Joseph Campbell Follow Your Bliss — Esalen Institute 1973

Esalen Institute, Big Sur, California. A special place where three waters meet: fresh water from a stream, salt water — the ocean below the cliffs, and hot sulfur water in the baths. Soaking late at night by candlelight with the sound of surf crashing below.

I attended a weekend workshop with Joseph Campbell: “The Power of Myth.”

Joseph began with the earliest known human-created images, drawing from his library of 10,000 slides taken with a hand-held camera, mostly from art books. For three days he worked his way through the centuries with beautiful art of many cultures — until he reached the twentieth century. Suddenly the art he chose was dark, gloomy and pessimistic, illustrated by fragmented abstract images. The conclusion of the workshop after so much beauty was so depressing that we all sat stunned. Finally one person asked, “Joseph, what are we to do?” and he answered with advice that has been repeated many times. He said, “Follow your bliss.”

On one of the breaks, I asked him if he had ever used a camera stand. He said, “What a good idea.” My contribution.

I worked for Esalen in the San Francisco office on Union Street from 1970 to 1974. One of the perks was being able to attend all the workshops, both in San Francisco and Big Sur, for free. Almost every weekend I signed up for something- — bioenergetics with Stanley Keleman, the Feldenkrais Technique with Moshe Feldenkrais, psychosynthesis with Jim Fadiman, eastern philosophy with Michael Murphy and George Leonard, massage training, rolfing, meditation, biofeedback, yoga, an encounter group. We sponsored a conference on “Spiritual and Therapeutic Tyranny”.