“People say that what we’re all seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think that’s what we’re really seeking. I think that what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive, so that our life experiences on the purely physical plane will have resonances with our own innermost being and reality, so that we actually feel the rapture of being alive.”

― Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth

The above quote is about being your true self which is centered in the creative realms or/and serving your fellow man by doing that thing you love doing most. Another quote from Campbell;

“If you do follow your bliss you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living. Follow your bliss and don't be afraid, and doors will open where you didn't know they were going to be.”

What is your bliss? What is it in life that you love doing most? Most of us don't know because of barriers. Remove those barriers and you discover your purpose. How do you do that? By creating your own device. A device that removes the barriers and opens your eyes to your true self and your bliss.

There is a device and you have already named it. Inner knowing, Inner Knowledge. The device is not a material thing but is psychological. Knowing yourself by searching your whole life and finding what emotional energies influence and control your life. All of us have emotional energies that are formed from life experiences, especially early life foundations and later life traumatic experiences. What you 'learn' in early life from your environment are instilled within the psyche and influence if not control who you become and your actions. An abusive childhood doesn't go away, it stays until there is a reconciliation of the energies associated with the abuse. Childhood experiences and influences in general do the same. If both parents smoke there is a good chance you will smoke. Like parents like child. Then there are experiences associated with peers, school and relationships in general. Experiences that have strong emotional energies go with you and influence your life. Put these together and with all people psychological issues develop. The issues related to negative experiences need to be realized, understood, confronted and resolve. Once this is done your true purpose will be realized because you no longer have barriers preventing your true self to be known.

There are also the issues related to community, culture and society. Doing what you are told to do, following the rules of society that draw you away from your true purpose, your true bliss. We are programmed by social environment and culture which influences who we become. In the hero journey {we are all on a journey and become a hero in our own lives when we discover our true self and our true purpose} the hero must overcome the 'machine'. Luke Skywalker and Star Wars is a perfect example of how society keeps us from our true purpose. Do you follow the machine or do you follow your true self? Sometimes you are cast into a situation where your purpose is to fight the machine {Luke Skywalker} so you can achieve your true purpose in life. If the society you grow up with restricts you from self discovery then it becomes the machine. But more over a society that pushes material worth is the machine. When you focus on the outer world and ignore the inner world you become lost in material delusion. We are led to believe that material things will solve our problems.

Luke fought the machine but he also had to fight the inner 'machine' that prevented him from using the 'Force' within. One fight is an inner one, the other against the machine, social duty of the material world.

Let me give you an example from my own life. Up until the age of 42 I was a sports freak, political junkie, controlled by outer desires that covered up my inner wounds. Three failed marriages to three wonderful women, countless physical relationships, wondering about in life with no direction. I had this feeling something was missing but could not, did not know what it was. Then I discovered Campbell and Jungian psychology. I began a journey of self discovery by looking inward, psychologically. I discovered why I could not stay in a relationship/marriage and began to remove the barriers {like most people the issues where from childhood, and like Skywalker it was primarily a father issue}. When I had removed the barriers I discovered I had this talent of analyzing and interpreting dreams {using Jungian psyche}. I also discovered my abilities in web design which was my creative self. I no longer endlessly watched sports, spent all hours at the pool drinking beer and looking for love in all the wrong places {physical relationships}. Instead I began learning Jungian psychology {I have always had a keen interest in psychology which was in itself the inner self seeking expression} and learning web design. The Jungian education led to dreams and the web design allowed me to express my inner self {Myths-Dreams-Symbols being my first website designed in 1998}. This was and is my true self. The device that allowed me to discover this other self was, and is psychological. Removing the emotional energies developed from early life, family {father} as well as culture, that were instilled early in life and throughout early adulthood. The energies were unconscious and the conscious actions resulted from those energies. Like Luke Skywalker I had an 'evil' father {who was also my shadow self, symbolic of the dark suit and mask Darth Vader wore}. I never received the love and affection early in life from my father that are so essential in psyche development {this motif, the son seeking the father, is a common theme in mythology around the world}. I substituted that lost love with failed relationships because I was looking for that lost love in the outer world when I should have been looking 'inward'. And when I did begin to look inward, the barriers were removed, I reconciled the issues with my father {psychologically} and in the process discovered my 'bliss'. It is a simple formula when you think about it but a long, long journey to get there. And it all begins by going inward.

Jerry

Age & Gender & Location {Required}: 68 Cocoa, Fl