Refusal of the call to adventure
Recently, I met with a teenage client who was torn over a decision—whether to join her friends on a weekend camping trip. She’d never been before, and the uncertainty of it all filled her with dread. What if she hated it? What if she felt trapped out in the woods, wishing she could go home? At the same time, she didn’t want to be left out, or have her friends think poorly of her for not going. Her best friend especially wanted her to go and she felt terrible about the prospect of letting her down.
During our next session, she let me know that she had declined the trip. She told herself she'd be happier staying home with a movie. And yet, the decision still niggled at her.
In the language of myth and storytelling, her decision represents what Joseph Campbell called the “Refusal of the Call” in the Hero’s Journey. Every heroic story begins with an invitation to step outside the familiar—the “ordinary world.” And almost every hero hesitates before accepting the call.
We talked about how it's perfectly all right to refuse a call. Life presents us with countless potential journeys, and we can’t take them all. What matters most is understanding why we say no. Is it genuine discernment or just fear in disguise? Given that she was still fretting over her decision, I invited her to take a second look.
First, we got to know her inner voices better. There was one saying, “you’re such a scaredy-cat, you’re really letting your best friend down” and another saying “but I can’t stand the idea of feeling trapped and alone.” Together, we appreciated these parts of her for trying to protect her. We deepened into “worst case scenarios” and what these parts needed in order to feel safe. Once these anxious voices had quieted down, she was able to hear herself clearly. She realized that staying home was less about being happier at home and more about fear of the unknown, which took her in the opposite direction of her therapy goals. So she reconsidered, not so much because she really wanted to go camping but it felt like the lesser of two evils. (Note; accepting a Call to Adventure doesn’t necessarily feel good. Sometimes it just feels unavoidable.)
Most of us face these moments from time-to-time. Maybe someone invites you to attend an open mic night, a weekend away with friends you haven’t seen for ages, or take on a new role at work, and your first response is to recoil. Rather than dismiss the offer outright, it can be illuminating to pause and ask—to what am I reacting? Fear of failure? Fear of being seen? Fear of change? On the flip side, sometimes we accept calls we probably shouldn’t. A restless desire for excitement or rebellion can lead to questionable “adventures” (or “misadventures” as is more likely the case). It is important to recognize these patterns, as they tend to repeat until they are identified and they detract us from our true journey.
The good news is that most of our journeys don’t lead us into dragons’ lairs or the “belly of the beast” as in the mythical Hero’s Journey. Real-life adventures are often quieter—marked less by dramatic crises and more by discomfort, self-doubt, or small acts of courage. They may not look heroic from the outside, but they still ask us to stretch beyond what is familiar so that we can return home with more self-knowledge. In my client’s case, she ended up giving the camping trip a mixed review. She started out feeling excluded and out of place, but then noticed that another girl seemed to feel the same way. They bonded over their shared awkwardness. She realized that she liked the outdoors—it enlivened her—it was the social piece that made her anxious. As long as she had one person with whom she could connect, she felt safe. She made the decision to try to be more sensitive to others who might be feeling out of place in future.
In mythology, heroes return home from their journeys with tools to aid them in their ordinary world—magical swords, enchanted potions and the like. Most of us do not return from our adventures with swords or magic amulets, but with something far more valuable—insight. Each call we accept—or decline thoughtfully—reveals a bit more about who we are, what fulfills us and how we want to show up in the world.