“MOYERS: So if my private dreams are in accord with the public mythology, I'm more likely to live healthily in that society. But if my private dreams are out of step with the public –
CAMPBELL: -- you'll be in trouble. If you're forced to live in that system, you'll be a neurotic.
MOYERS: But aren't many visionaries and even leaders and heroes close to the edge of neuroticism?
CAMPBELL: Yes, they are.
MOYERS: How do you explain that?
CAMPBELL: They've moved out of the society that would have protected them, and into the dark forest, into the world of fire, of original experience. Original experience has not been interpreted for you, and so you've got to work out your life for yourself. Either you can take it or you can't. You don't have to go far off the interpreted path to find yourself in very difficult situations. The courage to face the trials and to bring a whole new body of possibilities into the field of interpreted experience for other people to experience -- that is the hero's deed.”
― The Power of Myth
CAMPBELL: -- you'll be in trouble. If you're forced to live in that system, you'll be a neurotic.
MOYERS: But aren't many visionaries and even leaders and heroes close to the edge of neuroticism?
CAMPBELL: Yes, they are.
MOYERS: How do you explain that?
CAMPBELL: They've moved out of the society that would have protected them, and into the dark forest, into the world of fire, of original experience. Original experience has not been interpreted for you, and so you've got to work out your life for yourself. Either you can take it or you can't. You don't have to go far off the interpreted path to find yourself in very difficult situations. The courage to face the trials and to bring a whole new body of possibilities into the field of interpreted experience for other people to experience -- that is the hero's deed.”
― The Power of Myth
“Refusal to hope is nothing more than a decision to die.”
― Love, Medicine and Miracles: Lessons Learned about Self-Healing from a Surgeon's Experience with Exceptional Patients
― Love, Medicine and Miracles: Lessons Learned about Self-Healing from a Surgeon's Experience with Exceptional Patients
“If a person deals with anger or despair when they first appear, illness need not occur. When we don’t deal with our emotional needs, we set ourselves up for physical illness.”
― Love, Medicine and Miracles: Lessons Learned about Self-Healing from a Surgeon's Experience with Exceptional Patients
― Love, Medicine and Miracles: Lessons Learned about Self-Healing from a Surgeon's Experience with Exceptional Patients
“long-term survivors had poor relationships with their physicians—as judged by the physicians. They asked a lot of questions and expressed their emotions freely.”
― Love, Medicine and Miracles: Lessons Learned about Self-Healing from a Surgeon's Experience with Exceptional Patients
― Love, Medicine and Miracles: Lessons Learned about Self-Healing from a Surgeon's Experience with Exceptional Patients
“Science teaches that we must see in order to believe, but we must also believe in order to see.”
― Love, Medicine & Miracles
― Love, Medicine & Miracles
Caroline’s 2025 Year in Books
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