938 Quotes by Joseph Campbell

I have found that you have only to take that one step toward the gods, and they will then take ten steps toward you. That step, the heroic first step of the journey, is out of, or over the edge of, your boundaries, and it often must be taken before you know that you will.

There's always the possibility of a fiasco. But there's also the possibility of bliss.

Life is without meaning. You bring the meaning to it.

The cave you fear to enter holds the treasure you seek. Fear of the unknown is our greatest fear. Many of us would enter a tiger's lair before we would enter a dark cave. While caution is a useful instinct, we lose many opportunities and much of the adventure of life if we fail to support the curious explorer within us.

Original Experience has not been interpreted for you, and so youve got to work out life for yourself. Either you can take it or you cant. You dont 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 heros deed.

The Greeks, it will be recalled, regarded Eros, the god of love, as the eldest of the gods; but also as the youngest, born fresh and dewy-eyed in every living heart.

The achievement of the hero is one that he is ready for and it's really a manifestation of his character. It's amusing the way in which the landscape and conditions of the environment match the readiness of the hero. The adventure that he is ready for is the one that he gets.

Myth is the secret opening through which the inexhaustible energies of the cosmos pour into human manifestation....

Poetry comes out of an elite experience, the experience of people whose ears are opened to the song of the universe.