You are a hero. Yup, you. No need to look around, I’m not talking to anyone else. I’m talking to you. So, let me say it again – you are a hero.
Now, it’s not quite that literal. It actually is, but it also isn’t. 🙂
It actually depends on you.
It depends on whether you will answer the call.
Will you?
Today we steep ourselves in The Hero’s Journey, an archetypal tale made mainstream by myth mastermind Joseph Campbell in his 1949 classic The Hero with a Thousand Faces. You may have heard of Campbell, he’s most definitely back in vogue right now. Frustrated and disappointed with the limitations of sterile rationality it appears society is making a major shift (return really) back to the magic of story. And The Hero’s Journey is not only a story – it’s the story.
This story is everywhere. It’s every movie ever made and every book ever written concerning transformation. Whether it’s one descriptor or the other – transformation, metamorphosis, evolution, renewal, resurrection or rebirth – at the crux is change. From Buddha to Moses to Luke and Leia to any of the far too many superheroes on screen nowadays they’ve all walked this universal path.
And so have you.
You’re somewhere on it. Because you’re alive and because life is one mega hero’s journey composed of countless micro ones. And because you are here.
You’re here because you need to make a change. Because there’s a voice inside urging you to do something. That’s why you’re a hero. Because regardless of your health and wellbeing goals at its most distilled it is about making a change in your life. About not surrendering to how things are and striving for how you want them to be. About shedding the old and living anew. About putting what was behind you and creating what can be.
About living fuller, healthier, stronger, truer and happier.
The journey is made up of three key phases – Departure, Initiation and Return. Departure is all about knowing you have to go somewhere and do something but you wrestle with doubt, fear and hesitation. Initiation begins once you’ve accepted the task, crossed into the arena of challenge and face what will be many trials and tribulations. This is where you are shaped by struggle. Finally, you Return from the other world changed – finally in control of your life.
Whatever it is you are facing, whatever the magnitude, it is a heroic endeavor. This framework can be supplanted onto any objective. Let’s take one of the most common wellbeing goals – shedding some pounds. Yes, that too is heroic. You know what you want to do and probably even how to but it’s hard, and you keep resisting the change you want to make. Finally, you get to it, you’re in the fight, following some food plan, getting to the gym, not letting those tasty treats tempt you and eventually little by little you do it. Now, you return to your old world not only unbent and unbroken but wiser and stronger than ever before. A hero’s journey completed.
And then something strange and magical happens – you realize the journey, the crisis, the pain, the suffering was never about the weight or depression or all the many fears. It was about you re-discovering and manifesting your true self.
“Identify yourself as the hero and that there are going to be patches of deep struggle
and that is what defines the hero. That’s what you signed up for.
And it’s the overcoming of these things that give you the character and
defines who you are.
In the overcoming of this is where the steel of my soul is
going to be forged in the fire of this depression.”
I love the hero’s journey. And it personally manifested itself ever clearer the clearer I could see. Now everyday, whether it’s a good day or a challenging one, to take another step forward, I say –
“Go hero, go.”
Want to get into your hero’s journey? Find out where you’re at? Refusing the Call? Fighting the dragon!? I get super into it in this exclusive three part e-mail series. It’s powerful stuff and I’d love to share it with you.
One of my mentors Aubrey Marcus takes the credit for all the quoted text. He is the one who truly inspired me to see this life as the heroic quest it is and Aubrey is the one who gave me the courage to say “go hero, go”.
Image credits:
Disclaimer:
Remember dear reader, I am neither a doctor nor any sort of medical physician in any capacity. None of the information presented above can be construed as any sort of medical advice in any sort of manner. You as the reader is solely responsible for creating and implementing your own physical, mental and emotional well-being, decisions, choices and actions. As such, the reader agrees that the author is not and will not be liable or responsible for any actions or inaction taken by the reader or for any direct or indirect results. This information is simply presented and whatever you decide to do with it is your choice and your responsibility.
Leave a Reply