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Video Description
In this video, Academy of Ideas joins Joseph Campbell and Carl Jung to explore why the same mythic patterns show up in cultures all over the world. Campbell called the most famous of these patterns the “Hero’s Journey” — the story of a person who leaves a familiar life, steps into danger, faces a dark threshold, and returns changed. It is more than just a plot for old legends. It maps our own inner journey: the call to adventure, the fear that holds us back, the helpers we meet, and the “shadow” traits we have hidden from ourselves. By answering the call and facing what we have buried, we recover parts of ourselves we lost and come back stronger and more whole. The video ends with Campbell’s reminder that a good life is one hero journey after another — each one simply asking, do I dare?
Full Video Transcript
In the 20th century, a number of thinkers studying comparative mythology and religion noticed something peculiar about the myths of different cultures throughout history.
Many of them shared fundamental similarities in theme structure and symbolism.
This led to the question as to how such similarities could arise in cultures separated by both space and time.
Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell, two of the more prominent thinkers studying this problem,
proposed that the reason for such similarities was due to the fact that many mythological themes and symbols
emerge from an area of the mind called the collective unconscious.
In addition to the mind consisting of a personal unconscious,
which is composed of elements drawn from an individual’s life experience,
the collective unconscious contains elements or cognitive structures
which evolved over human history and are therefore common to all.
These evolved cognitive structures, which Jung called archetypes, cannot be observed directly,
but manifest various images or symbolic patterns which form the basis of many myths,
explaining how similar myths can arise in cultures separated by hundreds or thousands of years.
As Joseph Campbell, the 20th century’s foremost expert on world mythology noted,
The symbols of mythology are not manufactured. They cannot be ordered, invented, or permanently suppressed.
They are spontaneous productions of the psyche.
As manifestations of the deepest layers of the unconscious, myths are thought to reveal timeless truths about the yearnings, fears, and aspirations common to every individual.
In the words of Jung, myths are first and foremost psychic phenomena that reveal the nature of the soul.
Myths have served various functions in different cultures across time.
One of the more common of these functions has been to provide individuals with a template or model to assist in their psychological maturation and development.
Psychological development via what Jung called the individuation process
occurs when unconscious contents of the psyche are integrated into one’s conscious personality,
resulting in the formation of what Jung called the true personality.
There are various ways in which unconscious content can be made conscious.
Becoming aware of one’s dream life is the most well-known.
Exploring mythological symbolism is a lesser-known but equally effective
way to bring unconscious content into the light of consciousness.
. These symbols stem from the psyche, they speak from and to the spirit,
and they are in fact the vehicles of communication between the deeper depths of our spiritual life
and this relatively thin layer of consciousness by which we govern our daylight existences.
Activating unconscious content is important because the unconscious contains unrealized
potentials, which if discovered and integrated into one’s consciousness,
can result in a personal transformation. To discover and nourish these potentials
within Campbell called
the pathway to bliss. Myths of individuals undergoing heroic adventures
as they attempt to actualize their higher potentials and find their own
unique pathway to bliss
are abundant in many cultures throughout history. While these myths vary in detail
depending on their time and place of origin
they share a common pattern which Joseph Campbell coined
the myth of the hero’s journey. In myths which follow the pattern of the hero’s
journey
ventures forth from a familiar world into strange and sometimes threatening lands, be
it a passage into the desert, a dark forest, or an adventure into the deep ocean.
Campbell proposed we view this as symbolic of the individual’s departure from their
conscious personality into the unexplored regions of their unconscious, in search of
the ultimate boon, the unrealized potentials hidden within.
For the remainder of the video, we’ll briefly trace the pattern of the hero’s journey,
noting its relevancy to those who, feeling lost and disoriented in life,
could benefit from venturing forth into their unexplored, unconscious psyche.
The hero’s journey always begins with a call to adventure.
In myths, this call is often personified as an animal the hero encounters,
symbolic of one’s instincts or gut feelings,
which are insightful but too often ignored.
In the words of Campbell,
Often in actual life, and not infrequently in the myths and popular tales,
we encounter the dull case of the call unanswered, for it is always possible to turn the ear to other interests.
Refusal of the summons converts the adventure into its negative.
Walled in boredom, hard work, or culture, the subject loses the power of significant affirmative action and becomes a victim to be saved.
While the call is often initially refused, not all who hesitate are lost.
There are forces within which understand the importance of the adventure, and act to ensure
the call does not remain unanswered forever.
In myths these forces are often personified as supernatural helpers.
In fairy lore it may be some little fellow of the wood, some wizard, hermit, shepherd
or smith who appears to supply the amulets and advice that the hero will require.
The higher mythologies develop the role of the great figure of the guide, the teacher,
the ferryman, the conductors of souls to the afterworld.
by internal forces, the hero eventually answers the call to adventure and ventures off into
unknown territory.
At the boundary of the familiar and unexplored regions, the hero encounters the Threshold
Guardian.
In myths, this guardian is often a menacing being or Mephistophelian figure, which represents
one’s shadow, the portion of one’s personality which has been rejected over time and thus
relegated to the surface layers of the unconscious.
In myths the threshold guardian instills panic among those unprepared to meet him, just as
in real life confronting one’s rejected personality can be difficult and distressing.
Yet if one finds a way to accept their rejected personality, one gains access to an inner
strength which will be of assistance as one descends into the deeper and sometimes threatening
layers of the unconscious, as Campbell explained.
And so it happens that if anyone undertakes for himself the perilous journey into the
darkness by descending, either intentionally or unintentionally, into the crooked lanes of
his own spiritual labyrinth, he soon finds himself in a landscape of symbolical figures,
any one of which may swallow him. Descending deeper and deeper into the psyche, overcoming
trials and experiencing moments of ecstatic insight, eventually one’s previous self begins
to disintegrate and a new more impressive self begins to form. In myths this stage is symbolized
as a death and rebirth, in which the hero enters a dark area such as the belly of a whale, a tomb,
or dark cave, and after a period of time, emerges from it reborn. Reborn with a new sense of strength
and purpose, the ultimate boon, or unrealized potential within, is discovered soon after.
Finding the ultimate boon is described in different myths in a variety of ways,
yet it is always meant to signify an expansion of consciousness and their width of being,
illumination, transfiguration, freedom. While the discovery of the unrealized
potentials within is a highly significant moment, it is not the end of
the journey. One still must determine how to nourish these potentials and bring
them forth in the world. This can be exceedingly difficult, as Campbell
explained, the whole idea is that you’ve got to bring out again that which you
went to recover, the unrealized, unutilized potential in yourself. The
whole point of this journey is the reintroduction of this potential into
the world.
It goes without saying this is very difficult.
Bringing the boon back can be even more difficult than going down into your own depths in the
first place.
As you attempt to bring forth your potential into the world, there is the possibility that
nobody will care or pay attention.
There is also the possibility that the applause of others will divert you from your authentic
path leading to a life of mimicry or enslavement to the opinions of others.
The optimal possibility is to carve out your own corner of the world, where you can nourish
your potential, and offer your work to others without concern of applause or fear of rejection.
In doing so, you will have found your own unique pathway to bliss, and your life will
have followed the thread of the hero’s journey.
What I think is that a good life is one hero journey after another.
Over and over again you are called to the realm of adventure, you are called to new
horizons, each time there is the same problem, do I dare?
And then if you do dare, the dangers are there, and the help also, in the fulfillment or the
fiasco. There’s always the possibility of a fiasco, but there’s also the possibility
of bliss.
Source: Academy of Ideas