Your Hero’s Journey — A Framework for Building Resilience and Self-Discovery

It's been said that we have something significant to give to this world, and this world has something significant for us. We come to discover what that is through the hero's journey.

“You are the hero of your own story,” Joseph Campbell, the professor and mythologist, once said. And he shared some insights — “If you follow someone else’s way, you are not going to realize your potential,” and “If the path before you is clear, you’re probably on someone else’s.”

Found universally in all cultures, The Hero's Journey is the central story we all live. And although it may not always feel like it, we are called to an adventure where life is aiming to help us grow into who we truly are, so we can live more fully into our potential.

The hero's journey is more than a story. It actually reads like a map for our personal development.

Why We Refuse The Call Initially

So if this journey is so universal, why don’t we hear more about it? Most likely, because it means taking the road less traveled. And there's a draw to holding ourselves back. In stories like The Hobbit or Star Wars, the hero is often reluctant to leave the familiar world behind.

Our survival brain loves comfort. It clings to what is safe and familiar. It wants us to stay in untested waters — that may bore us, but still feel predictable and secure. Yet remaining there keeps us from discovering and developing new aspects of ourselves.

We’re also encouraged to follow our culture's common expectations. Leaving the familiar world can feel like defying tradition. As social beings, we crave belonging. So stepping away from one tribe before we know where another one awaits us can feel daunting. We like certainty and avoiding unnecessary risks.

The main reason we resist our own path is because we know that the trials that await us can challenge us in ways we’ve never experienced before. We may question our strength, our courage, and our ability to endure. Yet these very challenges shape who we are becoming.

For many of us, the first call to adventure comes in our teens or in young adulthood. Sometimes it’s subtle — a quiet nudge, a feeling, or an intuition. Sometimes it's obvious and abrupt, like it was for me when it helped to set me on my career path.

Mentors & Allies

Along the way, we meet inner and outer allies and mentors — and they often arrive in surprising forms. Inner allies can come through dreams, intuition, and insights. Outer mentors may come in the form of teachers, neighbors, or even through books, poetry, songs, and films that inspire us. While some may stay for quite some time or even the rest of our lives, some may disappear just as quickly as they arrived, after they've fulfilled their purpose.

Lasting Transformation 

There's a way in which we can explore the model — mapping out where we find ourselves and how we can transform from feeling like a victim of life's circumstances to realizing we are already on a journey of discovery, becoming more of who we truly are, while finding our purpose. And this is a core component of my RESET for Wellness training.

But this path is not for the faint of heart. When we do find the courage to answer the call, we come to know ourselves and life differently. And we step into more of our power.

In Alice in Wonderland (and I love the version from 2016), everyone is awaiting Alice. When she returns, they say to her things like, "Thank goodness you're here, you've come to slay the Jabberwocky!" And yet she thinks they're utterly confused and off their rockers!

Bewildered, she finds her way through the new terrain and continues. In the process, she comes to discover who she really is, and who the others already know her to be!

And like Alice, if we too can come to believe we can do “six impossible things before breakfast” and summon the courage to face our own personal dragons, we will find the gift — the boon — that awaits us. And when we return, transformed, others will see it. We’ll bring something valuable back to our communities.

Invoking Assistance

When life challenges you to your core and you’re not sure you can make it, the hero’s journey offers a saving grace and a timeless comfort. You can turn to Campbell's books or videos — or any story you truly resonate with — and discover where you are in the story.

It's been said that if you can find yourself in a story, you can also find your way through it.

You can also invoke your allies and mentors. Ask for guidance, invoking Divine or universal assistance. Be honest, “I’m not sure I can make it — can you send someone to help me?”  You may be surprised by what comes. Once, I dreamt of a divine being who came to assist me, and another time, my father visited me long after he had passed away.

“The journey of the hero is about the courage to seek the depths; the image of creative rebirth; the eternal cycle of change within us.”

The Breakthrough

Just as the caterpillar dissolves within the chrysalis before emerging as the butterfly, and the chick must break through its shell to emerge into a fuller expression, transformation often requires a forceful break from the old. It can feel like death to the parts of ourselves that have outlived their purpose. But when we let go of who we’ve been, we find the courage to step into who we’re becoming.

And there, life meets us with wonder and delight — rewarding our courage with transformation and a fuller and freer expression of ourselves. We come to know more of who we are and how we are uniquely aimed in life. It is said that the gift we receive is not only for us, that it will also benefit those around us.

We come to discover gifts, strengths, and talents we never knew we had, and that would not have emerged otherwise. Drawn out by those challenges — like Roosevelt suggested when he said, "A smooth sea never made a skilled sailor" — we are much more than we know.