Joseph Campbell Quotes

“Regrets are illuminations come too late.”

“In marriage you are not sacrificing yourself to the other person. You are sacrificing yourself to the relationship.”

“An old Apache storyteller reminds us”

“Every hero must have the courage to be alone, to take the journey for himself.”

“Man should not be in the service of society, society should be in the service of man. When man is in the service of society, you have a monster state, and that's what is threatening the world at this minute.”

“Any disaster you can survive is an improvement in your character, your stature, and your life”

“When you are required to exhibit strength, it comes.”

“We're not on our journey to save the world but to save ourselves. But in doing that you save the world. The influence of a vital person vitalizes.”

“I think a person who takes a job in order to live - that is to say, for the money - has turned himself into a slave. Work begins when you don't like what you're doing. There's a wise saying: make your hobby your source of income. Then there's no such thing as work, and there's no such thing as getting tired. That's been my own experience. I did just what I wanted to do. It takes a little courage at first, because who the hell wants you to do just what you want to do; they've all got lots of plans for you. But you can make it happen.”

“There's always the possibility of a fiasco. But there's also the possibility of bliss.”

“The black moment is the moment when the real message of transformation is going to come. At the darkest moment comes the light.”

“Everything starts with a story.”

“Life is without meaning. You bring the meaning to it. The meaning of life is whatever you ascribe it to be. Being alive is the meaning.”

“It's characteristic of democracy that majority rule is understood as being effective not only in politics but also in thinking. In thinking, of course, the majority is always wrong.”

“If we fix on the old, we get stuck.”

“If you follow someone else's way, you are not going to realize your potential.”

“I think the person who takes a job in order to live - that is to say, for the money - has turned himself into a slave.”

“The world is full of people who have stopped listening to themselves or have listened only to their neighbors to learn what they ought to do, how they ought to behave, and what the values are they should be living for.”

“Freud tells us to blame our parents for all the shortcomings of our life, Marx tells us to blame the upper class of our society. But the only one to blame is oneself.”

“The big question is whether you are going to be able to say a hearty yes to your adventure.”