Hero’s journey & Survival minsdet
Romanticized Hero’s Journey Belongs to Survival Mindset: There Are Alternatives
I was confused about the hero’s journey and mundane path.
Read on my website / Reading time: 6 min.
Everybody is familiar with the idea of a hero’s journey, which states that we are here to become heroes in our lives and overcome all difficulties and obstacles.
Reflecting on the hero’s journey and its life relationship, Joseph Campbell beautifully wrote:
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, and the fulfillment or the fiasco. There’s always the possibility of a fiasco.
But there’s also the possibility of bliss.
However, a hero is a solitary figure amidst a sea of adversaries, either conquered or yet to be.
They are all cast as villains; otherwise, heroes would appear peculiar, and thus, we have a starkly polarized mindset.
Even when a hero engages in an internal struggle, their ego or shadows are portrayed as foes to be vanquished.
They also have a fan base to whom they demonstrate their brilliance, reaping adoration for their qualities.
A hero is the one who gains the most, extracting the best from the best.
Being a hero, therefore, is the most coveted path, a path everyone aspires to tread.
When we make the conscious decision to turn our attention inward, to our state and emotions, we liberate ourselves from the shackles of external results.
This notion of focusing on our inner world, of letting go of external results challenges the very fabric of our current concept of life achievements.
A hero cannot let go of achievements and desires, which is never possible because this is the final result and the only meaning of a journey itself. A hero needs challenges, and he reveals himself by overcoming them.
The hero model is a result of successful survival, our legacy from past generations. The hero moment is an essential episode in every individual’s life and an aspect of masculinity revelation, which we all need for a period of time.
However, when everyone is a hero, nobody is.
Should we agree on less than a hero and take what is available instead of the most desirable?
Quoting The Gift of Sensitivity: “You need to see the film “Beautiful Mind” for an artistic representation of a decision strategy that could be used within game theory when all players can achieve the desired outcome by not deviating from the initial plan. The film’s main character explains to his peers what would happen if they all ignored a blonde girl in the bar as the most desirable one when everyone gets his girl. The case represents the win without competition for the hero position where everyone harvested for themselves yet without suppression of others. Most desired is the perception, not the reality.”
Similarly, a hero is just a method, not an end goal.
This understanding came with psychological practice when I met the downturn of heroic achievements and understood the inner state of people from desired life by many.
It happened when I achieved my childhood dreams, celebrated them for a few minutes, and got the empty sense back.
Why should I dream of a hero state if the aftertaste is so painful?
Emptiness is hurtful, would you agree?
It took time, however, until I fully got an answer to why people would desire something else if, traditionally, everyone wants to have the best, be the best, achieve the best, and live the best life of the best.
I was confused about the hero’s journey and mundane path.
Nobody dreams of being ordinary.
My inner hero felt nothing but tiredness from victories.
Asked during a workshop about how the hero’s journey can be adapted as a model for women today, Campbell acknowledges that it’s not up to him to say:
I don’t know what the counterpart would be in the woman’s case . . . There is a feminine counterpart to the trials and the difficulties, but it certainly is in a different mode. I don’t know the counterpart — the real counterpart, not the woman pretending to be male, but the normal feminine archetypology of this experience. I wouldn’t know what that would be.
Women will have to tell us the way a woman experiences the journey, if it is the same journey.
I found an alternative path and will share it with you right now.
My inner hero was reborn to become a magician with a lamp of inner truth: being at the best place is a never-ending journey, and another best place always arises as a new goal.
Our plan doesn’t mean to be/have the best, yet it must be yours.
It is so for the most straightforward reason: not followed by the pain of emptiness pushing for a new search to fill the inner void.
External needs and desires are insatiable, not fulfilling, and don’t give inner peace or long-term joy.
We must find our place, step into our power, and reflect on what belongs to our inner world.
External achievements provide a sense of great energy, which, unfortunately, is finite and require subsequent fulfillment.
A hero’s path is so fascinating. However, many dived deep into it and didn’t come back absorbed by that game.
Our emotional state is more important than outside achievements instead.
This understanding reveals the magical truth that sages believed.
This truth says the whole world will support you if you are on your path.
In this case, nothing could stop you, as you are ignited by inner light, not because you can overcome whatever; you don’t need any wins.
It is so because you are in a flow: all doors are open, all moments are synchronized, all needs arrive by time, there is nobody to defeat, and life amazingly happens for us.
A few additional notes:
The support flow started to show up in my life, confirming that the quality of my life journey had changed.
However, this only happened when I opened up to my emotions and put them above any consequences of the experience, such as victories or failures.
This method allows us to feel first to understand and only then proceed.
We can feel what is ours and what is not.
This is crucial for people who don’t distinguish themselves from other’s goals embedded in their minds during childhood or by false ideas of competition where we need to become the best.
Remember, when everyone is a hero, nobody does. What if the world were full of magicians and not just a few unsatiable heroes?
This is how women would like to experience the journey and the world: we are tired of wars, be they external or internal, and we ask for peace.
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