Joseph Campbell

The Gate of Wonder: A Reflection on the Adventure Card

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Field Notes from the Edge #007

There’s a moment in every myth where the hero stands before a gate.
Not a grand gate of gold or marble—but something subtler, more symbolic.
A shimmer between worlds. A crack in the ordinary.
A child in the forest, staring into the glow of a rainbow path.

That’s the image I pulled tonight.

From the Osho Zen Tarot deck came the card called Adventure.
A small figure stands on the edge of shadow and light,
stepping—without hesitation—into the unknown.
Not armoured. Not guided. Just open.

I felt something ancient stir.

This card felt less like a message and more like a mirror.
Because lately, I’ve heard the call.
Not just the whisper of a new project,
but the Call—the one Joseph Campbell spoke of.
The one that arrives with the weight of meaning,
that hums through your bones and rearranges your breath.

I’ve answered.

But as anyone who’s walked this path knows,
the call is only the beginning.
Just beyond it stand the gatekeepers:
Fear, Doubt, and Disbelief.

I’ve met them.
They tried to stop me, as they always do.
They mocked me with familiar scripts:
“You’re not ready. You’ll get lost. Who do you think you are?”

And still—I stepped forward.

This adventure is on.

I don’t pretend to know where it leads.
But like the child in the card, I’m approaching it
with childlike curiosity and wonder.
Not because I’m naive,
but because I remember:
wonder is how you walk through the world when you trust the path more than the destination.

It’s easy to forget that.

We get older, we get armoured.
We swap questions for answers.
But the soul doesn’t want certainty—it wants experience.
It wants you to feel the thrill of not knowing,
to be lit by the colors of the unseen,
to walk—open-hearted—into a story that’s still being written.

Two invitations for you, fellow seeker:

  1. Ask yourself:
    What does the child in the Adventure card know that I’ve forgotten?
    Let that inner adventurer speak. Write it down.
    Trust what comes.
  2. Map your Unknown:
    If your next step led into a mythic landscape—what would it look like?
    Who or what would greet you there?
    Draw it. Name it. Bless it.

The gate is always there, just at the edge of habit.
And on the other side?
Not safety. Not clarity.

But something better:
aliveness.

—Clay
Storythinker & Mythic Mentor for Seekers on the Threshold
Helping you rewrite the story beneath your story.

Want to carry this energy with you?
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in-between spaces

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I sit at my desk, the hum of the world still catching its breath from the night’s slumber. The sunlight is hesitant, as if it knows it should rise but isn’t quite ready to commit. This feels like the perfect time for some morning pages—a stream of consciousness that lets my thoughts spill out like water finding its course through rocks and earth.

I reach for my notebook, and as the pen touches the page, something curious happens. The words I write don’t seem entirely my own. Instead of the usual jumble of musings about my day or plans, the ink forms a river—literally. A small river on the page, its waters shimmering like quicksilver, twisting between the lines of my journal. I dip my finger into the ink and suddenly, I’m there.

The landscape is familiar but foreign, a half-remembered dream. Trees grow in spirals, leaves curling like question marks. A fox with emerald eyes stands on the path ahead, watching me. Is this some dream-shamanic journey I’ve wandered into? I’m not sure, but the ground beneath me feels solid, and the air is crisp with potential.

I walk toward the fox, and it doesn’t run. Instead, it speaks—soft, like a breath you’d miss if you weren’t listening closely.

“Write your dreams,” it says, its tail flicking with subtle impatience. “Record them. Live them.”

I nod because the fox is right. It’s time I renew that practice, time I dive deeper into the liminal, that in-between space where reality and dreams blur. Morning pages are the portal, but the dreamwork—the shamanic journeys, the hypnotic meditations, the sound of drums reverberating in the back of my mind—that’s the real work. The practice that weaves waking and sleeping into the same thread. I’m reminded of Robert Moss’ words—dreams and reality aren’t separate; they’re different lenses to view the same landscape.

The fox turns and darts away, and before I can follow, I’m back at my desk, staring at the now blank page. The river of ink is gone, but the message lingers in the air.

Later, in the afternoon, I make my way to Liverpool, and Joseph Campbell keeps me company. His voice echoes in the car, weaving the Hero’s Journey into every curve of the road. I can feel the myths breathing alongside me, the stories ancient yet evergreen. I know the power they hold—the power to reshape the psyche, to uncover those buried fragments of soul. His words about the hero’s call to adventure make me think of my own journey, not just through life but through the worlds that exist beyond the veil of this one. Perhaps I’ve been listening too much to the logical voices that try to impose order and meaning. Perhaps I’ve forgotten how to “fall in love” with the pictures in front of me—be they tarot cards or dream symbols.

Rachel Pollack had the right idea. Her tarot explorations in A Walk Through the Forest of Souls were like nothing I’ve read before—less rigid, more fluid, as though the cards themselves were breathing, inviting me to ask them questions instead of demanding answers. It’s time to let them speak their stories, to let the images reveal what they want, without the weight of interpretation hanging over them like a fog.

I pull a deck from my bag as the car continues its journey north. The cards feel warm in my hands, alive. I shuffle without thinking, without intention, and draw three: The Fool, Death, and The Tower.

I chuckle to myself. Of course. The story of transformation, of destruction and rebirth. A theme echoed in every myth, in every dream, and in every creative endeavour I’ve ever attempted. It’s the same story I’ve been telling myself but hadn’t yet realised I was living.

There’s a flash from the corner of my eye, and suddenly the fox is back—sitting calmly in the passenger seat. It’s strange how normal this feels now, like the veil between reality and imagination is thinner than I thought. The fox yawns lazily, eyes on the cards in my hand.

“You know what this means,” it says, as if we’re old friends, as if we’ve had this conversation before. Maybe we have, in dreams I’ve forgotten.

“I do,” I reply. It’s time to weave the magic of the surreal into my writing, to infuse my blog with this very essence. No more boundaries between the real and the unreal. I’ll call upon the cards, the myths, the dreams—perhaps even the fox—to guide me.

The road stretches out in front of me, endless and full of possibility. The pen is back in my hand, and the ink, once again, is a river waiting to be followed.

what myth are you living?

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Here’s the audio version of today’s blog post:

“This is what fools people: a man is always a teller of tales, he lives surrounded by his stories and the stories of others, he sees everything that happens to him through them; and he tries to live his own life as if he is telling a story.”

Jean-Paul Satre, Nausea

Carl Young said that the most important question we can ask ourselves is “What myth are you living?” That seems like an odd question to ask, considering most of us probably think of myths as make-believe or associate myths with Greek and Roman mythology. We consider ourselves too enlightened for myths. Instead, we put our faith in the scientific method and reason to answer our questions about life. And we trust that technology will give us the power to change or destroy what we don’t like.

But how do you answer the question of ‘what is the meaning of my life?’

via GIPHY

As Joseph Campbell said:

“The psychological dangers through which earlier generations were guided by symbols and spiritual exercises of their mythological and religious inheritance, we today…must face alone…This is our problem as modern, “enlightened” individuals, for whom all gods and devils have been rationalised out of existence.

What are myths?

Myths are:

“An intricate set of interlocking stories, rituals, rites, and customs that inform and give the pivotal sense of meaning and direction to a person, family, community, or culture.”

If you view myths in this light, then myths are all around us. We just chose simply not to recognise them as such.

To examine the myths operating in your life, ask yourself why you do the things you do in the way that you do them. This might be a hard question to answer because, when you are living the myth, it is nearly invisible to you. Our myths become “truths,” reinforced by cultural consensus.

Here’s and example:

“Most Americans would consider potlatch feasts, in which Northwest Indian tribes systematically destroy their wealth, to be irrational and mythic but would consider the habit of browsing in malls and buying expensive things we don’t need (conspicuous consumption) to be a perfectly reasonable way to spend a Saturday afternoon.”

Sam Keen, Your Mythic Journey

What we hold as “truths” is somebody else’s myth.

So, back to Carl Jung’s question, “What myth(s) are you living?” Is it a narrative you’ve created or are you simply buying into the prevailing cultural consensus? Do you have any personal myths you would rewrite to make them more empowering?

Last thing I’ll say about myths for now and then I’ll leave you to rummage through your personal myths (“truths”).

Think of myth as:

The software, the cultural DNA, the unconscious information, the meta program that governs the way you see “reality” and the way you behave.