be in my life, and I’m not too concerned if there are more than one. In fact, I have a very nerdy love of dragons, so bring ‘em on.
In the Hero’s Journey, the hero is challenged to move beyond the known into the unknown, where they face trials and tribulations that allow them to further define themselves. For many, religion has become about staying safe in a box, but that isn’t what faith could or should be. In reality, faith is what we gird ourselves with as we move beyond the known into the unknown. With a little bit of faith, I feel much more prepared to venture forth and live my life to the fullest, even though I know it will be full of mistakes and hardships, because that’s what life is or could be. A grand adventure.
The best part is, when it comes to faith, is we don’t have to go on quests to define ourselves anymore. We can, but we can also do all this journeying from the safety of our own homes. We can live the same life and frame it differently or we can do some real soul searching and make changes. Either way, faith serves a purpose. It creates a baseline safety and sense of self-love, acceptance, and forgiveness that allow us to venture beyond the box and become who we actually are, regardless of the demons we face. Faith isn’t really about purity, it’s about protection for the hero on our journey.