The Hero’s Journey, from your couch

The Hero’s Journey is a type of story that shows up in every culture.

Most ancient myths and legends follow this pattern.

As do many modern movies.

For whatever reason, we resonate with the idea of an ordinary person being summoned to adventure.

Maybe that adventure is to don a superhero costume and save the world.

Maybe it’s to change careers and save their soul.

Whatever the genre, the patterns are the same.

And you can use those patterns to enhance your own hypnotic experiences. I’m not the first to notice that trances follow the Hero’s Journey too.

You begin in the normal world – perhaps sitting on the couch, chilling out.

Then you feel this impulse from inside. For me, it’s as if I’m craving the trance experience. It comes on suddenly. You’re free to ignore it – just like how the archetypal Hero refuses the Call to Action.

If you go with it, though, you can quickly enter a deeper, relaxed state of mind.

Then you encounter a Threshold Guardian – something in your mind that prevents you from going deeper.

They could be distractions.

Or something inside your own mind. Thoughts or beliefs that keep you from the full trance experience.

Overcome those and you experience something new.

For me, this is usually when the Trickster shows up. I love the Trickster – it’s never predictable.

And whether it helps or hinders you is an excellent barometer for your own relationship with your unconscious.

I’ve had deep trance experiences where loved ones started torturing me. That was quite off-putting. I’ve also had trance experiences where I had one goal in mind – say, to delete the habit of biting my nails – only for some old emotional scar to heal.

Then again, most of the time my Tricksters show up as bizarre distractions.

How much the Trickster helps you aligns with how good your relationship with your inner mind is. Have you been ignoring, neglecting, maybe even belittling yourself lately? Then you can’t be surprised if your unconscious messes with you a little.

Stay with the trance long enough and you’ll enter your Underworld – as far deep into yourself as you can currently consciously venture. This gets intense.

Here, you can face many of your darkest demons.

You can also find the Elixir of Life – some valuable personal revelation – and bring it back to the surface world.

Then, like the Hero’s Journey, you return to where you started – only you’re not the same as the person who began the quest.

The Hero’s Journey and hypnotic trances align – even more closely than I’ve described here. I don’t think that’s a coincidence. These stories echo across human history because they reflect something about how we operate.

The Journey resonates with us because, in smaller ways, we are the Hero.

And if you would like to master this process of exploring your inner mindscapes, you can learn everything you need right here:

https://guided-thought.com/monster