By the crashing waves of Bray’s seafront, we will have the first Hero’s Journey of 2024, never a better time for it with all the madness thrashing about in the world.
“The Cave you fear to enter holds the Treasure you seek.” – Joseph Campbell
Let that beckon you to join us for the journey. Walk past the gelato cafe and into the crucible room where we will create a riot of stories, all shaped by the powerful archetypal narrative of the Hero’s Journey.
Whether you are looking to explore your inner world through creative writing through journaling and sketching, whether you wish to write your memoirs, or begin that novel you have always had in the back of your mind ( or pieces of it in your drawer (s) !), or you are looking to develop ideas for writing a screenplay or a play…
The aim of the course is to unlock your creativity, using the work and wisdom of Joseph Campbell’s ‘Hero’s Journey’- an archetypal narrative structure suitable for planning novels, screenplays, memoirs and for simply exploring one’s inner life through creative writing. The Hero’s Journey is a powerful template and brings new ideas and it unearths old memories.
The effects of using the Hero’s Journey can be transformative and therapeutic for you and your writing…
“Under their apparent diversity, the great myths of humanity present us with the same map of yearnings and fears that every human being experiences on the way to self-discovery. The Hero’s Journey is a pattern of narrative that appears in drama, storytelling, myth, religious ritual, and psychological development. It describes the typical adventure of the archetype known as The Hero, the person who goes out and achieves great deeds on behalf of the group, tribe, or civilization.”- Christopher Vogler
There are many heroes, and they have each had their Call to Adventure, and crossed the Threshold: Gilgamesh, Don Quixote, Luke Skywalker, Dorothy, Athena and Bilbo Baggins. Each of them has the same path, the same Trials, the same Dragons to face, no matter what form they take. They each invoke the archetypal journey, the Monomyth, the Hero’s Journey. Each returns with a gift for the world they left before they underwent the profound Trials that transformed them from what they were before what they became. What is it like to return from a Hero’s Journey? We all know it, the final stage-The Master of the Two Worlds, in which the Hero has received the Ultimate Boon, crosses the Return Threshold, and must find their way back to the Ordinary World, keeping a balance between that and the Special World.
Oh, the return. We all know what it’s like to return from an amazing adventure, and with photos in tow, we attempt to convince friends and family that THIS is the place to go, and please, oh please listen to me recount every detail of what happened. NO! They say. I DO NOT HAVE TIME. And why do they not have time? Apart from being envious, they may also be threatened by you, an emissary of another spatio- temporal reality that… actually has nothing at all to do with theirs. Or so they think. And isn’t it excruciating when the Returnee is particularly good at photography, and inflicts you with a slide show? Ho, ho!
But the thing is, it was just the same for Jesus, and for Buddha, and for Mohammed. And the same for Rip Van Winkel, and poor old Gulliver, who returned, sadly, empty handed and with nothing but their tales to tell, at the end of their extraordinary cavortings. Gulliver was deemed mad by the Royal Geographic Society, after recounting his tales of Lilliput, Laputa and the Land of Houyhnhnms. (Houyhnhnms are a race of intelligent horses described in the last part of Jonathan Swift’s satirical Gulliver’s Travels). But this is how it is for every traveller, I believe.
But for the Spiritual journey-er, it is an even more explosive reception, the Mastery of the Two Worlds… What do you do with your message, your gift, your boon of Wisdom, when you return? Are you stoned, slated or worse again, crucified?
We each go through Hero’s Journeys every day. For there are micro and macro versions of this never-ending spiral. It’s like Yeat’s Gyre, or the Serpent shedding its scales. The serpent, demonised by the Western World as an evil, poisonous and devious creature of sin, condemned from the Garden of Eden for Eternity, is a creature revered in the East. The power, our power, resides at the base of our spine, and this in the Vedic tradition is likened to a snake coiled at the base, and over time and with much yogic practice, it climbs up through the body, clearing out the debris of conditioning, delusion and ignorance along the way, until it reaches the crown, where the practitioner becomes enlightened.
Woman brings life into the world. Eve is the mother of this temporal world. Formerly you had a dreamtime paradise there in the Garden of Eden – no time, no birth, no death – no life. The serpent, who dies and is resurrected, shedding its skin and renewing its life, is the lord of the central tree, where time and eternity come together. He is the primary god, actually, in the Garden of Eden. Yahweh, the one who walks there in the cool of the evening, is just a visitor. The Garden is the serpent’s place. It is an old, old story- Joseph Campbell
The Hero’s Journey undertaken is an act of uncoiling that latent inner serpent, shedding the old skins, and growing a new one, infused with wisdom in insight. It is a transformation of the human spirit. Because it’s like this:
“The snake which cannot cast its skin has to die. As well the minds which are prevented from changing their opinions; they cease to be mind.”
Friedrich Nietzsche
“The Cave you fear to enter holds the Treasure you seek.” – Joseph Campbell
Starts Thursday 4th April 10-12pm
for 8 weeks with an Easter break!
Cost 225 Euro
200 Early Bird if paid for in full by 7th March 2024!
Or Deposit of 100 Euro!
Please PM for bank details … and provide your email address, please!
Bookings letters@siofraodonovan.com
ZOOM OPTION: 200 EURO
LOCATION: BRAY, CO. WICKLOW (NEAR DART STATION)
The Hero’s Journey is not an invention, but an observation. It is a recognition of a beautiful design, a set of principles that governs the conduct of life and the world of storytelling the way physics and chemistry govern the physical world.
-Christopher Vogler
THE ULTIMATE WRITING COURSE FOR UNLEASHING YOUR CREATIVE TALENT AND CRAFTING YOUR WRITING!
TESTIMONIALS:
“Siofra’s writing course “Heroine’s Journey” opened up for me another world of metaphor, myth and story that gave me language and symbols to write about my own inner process of re-connecting with my inner feminine. I love how the course was laid out, each step taking me deeper and closer to myself. The meditations that Siofra offered each week took me gently yet immidiately right into that place within where my head has no access. From there the words were just pouring onto pages effortlessly.I feel deep gratitude for this journey” . M. SZPILKA, 2019 THE HEROINE’S JOURNEY WRITING WORKSHOPS
“I found this course to be extraordinary. I thought it would be useful to help me find a structure to the stories I write. It was much more, it was quite a personal journey; challenging, rewarding, inspirational. Siofra creates an atmosphere of such creativity, a safe space to write, a place where we could push past boundaries and self-doubt. After one session, I felt inspired to write at home, so I sat and wrote a short story called A Dance with Time. Subsequently, that story was longlisted for the Colm Tobin Short Story.” Zandra C, THE HERO’S JOURNEY WRITING WORKSHOPS
"I can’t speak highly enough of Siofra or the Heroine’s Journey course – salve for the soul I didn’t know I needed! It allowed space for a wonderful way to look at the world, one which never failed to land with surprise and delight (even when dark). It has borne me gently around and left me facing the other way – the way that I maybe needed to face all along – and always with lightness, laughter and a great deal of support, very lightly worn so you don’t even know it’s been there until later. Thank you Siofra!" - DELIA, HEROINE'S JOURNEY 2023
“Siofra’s writing workshops are easily described as the emotional metamorphosis so many seek and can never find. hic sunt dracones, here be dragons, says the world, and “here be dragons, close your eyes and feel the calm…”, she says. Beautiful journey this was!” Ishwari, Sri Lanka, The Hero’s Journey and The Heroine’s Journey, 2019
"I have attended two of Siofra's courses, the first The Hero's Journey in person was my first proper foray into writing, and was a wonderful journey into adventure. The second I attended The Heroine's Journey online, over two years and pandemic later. It was such a rich experience I will be forever grateful. The places opened by Siofra's gentle yet powerful guiding light are almost beyond words - and yet words come, and it is our duty to listen. It is alchemy in action. I will return for more once I am sure! " Fiona, Greystones, attended The Heroines Journey and The Hero’s Journey 2019
The work done on the course is experimental and there is no pressure to produce a perfect book/ screenplay, but support will be offered in the form of advice.
Faciliated by PUBLISHED AUTHOR, JOURNALIST AND CREATIVE WRITING FACILITATOR FOR OVER 17 YEARS. SHE WORKS WITH THE WRITERS IN SCHOOLS SCHEME/ POETRY IRELAND, THE WRITERS IN PRISONS SCHEME/ ARTS COUNCIL OF IRELAND AND IS A MEMBER OF THE TEACHING COUNCIL OF IRELAND www.siofraodonovan.com