An Impulse to Something Greater

- Reg Harris
The Call signifies signifies death and rebirth, the death of our old self or old life and the rebirth of the new. We tend to think of the Call only as a call to rebirth, but it is also the end that allows the beginning. In his seminal book on the hero’s journey, The Hero […]

Finding your Bliss

- Reg Harris
A symbol is “like a mirror swinging out from the mind, able to look back on itself.” In symbols, we can step back from life and see it objectively. We can look back at where we are and where we have been. Joseph Campbell is, perhaps, most famous for his advice “follow your bliss.” In […]

The finger that points at the moon: Using the Journey

- Reg Harris
To use the journey in life, remember that the journey is a metaphor for a fundamental process of growth and transformation. To focus only on the journey is to lose sight of the lessons it teaches. Recently I received an e-mail from a reader who asked how to use the hero’s journey with clients suffering […]

Translating Campbell for Everyday Life

- Reg Harris
Ironically, the characteristics that make Campbell’s work rich and compelling are also the characteristics that can make it difficult to apply his ideas to our everyday journeys. Over the three-plus decades that I have studied and used the hero’s journey, people have often told me that they love Campbell’s work, but they have difficulty teaching […]

The Parable of the Raft

- Reg Harris
On life’s journeys, we use “rafts” to carry us from one point to the next. In this parable, Buddha tells us that carrying these “rafts” after they have served their purpose ties us to our past rather than opening our future. Buddha once told his disciples the story of a man who is trapped on […]