An article published on the Eco-Institute’s blog ahead of an upcoming workshop I’m leading there and the upcoming Spring 2020 Emergent Quest.

Living the Emergent Quest

How can we respond to the mysterious pull of what wants to come to life in us and through us? How do we hear the larger knowing and vision whispering for our attention? What does it mean to meet the challenges and possibilities of our times by living in service to our truest gifts and unfolding path?

One perspective on these questions of life purpose and direction lies in the riches of our world’s mythological heritage, those stories that can bring us into contact with the murky waters of the still emerging contours of our self and life. I’m sometimes reminded of Joseph Campbell’s descriptions of how the journey may begin: Perhaps we unwittingly fall or blunder our way into it, thrown into some situation that takes us far beyond the known, like the Celtic hunter drawn into a dark forest by a deer that turns out to be more than a deer. Or maybe we consciously embark on a mission with at least an inkling of its seismic potential, as did Telemachus in search of his father, Odysseus, or the Sumerian goddess Inanna in her deliberate descent to the underworld. I’ve always found myself nourished by mythological depictions of the essential moments one may encounter in their journey, whether expressed in art, performance, literature, or in the dramatic renderings of modern film.

There are, of course, the classic depictions of that archetypal journeyer found in a Frodo, Neo, Rey, or Jake Sully. But potent expressions of transformative dynamics abound in countless unsuspecting places, such as the suggestive birthing sequence charted by Sandra Bullock’s character in Gravity, which can be received as a beautiful and rather precise rendering of initiatory themes and territories we may encounter in our lives. Dramatizations of the dynamics of the soul are as varied as are our individual paths through life. In this sense, any piece of art or literature—or any encounter with the natural world, or with another human being, for instance—can evoke or activate something latent in us that is ready to be revealed. Life is always inviting us further into conversation with the depths of who we are, with what’s wanting to emerge, and with what is being called forth in us by our larger relationship with the world. If we are willing to engage in that conversation, life becomes an endless opportunity for discovery—for opening to this mystery and walking our path. It is with this understanding that I accompany people on their own, unique, always–unfolding initiatory journeys through life.

Responding to the Call

Following the pull into the unknown inevitably leads us through passages of heightened intensity, which can unfold in a variety of ways. One potential response to this tug is to stand at the top of the mountain in all one’s wide-eyed wonder, glorious naiveté, fear, and appetite for adventure, and summon it all in, ready—at least we think—for whatever follows. I’m familiar with this approach. As a 21-year-old at the tail end of a formative period of pronounced inner emptiness and private despair, I decided to relinquish the security of the budding academic or corporate road I had been preparing for in economics and finance, and instead leap into the alluring, frightening encounter with some greater mystery I had felt calling in the creative path of music and artistry. The next year, I would relocate from New Zealand to Los Angeles. The year after, during a magical summer on Washington’s Orcas Island recording a demo that became my first album—and then ultimately became a precursor to my actual first album—I would discover the writings of Campbell and C. G. Jung, as well as the fierce encounter with the dissolution of the known self precipitated by certain non-dual teachings. Both bodies of work became invaluable companions in those early years of the adventure. I see now that responding to that first call initiated a journey that would define the rest of my life, a journey for which I would discover I was in certain ways woefully unprepared, and in other ways perfectly ripe for the experience. The dual soulcentric and career journey of apprenticing to the muse, serving an artistic vision, and seeking to reach people on an essential level while attempting to navigate the music industry, proved to be fertile soul-making and soul-discovering ground. When I turned 30, something shifted, and I began moving in the direction of working more directly with people on a core level. This eventually led to my current incarnation as my 38-year-old self accompanying people on their own inner journeys, while still very much continuing to grow and learn on mine.

Another, perhaps more informed approach is to consciously create a container that is conducive to a heightened encounter with one’s depths and with the murmurs of one’s soul. Here, we intentionally enter into the process of shedding layers of ourselves and opening to what’s ready to be revealed, knowing full well that this encounter with the unknown includes an encounter with our own unconscious, aspects of ourselves—desirable and undesirable—that we have, in one sense or another, run from, hidden from, or simply not recognized. In this alchemical cauldron, much can shift, and much can come to life. A number of practices exist for creating such a container and turning up the heat. One of the best known is the vision fast ceremony*, typically a four-day experience of ceremonial and solitary fasting in the wilderness. Drawn to the history and purpose of this work, I participated in a yearlong program with Bill Plotkin, whose work in some ways develops a contemporary synthesis of the depth-psychology traditions of Jung and James Hillman and the nature-based practices of various traditional cultures. I went on to train in a more accessible approach to this work with Purpose Guides Institute, where I later served on staff as a mentor.

Of course, these two responses to the deeper pull of our lives are not a matter of choice: We respond to life from wherever we are, no matter how messy or seemingly intentional our movements may look, and this is exactly as it should be. Ultimately, this apparent dichotomy belies the more fundamental truth that we are always, already on our life’s quest, and there are countless ways into the heart of our life’s journey. In my experience, one of the potential pitfalls of the more intentional path is that there can be a tendency to approach a practice or path—especially one that carries as much mystique as a vision fast—as if it will provide an answer or solution. While it may do that—though likely not in the form one is expecting—I think we are better served by understanding on a fundamental level that we are already on our quest, and that any program or practice is an amplified and maybe precious moment within the larger quest of our life. The vision fast, in this sense, is a moment of fiercely summoning all that is ready to be known, all that is ready to be awakened and dissolved and revealed within us, and allowing it to do its work on us. We enter it not knowing what to expect and not knowing where it will lead. This attitude of courageously coming into relationship with our depths and with life itself is, I believe, the core of any quest, and it’s also the nature of how we navigate the endless quest of our own lives.

Life Purpose and Direction

It’s not uncommon to bring to such purpose-oriented journeys an expectation for clarity around career, job, role, and the like. There’s sometimes an urgency that pushes us toward needing the answer or needing something to hold onto—a concrete knowing or definition that we can rest in, something we know what to do with. This gets us in the door, perhaps, or it’s the vehicle our heart chooses as it propels us and keeps us diving deeper. But as we forge into these inner territories, we soon realize that our quest is not a project under our control or subject to our demands: It has much more to do with relinquishing our usual strategies of getting and knowing—much more to do with a willingness to embrace the unknown—than it does with incorporating a new addition into our existing sense of self. In our realization that our quest is not for any particular external function, place, or role, we discover the freedom to fully open to the beauty of what’s more essential than any role. We come into relationship with the ever-unfolding essence of our journey and our offering. The paradox is that, as we surrender our need to grasp at an answer, two things happen. First, our fixation on finding the “right” role or function relaxes, because as we ground ourselves in a deeper knowing, we naturally begin to live the more essential elements of our offering in whatever situation or role we find ourselves in. There is less pressure to grasp at a hoped-for external solution as we increasingly experience ourselves embodying our gifts moment-to-moment and serving our vision as a lived reality. This is liberating and expansive in itself. But the second thing we find is that this greater clarity about the essence of what we’re offering enables us to much more readily discern and craft the expressions and vehicles—career path, job, role, etc.—that can truly serve this larger vision wanting to be born through us. The clarity we initially sought eventually comes, though it’s not the original seeker who receives the clarity, but the one who finds herself at this new vantage point with this shifted perspective. The quest comes full circle, and through the embrace of the essential layers of our journey, we continue the endless adventure of living our soulful visions into the world.

We come to this journey in a multitude of ways. Maybe we wholeheartedly dedicate ourselves to a particular vision or calling that then becomes our path of initiation, giving us much more than we bargained for. Perhaps we recognize the growing weight of a life that has contained or anesthetized a deeper truth, and in some way we follow the whispers of a greater vitality. Maybe tragedy strikes or something shakes us to our core or shatters our known world. We could find ourselves following the lure of the deer into the forest, or responding to an existential challenge. However we come to our path, I believe we are well served by the understanding that every moment is a part of our life’s endless, emergent quest. Life is forever inviting us further into this conversation. In our lived response, we discover our path.

Endnote:
*The term vision fast is used in this article to denote contemporary expressions of wilderness fasting rites, which often owe much to the practices of certain Native American peoples, practices sometimes referenced by earlier anthropologists by the term vision quest. In keeping with other contemporary schools and writers, and as someone of European heritage navigating these histories, my intention is to use the term vision fast as a means of indicating that any comment of mine is limited to current expressions of fasting rites that exist outside of Native American traditions, while at the same time seeking to implicitly acknowledge some of the historical and cultural sources of such practices and the debt owed to vision quest traditions.