“We're so engaged in doing things to achieve purposes of outer value that we forget the inner value, the rapture that is associated with being alive, is what it is all about.”
Work
"Joseph Campbell ... was the world's foremost authority on mythology. a preeminent scholar, writer, and teacher whose work has had a profound influence on millions. To him, mythology was 'the song of the universe, the music of the spheres.' In [this book], he and distinguished journalist Bill Moyers offer a brilliant combination of wisdom and wit in conversations that range from modern marriage ('Marriage is a relationship. When you make the sacrifice in marriage, you're sacrificing not to each other but to unity in a relationship') to virgin births, from savior figures to heroic figures such as Luke Skywalker from Star Wars (' ... By overcoming the dark passions, the hero symbolizes our ability to control the irrational savages within us'). The Power of Myth is a great summing up of Joseph Campbell's work, sure to stand alongside his two celebrated classics The Hero with a Thousand Faces and The Masks of God and his ... Atlas of World Mythology."--Back cover.
Quotes
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Joseph Campbell
Canonical work source
“We're so engaged in doing things to achieve purposes of outer value that we forget the inner value, the rapture that is associated with being alive, is what it is all about.”
“Mythology is not a lie, mythology is poetry, it is metaphorical. It has been well said that mythology is the penultimate truth--penultimate because the ultimate cannot be put into words. It...”
“Follow your bliss and doors will open where there were no doors before.”
“Sit in a room and read--and read and read. And read the right books by the right people. Your mind is brought onto that level, and you have a nice, mild, slow-burning rapture all the time.”
“Computers are like Old Testament gods; lots of rules and no mercy.”
“People say that what we’re all seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think that’s what we’re really seeking. I think that what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive, so that our lif...”
“The demon that you can swallow gives you its power, and the greater life’s pain, the greater life’s reply.”