A New ‘Hero’s Journey.’
By: Floris Koot
Tags: Storytelling, Social Change, Scenario, Heroes, Mythology

A critical post about the biggest cliche story of all time and suggestions for a new story lines towards a more united earth.

(I’ve tried a writing innovation. I call it the READER EDIT. If you only read the normal font, you get a shorter more straightforward version. You can also read the Italic, which will explain some points a bit more, if the normal script is not enough or you wish for an example.)

The Cliche Chart to reveal the biggest cliches of our time. Google: ‘Hero’s Journey model’ for more models. At the end of this post I offer some alternative stories, with a little different take on overcoming trouble.

It’s time to end our current ideas on how stories essentially go. We all must have heard of the ‘Journey of the Hero’, the basis for every good story. It works in training. And Hollywood can’t do without Joseph Campbell’s mono myth anymore. It always repeats this set up: Some huge, often bigger than life, threats need to be overcome by a bigger than life hero. The evil must be stopped. The movie works towards the big shoot out or confrontation that will solve almost everything (unless part II is planned).

And the Hero’s Journey is the basis for very good business training models too. It works for leadership, change programs, entrepreneurship, and plain motivation. You are on an adventure in this training, learning how get breakthroughs. Hey, me and a college offered them as “Breakthrough by Metaphor” They are great fun and confronting too. I still offer them, but do add new twists.

Yet, it’s time to let it go off this dominant idea of the ‘Hero’s journey’ and find a brand new take on it, that will help the world going through the coming big changes or storms. For a real bigger than life ‘storm is coming’. Our climate crisis has no evil villain, nor can be stopped by one heroic being. It will need all of us to weather the storms.

Literal storms from the changing weather and degrading of essential eco systems and metaphorical storms due to the messy economic and political developments, in part caused by the literal storms. Tensions over natural resources will keep rising, like those about energy, whether it’s about oil, or between oil corporations and innovative alternatives. Or just new technological breakthroughs hitting the market that really outdate your business or job.

Do Superhero movies offer an escape, inspiration, distraction or false illusions about solving problems? I’d guess all of the above, but still. One wonders.

Four reasons why the ‘Journey of the Hero’ needs scrutiny.

1. It boosts ‘Us vs. Them’ thinking.

Hollywood loves that simple reality. Kill the bad guy and everything is right again…wrong. Many bad things happen due to broken systems, not because one person rigged it. Also in training the format is often simple: believe that finding and overcoming one big obstacle is the way to go. Where’s the sense of reality? After the training you’ll feel wow, but back at the firm you get confused. Many big and small obstacles, interests, alliances and oppositions, rules and customs are all interwoven and seem out to stop you.

That’s why many revolutions end in a mess. A, it turns out it’s often just more of the same, and B, new faces and new system doesn’t always mean better. Reality is complex. And solutions often become the source of new problems. Cars, chain saws, junk food, or insect poisons all were a great idea once. Also the whole idea that there is some evil out there targeting us to destroy everything, hinders acceptance for strangers and other cultures. Mistrust and fear actually create more conflict and suffering than they solve, from racist ‘solutions’ to ‘big walls’.

2. You might start to believe it’s all too much.

The bigger the heroes, the less we recognize ourselves in them. Standing up is dangerous. The other side is really willing to destroy you for what it wants. You’d rather hide. And you lack what heroes have: specials tools, gifts, inner conviction and especially a kind of magic call. The call you never received.

You may feel rudderless and filled with a doubt, that heroes seemingly rarely have. So you wait for a real signal, not this joke: “If you’re waiting for a sign from God, this is it.” We need to start realizing doubters are actually people who care and don’t want to hurt people. It’s the ones who don’t mind and think they can get away with it, who are the problem. And it’s often the sensitive ones who seek to improve things for the victims of the guys who didn’t mind.

3. Almost no hero succeeds alone.

We all need help to make it happen. People who do their thing, people who believe in you, people who give in and accept change has come. Heroes often have many people to thank for their success. We should not take them out of the light with our focussed admiration for the ‘one’, but get the others back in.

Consider Nelson Mandela. His integrity and values inspired many. And many people were needed to free him from prison and make him president. On both sides of the lines. Sometimes it’s even unclear who all made something happen. Who made the tools for the fire brigade? Many many little things led to the fall of the Berlin Wall, many people wanted it down. Many efforts became an unstoppable wave. And please acknowledge the guards that fired no shots at all as important too. Consider the fight for women to vote. Consider the end of slavery. Etc. There are many heroic individual stories within the process, but how to show the collective making the difference?

4. What is the bigger picture?

Firstly those who make the movie frame what you see. They may also decide what values rank on top. A movie about an American Commando saving a hostage from a group of terrorists, will often neglect that the war probably got started, let alone got worse, due to US meddling of some kind. Regime change wars anyone? The USA military has a big finger in Hollywood movies, but they can’t stop side effects. ‘Fun’ fact, many terrorists according to a former CIA agent identify with Luke Skywalker, lone desert boy, rebel, fighting an evil empire.

We do have to wonder, is the movie to tell about a hero, who made a difference, or is it once more confirmation that the ‘psychopath attitude of not hesitating to kill’ is what saves the day? Too many leaders and heroes, are shown as people who stay cold blooded in any situation. In reality we can’t trust that strong decisive leaders actually have the capacity to care enough about others. Because of our ‘hero’ culture we forget to wonder, is the way of the hero the best way to solve a situation? Of course calling the cops to arrest all the bad guys is more boring, than a good shoot out of one guy vs the rest. But we should wonder, what isn’t shown, isn’t told?

A New Story

So what is the new story we need? Here are essential elements that I propose:

A: We are all together in it. Everyone who saw the short video: “The Blessed Unrest” of Paul Hawken can feel that millions worry and do something. We all want peace, safety and positive change. Much has been done. There is less war, less slavery and we need to work to improve beyond where we are now. We can. “Earth is a Space Ship and We’re all Crew”. That realization becomes more apparent as we understand our planet better and the threats get bigger. It makes more and more people feel we must act. This new approach should help liberate us from out tendency to wait on the ‘leaders’ or the ‘one’ to make it happen and see how we together ‘as a positive swarm’ are the ones with power. Some people called for a WQ, We Quotient, for our capability to see the whole and our role in it. I think this capability is becoming increasingly important if we want to prevent global self destruction. In tribal ‘Us vs Them’ thinking whistle blowers like Edward Snowdon are traitors. For global citizens we see how he seeks to help safeguard the whole from misuse of power.

B: There’s a lot of common people, with no gift at all, making a difference through hardship. Movies like ‘Erin Brockovich’ are way too rare. And the movie makes her plight individual, because, well, hey, you need to feel with and for her. Yet many more people than shown in the movie helped her make that difference. There’s many idealistic, sensitive, simple, strange and even victimized people who go out of their way to help others, because if feels like the right thing. This behavior needs way more light, compared to the hero willing to shoot up bad guys. We applaud Fortune 500 success even when it damages the planet and forget the ordinary volunteers, because they didn’t get rich. Where’s the Humanitarian or Green 500? Movies also love the grander scale. Heroes safe the country. Thus all the daily poverty and small stories of daily survival are pushed to the side. I admit, when in trouble, a great action or fantasy movie takes away the trouble away for a bit.

C: We need to see more of the effects for normal people, when big powers clash. Next to focus on the heroes, we need to know what it means for all who live through the consequences of clashes. Stories need to show, all people are people, not just inconsequential puppets to make heroes look grand. What makes it okay for heroes to endlessly kill lots of the ‘bad’ guys standing in his way? Or have the hero safe populations, who seem to have no guts, insights or options themselves whatsoever, until ‘our’ (read mostly white male American) hero leads them. We hear the numbers, about civilian victims fallen through drones, but we don’t understand. In most media they are numbers, while the mother of a local victim of violence gets full exposure on screen. Once a Austin Powers movie showed the funeral of an unknowing guard killed as crony of Dr Evil. You know the kind of guys who die, just because they’re in the way of the hero, on his way to safe the day. Perhaps we need to distrust the fingers that point at ‘others’ as dangerous, more than these ‘others’.

Reality is, most efforts need other people to succeed.

The New Hero’s Journey

There is a call; can be a problem or a longing of many. People answer that call. They discover each others role in the issue, during which reality starts to hit harder. Out of this the people rise. They start to connect and frame what is wrong and what might be system shifts needed. A solution emerges. Things start to fall in place, people set up actions and change begins to happen. Resistance slowly turns into new understanding and willingness. People celebrate and reward each other for their help.

(2018 edit: small video told by Caitlin Johnstone explaining the need for this)

Differences with the old model: The dragon is there right in the beginning. Or there is a longing for a better system. The trouble with the old no one’s fault, though their might be people who misuse the old system, consciously or because of ignorance. Nasty suffering is quite possible, as are nasty attacks or setbacks. Not because of a criminal, but perhaps even the FBI totally convinced it is preventing unrest, while they only help postpone corruption to be exposed. Most of all, it is a story of people with a higher purpose, willing to be human read vulnerable, grateful, trusting, willing to help during the experience. The end does not justify the means at all. The new stories shows how that can be done. There may not be a final fight, but there sure is a celebration at the end. Instead of the final fight there may be a series of shots of people changing, more green in cities or hugs between strangers. Not just a camera doing a fade out over a hero walking away form the dead body of the evil bastard. Rather images that shows the (long term) result of positive action.

Around the world people are working for a positive change. And there are still a lot of people who need human dignity and solutions that work for them as well. They deserve to be in the light as well. It’s up to us to invent stories that makes us all feel part of our ‘ship’. It’s up to us to connect to dots, not just see the Hollywood ones that distract us. The hero’s journey can be replaced by the Human Experience. Happy Journeys.

There’ already a ‘lot of calls for change or examples of what works and what not’ out there. And movies like this one, about what it means to be Human. Yet fictional movies that address real issues are way too few, and if they’re there, often way too safe as to not compromise the interests they address, all to prevent legal issues.

(2017 addition) Here’s a very similar call for changing stories, but in very different wording and a, can I see it, deeper scope: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/maya-zuckerman/the-collective-journey-pa_b_9073346.html

And here a step what this might mean for Hollywood.

And if you’re up for it. Here’s some ideas for Future Scenario’s.

Some stories we need to see more often:

Border patrols and paper works, can be very hard for people on the run for war.

Game of Bones.

A story about the effects of big players on the world.

What about a series of an Afghani family? They all suffer the real world ‘Game of Thrones big powers play’. The strategist big players we hardly get to see and don’t follow. Just the effects of their choices. Mother gets, by mistake, for carrying large branches for the fire that look like guns from above, killed by a drone. Daughter 1 flees to Pakistan, and works in a sweat shop for a big company seeking the cheapest labor. It’s that or prostitution to foreign diplomats. Daughter 2 marries a guy, through Taliban pressure. Her husband later becomes Isis soldier and dies. She stays behind in an Isis occupied, war zone. Son 1 gets threatened for translating for the Americans (read is seen as a traitor by fellow country men) and flees to US. And he only gets there after a long long journey and then gets arrested as illegal alien. Son 2 leaves for Australia and gets a lot of racial hate and suspicion towards him. Father stays behind and gets harassed because son 1 betrayed his country by working for the Americans. Etc. Politics, Religion and Business rule their lives from afar.

Moral of the story: people who see the world as a chess board never bring the solution. They are part of the problem.

Flash mob as form of intelligent and positive swarming for fun.

Magnolias with a purpose

A story of people working together to make a difference.

In reality we are already swarming towards emerging solutions for big problems. With our focus on individuals we too often don’t realize that.

This is a typical ensemble concept for television. In this series a group of individuals all work together on the same real world issue. The series focusses on the positive ones making the change. There is no real enemy, but there may be conflicting interests, corruption, broken systems and some nasty people. The theme doesn’t matter; whether it’s about gay rights, corporate pollution, local corruption or the fall of the Berlin Wall. It’s about how we all are helping to make a difference together. Big point is, for a long time these people feel alone, don’t know about each other. They all start with hope, care, pain or anger about what is happening. During the series each of them is serious help to several of the others and to the whole solution, while not (yet) seeing the bigger picture or knowing about each others efforts. Slowly they start to see and learn about each other, which gives them more hope, courage and purpose. In the end they have a breakthrough and solve a big threat, perhaps even fracking or celebrate the first gay marriages.

In a second series they may face a new issue more together now, or a different historic change, where many made the difference together is retold, for example the end of slavery. Here’s a blogpost with an example of the style of writing fitting this: Everything Touches.

Moral: We are all in it together and must trust others act on this too. By acting our care we help the whole to evolve and overcome problems.

iEye may even be a sweet alien detective.

iEye

Our collective effort can become stronger through technology.

By now we’ve all seen movies where ‘need to know’ means the hero will be betrayed. And we live in a world that gets more transparent. Transparency already has solved crimes, through people who shared their need on social media, or police who aired certain faces. So what if the detective takes you directly on the case? iEye is a science fiction animation about a small detective all wired up to social media. In many rooms people sit in with his researches, and of course sometimes the crooks as well. :) The downsides must also be shown and discussed.

His most loyal followers give him advice on the spot or do online research for him. Thus he is helped by a hacker, a intuitive girl, an unemployed lazy bum mostly offering advise filtered by his bias, and some others. We see every episode his followers doing a poll who, or what, might be the culprit. Our detective may even talk to the audience or phone in to one of them, wondering about a suggestion nobody thought of before. Later there might be a media station airing his researches, which attract perhaps more dangers, but also may safe him at times, as there are always witnesses.

His cases are all over the top global issues. Arms industries starting wars for profit. Robots who want to be recognized as people, getting lynched. Refugees with five sexes, who get imprisoned because they aren’t male or female. Dangerous products that kill. Banks inventing literally new money out of nothing and the dangers that come with that. Etc.

The series is a bit crazy, like the Simpsons in 3d/cgi. My favorite style would be more funny, more humane, more Pixar. While the arena (story stage) is clearly a smaller simpler version of our planet (Earth may have been destroyed, because we learned too late you can’t eat money) many other planets with each their own issues, rules and aliens may be visited. Once again: there’s NO big evil, behind all murders that slowly becomes the arch enemy. (it may seem like this for a bit, only to have that illusion broken, the other is I too.) It’s about working together towards solutions, where all differences are accepted, as they each bring in their own valuable viewpoint.

Moral: Our differences are contributing and adding to each other. Big issues need a diversity in voices and viewpoints willing to listen en investigate to be solved.

Note: I used some pictures I found on the internet. I will take them down immediately when you have rights to them, or add the name of the makers, if so desired.