Follow Your Bliss

 

 

Joseph Campbell was being interviewed by Bill Moyers on the PBS “Power of Myth“ series when I first heard his phrase “follow your bliss”. In his viewpoint this undertaking must happen if a man were to experience fulfillment in his lifetime.

 

Joseph Campbell was a very wise man, but just what does it mean to follow one's bliss?

 

Well, in my opinion it means merely to be balanced enough to know your gift and be willing enough to work towards bringing it to fruition.

 

An artist creating a work.

A business man creating a new business.

A teacher creating wonder and hope in young minds.

A philanthropist in the creative stage of giving.

On an on it goes, different for each individual yet having the same affect on all of them by bringing purpose into their lives.

Did you catch the major theme through all this dream following?

Creativity. Being a creative human being is what it's all about. After all what are we if not creators?

Followers.

Now, following is not bad nor necessarily wrong. Without leadership we would be living extremely chaotic lives on this planet, and in all reality would probably have gone extinct some time ago.

But there is a balance that must be maintained while following or else you may just deny your gift and ultimately lose yourself in another's cause.

What's your dream? (it is normally tied into your gift) Everybody who has not been beaten down or brainwashed by the society he lives in has one.

What do you need to do in order to fulfill it?

I would say also that in order to follow your dream you must be realistic in your goals. Otherwise a man will spend his valuable youth chasing after someone else's dream, be he/she a scholar, a movie star, a musician or a magician, it doesn't matter.

He will merely be living as a copy cat who will never be as good as what he copies. Why? It's not his. He is just fantasizing it is.

Has anybody ever made Mozart's music as good as Mozart himself? No, of course not. He may be good enough to copy and be almost equal to Mozart, but never will he surpass him. It's impossible.

My gift is not in the music field and I know it, yet I still enjoy playing an instrument. Nor am I a painter, yet I enjoy painting a picture. We can do a lot of really cool stuff without activating our gift. Those who excel, the gifted ones who seemingly are heads above the rest of us, these guys are the ones I'm talking about.

I know my gift and when it's working I am in another place. A place where nothing can touch me, nor harm me, spiritually speaking anyways. When I am in my gift, I am at one with the earth. That's the best I can explain it. I'm sure Joseph could do better.

I fundamentally believe that each person born into this world has a gift of some sort programmed into his DNA and his goal, in order to be happy, is to find that gift and use it to the betterment of himself as well as his fellows.

 

The problem I see, at least in this country, is that in order to create anything of value you first must follow a learning curve of dedication, commitment, discipline and practice. All the things that seem to be out of vogue in this “hurry up I want it now!” society we live in.

As a practical matter we need to have a place of quiet solitude where we can meditate upon these questions and resolve them in our own minds before we even begin. Then we need to move forward to practice them.

Thich Nhat Hanh (a Vietnamese Buddhist monk) is a great example of a man following his bliss.

In the midst of the Vietnam War while the Americans were bombing the hell out of his country, he and his organization were busily rebuilding bombed villages, setting up schools and medical clinics, and helping through non violent means all he could to alleviate the plight of the citizens of his country.

For doing that he was ultimately forced out of his country and banned from ever returning. Nothing stopped him however and he remains practicing peace to this day in Plum Village somewhere in France.

Hopefully as/if things get worse for you in this country nothing will stop you either because what takes place on the outside is nothing to be compared to the power within once you find and follow your bliss. . . . Go for it! You'll be glad that you did.

 

Reviews

[TLK]

It's a vague sentence that means nothing that allows the privileged to quest for yet more privilege in a world of unseen wants.

You eat, you drink, you have riches beyond a king of the past -- seek more bliss. Fulfil yourself. You deserve it, you are an individual. From the broken bones of past ages you have sprung, and you consume the earth to power your self-regard. Go for more. Truly, you should ruin everything so that it is debased in your Kingly presence.

Go for bliss and, if you miss, get pissed.