Answering the Call

Joseph Campbell speaks of “answering the call” as part of the archetypal “Hero’s Journey” that unmistakably calls to us all at some point in our lifetime. It is the call that will ask us to put aside our ordinary life and embark on our own custom made hero’s journey that will ultimately allow us to claim the honor of being the hero of our own lives.

Whether or not we answer the call and begin our hero’s journey will set the tone for the rest of our lives.

Once begun, all manner of previously unforeseen and unimagined circumstances will come to the fore to speed us on our journey and aid us along our way. We must trust that this will be the case because though there is no doubt that we are called, there will be uncertainty, trepidation and reluctance in our minds.

We will return from our hero’s journey to a world that is decidedly but not obviously different than when we began our journey because it is ourselves, not the world that will have been transformed.

In May of 2007 I asked the universe to show me my purpose. I ask only that it be something so irresistible, so joyful and so fulfilling that it would be undeniably and obviously the call to my hero’s journey. In June of that year I got and answered the call.

I will leave you with this quote by Ken Wilber that provided the first step in my hero’s journey.

“And therefore, all of those for whom authentic transformation has deeply unseated their souls [they] must, I believe, wrestle with the profound moral obligation to shout from the heart--perhaps quietly and gently, with tears of reluctance; perhaps with fierce fire and angry wisdom; perhaps with slow and careful analysis; perhaps by unshakeable public example--but authenticity always and absolutely carries a demand and duty: you must speak out, to the best of your ability, and shake the spiritual tree, and shine your headlights into the eyes of the complacent. You must let that radical realization rumble through your veins and rattle those around you.”