“If you follow your bliss, you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living. Wherever you are — if you are following your bliss, you are enjoying that refreshment, that life within you, all the time.”
Joseph Campell
Joseph Campbell was an American mythologist, writer and lecturer who coined the phrase “Follow Your Bliss”. Campbell’s famous quote is rooted in his theory where all mythic narratives are variations of a single great story called The Hero’s Journey. Campbell first described this great story in his book The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1949). In his work, Campbell outlines the hero’s journey as having three main parts – the departure, the initiation, and the return. (Each stage can then be divided further.) Having completed the journey out and back in, the hero is now a master of both natural and supernatural world and can pass the threshold between the two without further trial. This rewards the hero with mastery.
Campbell’s great story shows the hero as a normal person whose ordinary world is changed by some outside force. A ‘call to adventure’ is then offered which the hero usually refuses. When the hero finally does accept the journey, they must first cross an experiential threshold – the initiation. As the hero continues there are trials, friends, and foes that appear along the way. A mentor, trainer, or aide joins the journey, offering gifts, training, or support that is fundamental to the hero’s development on this path. Finally, into the dragon’s lair our here goes… where he/she experiences despair, death, or destruction. In the end, our hero magically rises despite what seems like defeat, to return with the ultimate treasure of mastery.
According to Campbell, the key to taking the hero’s journey is to “Follow Your Bliss”. What is Bliss? Bliss is said to be a state of complete happiness or joy – often associated with love and heaven – because pure bliss is reached when a soul connects with the Oneness of Everything. Whereas happiness is an emotion, bliss is a broader conditioning of the mind.
“What did you do as a child that created timelessness, that made you forget time? There lies the myth to live by.”
Joseph Campbell
Are YOU a hero? Are YOU ready to take the hero’s journey? First, create your hero. (Forget all about the traditional implications of the word ‘hero’ and let your imagination run riot. Draw it out. Get creative.) Next, give your hero a goal. Then, set out the steps of the great story cycle mentioned above… and follow your bliss!!
To increase your Bliss:
- Focus on relationships.
- Don’t fall for the trap of thinking “I will be happy when…”
- Don’t look to money for happiness.
- Be authentic.
- Do something nice for somebody else and talk with others.
- Keep working on it.
- Move to a happy place.
- Seek meaning in your life.
Be sure to journal your journey… and KEEP GOING!!