Heroism Science Volume 4 Issue 1 Article 6 2019 Reviewing the Heroic Experience: A Humanistic and Existential Counselling Perspective Peter Bray University of Auckland,
[email protected] Peter James University of Auckland,
[email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.richmond.edu/heroism-science Part of the Counseling Psychology Commons, and the Developmental Psychology Commons Recommended Citation Bray, Peter and James, Peter (2019) "Reviewing the Heroic Experience: A Humanistic and Existential Counselling Perspective," Heroism Science: Vol. 4 : Iss. 1 , Article 6. DOI: 10.26736/hs.2019.01.06 Available at: https://scholarship.richmond.edu/heroism-science/vol4/iss1/6 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by UR Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Heroism Science by an authorized editor of UR Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. 1 Heroism Science: An Interdisciplinary Journal (ISSN 2573- 7120) https://scholarship.richmond.edu/heroism-science/ Vol. 4 No. 1 (2019) pp. 1-34 Reviewing the Heroic Experience: A Humanistic and Existential Counselling Perspective PETER BRAY1 University of Auckland
[email protected] PETER JAMES University of Auckland
[email protected] ABSTRACT: Taking a humanistic and existential counselling stance, this brief review of heroism and the heroic experience begins by discussing the utility and structure of Joseph Campbell’s (1949) monomythic narrative of the hero’s journey, whilst considering the Jungian conceptualisation of the archetype and the collective unconscious. With their shared assumptions about transformation and growth, modern psychology and the therapeutic practice of counselling and psychotherapy are reviewed in terms of their utilisation of the hero-journey as a developmental metaphor for clients, particularly in trauma recovery.