The Top 10 Thoughts on the Final Attempt at Big Change (Resurrection)

Originally Submitted on 4/24/2001.

The Hero's Journey is another way of viewing a rite of passage or personal development: adolescence, first career, sobriety, parenthood, retirement, self-peace, etc. Resurrection is the eleventh stage of this Hero's Journey. The hero has faced the shadow and has been victorious with his first attempt at big change. It is now time for the hero to be reborn through a final attempt at the change. This attempt aids in the hero's understanding of his new self.

1. In this stage of the journey, the hero makes one last attempt at change.

The stakes are at their highest and the hero will know by his action and outcome whether he is an addict or sober, warrior or peacemaker, biological father or active parent. The hero must make a choice between the old way and new. How hard has that change been for you?

2. A catharsis or purging of the old way may be necessary for the hero to fully transform.

A catharsis often involves tears or laughter. Both expressions of emotions break through illusions and provide awareness or higher consciousness. When have you experienced this in your own life?

3. The hero's ability to succeed at this step is not a sure thing.

The hero is human and may stumble through the last attempt. It does not mean that the hero will fail, however. When have you stumbled towards enlightenment?

4. The hero's worthiness may be called into question and require proof that the reward has been won.

When have you proved your worthiness and change? When have you asked others to prove to you?

5. Or the hero may need to make a sacrifice (Latin for "make holy") as an outward symbol of inner transformation.

When we let go of the old through sacrifice, we make room for the new. What did you let go to receive?

6. The hero is given the opportunity to show that she has incorporated all of the lessons of the characters she has met along the way.

The hero comes to the realization that everyone she meets has something to do with her own personality. The hero is her own shadow, trickster, shapeshifter, mentor, ally, herald and threshold guardian. While in the process of change, have you integrated other lessons from mentors, allies and enemies around you?

7. The hero must have a period of reintroduction before jumping back into the Old World.

Since the journey has helped the hero decide on a new way of "being" this moment of acclimation gives her time to decide how to "act" with her newfound knowledge. How have you experienced this?

8. "The adventure evoked a quality of his character that he hadn't known he possessed." (Joseph Campbell)

Adventures give us the opportunity to experience our hidden talents. Just like Dorothy's hidden ability to go home at any point in her journey by clicking her heels, we have hidden abilities uncovered by the risk of adventure. What have you uncovered through risk?

9. Another metaphor for this stage is the final exam.

Why is testing important to human growth?

10. "There is an electric fire in human nature tending to purify - so that among these human creatures there is continually some birth of new heroism. The pity is that we must wonder at it, as we should at finding a pearl in rubbish." (John Keats)

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