by: Rev. Dr. Anna Hall
Are you called to a new journey? Maybe you felt the call on Easter morning. Maybe you heard it at a march or protest. Maybe you found it in your garden, whispering in your own still, small voice.
If you are feeling called down a new path, how can you take up this calling today? By now, most of us have heard of the Heroic Journey. Perhaps we first learned of Heroic Journeys from our favorite fictional worlds, Joseph Campbell, or the sacred stories of our faith. The heroic rhythm of a journey into adversity and back out again is ancient and modern, imaginative and spiritual, personal and collective.
For those who are new to the idea or need a refresher, the rhythm goes like this:
- The heroic figure is called from ordinary life into new lands, physically, mentally, and/or spiritually.
- They respond to this call and face numerous adversities, even unto death.
- Upon return (or resurrection), our protagonist has new power or insights for their next journeys.
Since the late 1800s, scholars such as Edward Burnett Tylor, Johann Georg von Hahn, Otto Rank, and Lord Raglan have suggested that this is a common story across a number of world religions. Joseph Campbell popularized the idea in the late 20th century and gave it the label of monomyth – a unified spiritual story intrinsic to humankind. Others such as Maureen Murdock, Alice Meichi Li, and Valerie Estelle Frankel have critiqued this lens for its temptation toward the masculine, individualistic savior tropes, and the idea of its universality, but it can be a helpful lens to explore our own journeys. You can go as deep into these ideas as you like by reading the writings of those listed above, but for today, let’s keep it simple with one guiding question:
How can the heroic journey guide us, as faith communities and individual people of faith, in this post-Easter season in our world that is crying out for transformation?
Once we hear an invitation or calling, the heroic journey is about departure. Are we willing to travel an unknown road in the days ahead? Sometimes the first trial is overcoming our inertia and resistance to change. The truth is – there is no journey found in keeping things the same forever, and baby steps are not sufficient. If we are willing to move, we must take the big leap. Mark this departure with a ritual of initiation, either personal or collective. Bless the journey with a laying on of hands or a group prayer of sending forth. Or we can throw a symbol of our old path on the burn pile or blow dandelion seeds into the wind. The old ways are gone. Where now will we go?
The next stage is facing trials and adversities. Are we prepared for what will come as we walk a new path? Our greatest supporters may threaten to withdraw that support. Our friends and family may be confused and even angry at our departure from the norm. The world at large certainly never makes change easier, as there will always be a new reason to put things off – the economy is terrible, political change is necessary and urgent, our schedule is just too full. All of those can be true AND we can still be called into a new journey.
Each trial will come with the temptation to turn back. Things will get way harder before they get any easier. We can build our muscles for hard things by taking each obstacle as it comes, noticing the strain, resting, reflecting, and then persisting on our path. What are you willing to give up to follow your call? Comfort? Over-functioning? Conflict-avoidance? Saying yes to every request? Trying to make everyone happy? Income and stability? Personal safety and security? Everything is on the table.
During these rough middle times, the heroic journey often brings us a guide or advisor to aid us in our quest. Be still enough as you travel to notice who is available to you, whether that be a mentor, peer, or the Holy Spirit. New insights are found on the journey from these guides and from our own inner work.
Finally, our journey brings us to return. We are now called to integrate our new ways of walking into ongoing life, share our new insights and tell our travel tales to those who remain in the old lands. The journey, while it may seem like leaving our old lives behind, is in fact a gift to those old life people and places when we return to share with them all we have learned. They may or may not receive it well, but as long as we try, we have fulfilled our journey.
During this post-resurrection season, I hope you will take the time, individually or in your faith community, to ask these questions:
- What is calling you forth into new lands right now?
- What new journey is risky and scary and yet won’t let you go?
Unless we travel new paths, we can not build a new future of generosity, love, and justice. The road is calling. Say yes to the journey.
If you get stuck along the way, reach out to Convergence. We have helped many a person and organization on this path.