Joseph Campbell--On Becoming an Adult

remember Anna watts process once asked me Joe what is your yoga I said my yoga is underlining sentences and everything I know all the Will Rogers used to say all I know is what I read in the newspapers and all I know is what I read in books a little more added the rituals of initiation of young men in some of the very simple societies extremely interesting the boys are brought up to be in fear of the masks that the men wear in their rituals these are the gods these are the personifications the powers the structure the society the boy when he gets to be more than his mother can handle the men come in with their masks or whatever the costume is and they grab the kid and he thinks he's been taken by the gods taken out of the men's room ground and he beaten up and everything else but then they're in New Guinea there's a wonderful wonderful event where the poor kid has to stand up and fight a man with a mask I'd say he's finding the God the man let's the kid win takes the mask off puts it on the kid now the mask is not there defeated and simply said all this just bet that the mask represents the power that is shaping the society and has shaped you and now you are a representative of that power that's a big story and there are quite a number of examples around the world down in Tierra del Fuego the owner people down there had rituals of this kind where the kid had to get up and fight this God power that had always been afraid of and the man put up a good fight for the kid you know but then the boy won now you're a man you've broken past the image as fact and understand the image as metaphor and you ought to represent what the metaphor stands for well the burial isn't is important as the kid thinking is dead in again these um bullroar 'as you know the whoo-whoo-whoo-whoo this is the voice of the deity again in New Guinea there's a ritual where the kid is his eyes are covered by the initiating man and the bull-roarer comes over and he tells them now the demon dragon grandpa is coming to eat you keep these he's a goner that's the lis bestowed idea that vug the handles you see you think you're dead and baby you've broken past it we've got a new expanded life you're bigger what has died has been the infantile ego we until we're pretty well along twelve thirteen fourteen are utterly dependent on our parents and on our society so a psychology of dependency is developed a psychology of submission asking for approval expecting reproof and all this sort of thing but how are we going to break out of that psychological bondage into self responsible Authority courage for what our thoughts are in our life this is the problem of killing the infantile ego which is one of dependency and coming into the mature ego of authority I always say that if you're going to go through for your PhD you're in the dependency position until you're 35 or 40 and may never get out of it you can judge by the number of footnotes a scholar applies as to whether he's got no authority or is always simply hoping that somebody will feel that he has the right authorities the it's an important a sensitive point in the academic world it's impressed me you know you see on TV professor is asked a question any homes he's trying to get the answer out straight and so forth and then some big league baseball player is asked was boy what authority he's not humming in Hawaii he comes out he knows he was an authority from the time of his playing ball on the Sandlot he's not asking anybody for approval he's dalian and this is the breakthrough to maturity that is required in in the life of Adam

Channel: campbellfoundation

Views: 910,499

Rating: 4.9425793 out of 5

Keywords: Joseph, Campbell, mythology, adulthood

Id: aGx4IlppSgU

Length: 5min 40sec (340 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 01 2010

Reddit Comments

[u/OneManGayPrideParade]

Campbell -> Star Wars -> Jedi -> Yoda -> yuddha युद्ध (battle) -> talking weird -> dharma combat -> ZEEEENNNN

I really like him, went through a big Campbell-Sagan phase back in the day. Speaking of which, has anyone read the book Contact? Really great, just no Tom Skerritt or Jodie. Much more subtle take on religion than in the also great movie. I remember being mind blown as a youngster reading about the computation deal with the thing shaped like the thing on the sidebar.
Also sort of speaking of which, I'll ask again if anyone knows of sci fi books with a theme of Zen and artificial intelligence. Think that could be really rad if done well.

[u/[deleted]]

Oh I love Alan Watts.

[u/King_Theodem]

smell that? It's the smell of Noam Chalmsky

[u/windDrakeHex]

It reminded me of a modern zen saying " stand in your own shoes'

[u/[deleted]]

Campbell was accused of being an antisemite and a racist (against blacks) by Brendan Gill, for example, in an article published in The New York Review of Books in 1989. Where these charges actually stem from I am not sure.