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If you want the whole thing, the gods will give it to you. But you must be ready for it.

Joseph Campbell

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Joseph Campbell
Age: 83 †
Born: 1904
Born: March 26
Died: 1987
Died: October 30
Academic
Anthropologist
Essayist
Ethnologist
Historian
Historian Of Religion
Lecturer
Mythologist
Orator
Researcher
Short Story Writer
White Plains
New York
Joseph John Campbell
Joseph Cambell
Thing
Gods
Ready
Inspirational
Give
Whole
Must
Giving

More quotes by Joseph Campbell

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Without passion, men are not willing to pay any price or bear any burden to set the captives free.
Joseph Campbell
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Just as anyone who listens to the muse will hear, you can write out of your own intention or out of inspiration. There is such a thing. It comes up and talks. And those who have heard deeply the rhythms and hymns of the gods, can recite those hymns in such a way that the gods will be attracted.
Joseph Campbell
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Perfection isn't human. Human beings are not perfect. What evokes our love--and I mean love, not lust--is the imperfection of the human being. So, when the imperfection of the real person peaks through, say, 'This is a challenge to my compassion.' Then make a try, and something might begin to get going.
Joseph Campbell
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Myths are public dreams, dreams are private myths. We must be willing to get rid of the life we planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us. I have bought this wonderful machine — a computer ... it seems to me to be an Old Testament god, with a lot of rules and no mercy.
Joseph Campbell
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You don't have to believe that there was a King Arthur to get the significance of those stories, but Christians say we have to believe there was a Christ, or the miracles don't make sense.
Joseph Campbell
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The big question is whether you are going to be able to say a hearty yes to your adventure.
Joseph Campbell
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A hero is not a champion of things become, but of things becoming the dragon to be slain by him is precisely the monster of the status quo.
Joseph Campbell
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A bit of advice Given to a young Native American At the time of his initiation: As you go the way of life, You will see a great chasm. Jump. It is not as wide as you think.
Joseph Campbell
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The world is full of people who have stopped listening to themselves.
Joseph Campbell
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We must be willing to get rid of the life we've planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us. The old skin has to be shed before the new one can come. -
Joseph Campbell
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One great thing about growing old is that nothing is going to lead to anything. Everything is of the moment.
Joseph Campbell
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Our life has become so economic and practical in its orientation that, as you get older, the claims of the moment upon you are so great, you hardly know where the hell you are, or what it is you intended. You are always doing something that is required of you. Where is your bliss station? You have to try to find it.
Joseph Campbell
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When an idea is important to a person or culture it will find its way into imagery.
Joseph Campbell
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There have been systems of religion where the mother is the prime parent, the source, and she's really a more immediate parent than the father, because one is born from the mother...so that the image of the woman is the image of the world.
Joseph Campbell
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People who don't have a concept of the whole can do very unfortunate things.
Joseph Campbell
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Follow your bliss. The heroic life is living the individual adventure. There is no security in following the call to adventure. Nothing is exciting if you know what the outcome is going to be.
Joseph Campbell
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You have to have a feeling for where you are. You've got only one life to live and you don't have to live it for six people. Pay attention to it.
Joseph Campbell
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When you follow your bliss, you begin to meet people who are in the field of your bliss, and they open the doors to you.
Joseph Campbell
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The ultimate dreamer is Vishnu floating on the cosmic Milky Ocean, couched upon the coils of the abyssal serpent Ananta, the meaning of whose name is Unending. In the foreground stand the five Pandava brothers, heroes of the epic Mahabharata, with Draupadi, their wife: allegorically, she is the mind and they are the five senses.
Joseph Campbell
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Myths are the world's dreams. They are archetypal dreams and deal with great human problems. Myths and dreams come from the same place. They come from realizations of some kind that then have to find expression in symbolic form.
Joseph Campbell