To my parents, I am a stubborn but precious daughter. To my sister, I am an little sister, too young to understand many things and inferior to her. To my teachers, in or outside school, I am a diligent and hardworking student. To my friends or acquaintances, I am seen in an entirely different light depending on countless factors, including when and where they see and talk to me. On the other hand, I have no idea how strangers percieve me. Overall, some see a single side to me whether it be nerdy and studious or goofy and weird. For some, I fit into and limited to this one box, label, group, etc.. Others see almost all of my different layers peeled back. My identity is multifaceted and complex, and so is everyone else’s-- whoever they are. In the course of our lives, we are all on a similar journey to find and understand our identities, our true selves, whether we realize it or not.
The hero’s journey can be paralleled with or even closely follows our search for identity. Although a hero may be perceived as an almighty, powerful individual-- better and different from the rest of us-- any individual has the potential to follow a hero’s journey; Campbell mentions it himself-- we all have to leave childhood and become adults, which follows the basic motif of a hero’s journey: “leaving one condition and finding the source of life to bring you forth into a richer or mature condition” (152). However, our journey-- a hero’s journey-- is not limited to simply leaving dependency and entering independence. By entering adulthood, by being left by ourselves, alone, independent, we also discover more about ourselves, our identity, because, as an independent entity, we are no longer barred to the rules of others, like our parents, and, therefore, are enabled to be introspective, find ourselves, and be guided by that inner self. To get there, an individual must, of course, go through the trials that any hero goes through in his or her journey-- whether it be self-doubt or self-denial or anything other hindrance. However, at the end of the journey, we must eventually figure out more about ourselves and our identities.
Literature mirrors this exact structure and journey through many different lenses and genres and paths. Every protagonist goes through some sort of struggle, and, in the end, the reader and the hero/heroine are often left with a better understanding of the world and the hero/heroine’s identity. In some novels, the path and journey is more explicitly laid out like in Siddhartha. In the beginning of his journey, he feels dissatisfied that he has not found his “inner self”, or, in other words, his true identity. Once he has this revelation, Siddhartha seeks himself through other groups, the Brahmins, the Samanas, and-- you can even consider-- the monks of Buddha. More specifically, he tries to find the self through these teachings but never succeeds. Instead, he has denied his true self (as he later realizes in “The Awakening” chapter), and, hence, has gone through several “trials” that have departed him from his path but also, in a way, furthered his efforts of finding himself by learning from his mistakes. In the end, he only achieves his goal of self-actualization by focusing solely on himself and his entire being rather than being distracted or worried about the more trivial and even irrelevant manners of others. He doesn’t find himself by labeling himself or limiting himself but accepting himself as one of many and uniting himself with everyone else as “one” (accepting the universe as one). By finding this self, he reaches Nirvana as well. Siddhartha's journey for identity is very conscientious and deliberate. However, literature typically does not convey such a search for identity so directly and in such a straightforward manner-- most likely because our lives don’t typically take the path of Siddhartha in which our sole priority is finding ourselves-- but that certainly does not mean that protagonists in other stories don’t mirror the same path to discovering ourselves-- in fact, they do! Their Eyes Were Watching God is one example. In this coming-of-age story about Janie, she finds her own inner voice and strength. In the beginning, she is a oppressed and inferior woman who couldn’t express herself and didn’t really comprehend her role in society. She was lost by herself; her life was dictated by others around her, whether it was her husband telling her to stay inside the store and keep her hair up or whether it was her Nanny telling her who to marry/who to not kiss. However, through Tea Cake, she learned more about herself and how she wanted to live her life by being able to speak up more and even let her hair down (let herself be). In the end, through this liberation, she found who she was instead of being a suppressed version of herself.
Although I only explained the broad terms of an individual’s journey to find themselves and gave a couple of supporting examples, the motif of a hero’s journey to find their true selves is explicit in many realms of society and life-- in reality, in media, in movies, in art, and in more books. You just have to look for it. As we lead our lives, we are subconsciously or even consciously learning from ourselves and, hence, developing ourselves to create and know a better self. Hence, our life’s journey can be always paralleled with some stage of the hero’s journey and a path to self-actualization.
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