How open are you to change, to opportunity, to life?  We humans have sometimes felt as though we’ve known “the answer” – and we’ve perhaps gotten stuck there when our perceptions became rigid.

Coach Phil Jackson said, “Always keep an open mind and a compassionate heart.”

Keeping an open mind is most often simply a matter of practicality because circumstances are always changing, so one’s mind or perceptions often move as well.  And having compassionate hearts assists in keeping our minds open.

Would you characterize yourself as having an open mind, or are you more rigid in your points of view?  How can we balance being open, yet being decisive when we need to be?

The Hero’s Journey is an archetypal way of understanding the quests of our lives. Joseph Campbell wrote about the hero’s journey as a way to conceptualize how and why we take on the challenges we choose. Very simplistically, think knight in the castle who learns that there is a damsel in distress. He sets out to slay the dragon and return home victorious with the rescued damsel by his side.

There are seven major steps to any hero’s journey – with many sub-steps. Today, we’ll start just by naming them:

The Call to Adventure

Refusal of the Call

Supernatural Aid

The Crossing of the First Threshold

Belly of The Whale

Initiation

The Road of Trials

Return

Think of any challenge or opportunity which confronts you. At the very least, you’ve heard the Call to Adventure based on your awareness of the challenge.

Just knowing what you know now about the Hero’s Journey, can you think of an example, past or present, where your life’s journey might be able to be understood through the steps of the Hero’s Journey?

With apologies to General Douglas Macarthur, his words about security may be just a tad strident. He said, “There is no security on this earth – only opportunity.” Apparently, another “security purist” who, to be sure, is technically correct in the absolutist construct of black-and-white thinking on our topic of the week.

Yet, we all know that life is a paradox. As Louis Adamic (a non-General whom I had never heard of) said, “Living is like licking honey off a thorn.” So it is with security: we can have health, wealth and wisdom . . . and, in the having of them, we can FEEL secure. Yet, since nothing endures, that feeling of security is fleeting . . . even if it last for decades.

Security may uniquely be both a one-word oxymoron as well as a one-word paradox . . . in any case, tough to reconcile with the realities of everyday life. Most likely, a solid way of dealing with any form of perfectionism – as absolute security is – is to use it to strive toward, but to resist being seduced by the promise of its NEVER CHANGING.

Dig deep and sense how you really FEEL about security. Not how you THINK about it, but how, deep in your gut you feel. Maybe confused, wistful, curious and perhaps even angry?

Perhaps the best security is the ability to appreciate the human experience in all its contradictions and up’s and down’s. How do you deal with your desire for security? Have you ever felt driven to make choices based on your perceived need for any kind of security?

Copyright 2009. E. B. Hutt Bush and Coaching for Results, Inc.