We Play Full Out with Bart and Sunny

The Hero's Journey Is Not Just Someone Else's Story...

• Bart and Sunny Miller • Season 1 • Episode 42

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Welcome to this week's episode of We Play Full Out with Bart and Sunny!

The Hero's Journey Is Not Just Someone Else's Story... It's Hidden Inside You, too!

In today's episode we discuss the hero's journey: a common plot in movies and tales around the world... we are always enthralled by it even though it pops up over and over and over again. Different story. Different characters. Same plot.

Our hero (who doesn’t know they are one yet) goes on an adventure he or she was not expecting or even wanting. Some kind of crisis or protagonist comes along and makes things exceedingly difficult along the journey - sometimes to the point where it doesn’t seem like there is any possible way out. Then, when things are at the end of their rope, our hero comes to a sudden realization about himself or herself. Empowered with this knowledge, our hero saves the day (or the world) and returns home, a changed (or transformed) person.

What you may not know is there’s a reason why we all get so wrapped up in the hero’s journey over and over again. Because it’s our journey, too.

Join us as we discuss the journey through the Sufi poem, "The Conference of the Birds" and see if you make some of your own self-discoveries along the way! 

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Bart:

Welcome to we Play Full Out. I am Bart and this is Sunny. Take it away Sunny. Thank you, bart.

Sunny:

Okay, I'll just keep going. I was going to say something, but I won't, all right, so we're going to talk about something really cool today.

Bart:

Don't we talk about something cool every time?

Sunny:

We might.

Bart:

Let's go.

Sunny:

Yeah, I would say that makes this podcast pretty cool.

Bart:

It's because we play full out, baby.

Sunny:

All right. Well, today we're going to talk about the hero's journey. The hero's journey is a very common plot in movies and tales throughout the world. We're always enthralled by it, no matter how many times we see it Different story, different characters, same plot. Different story, different characters, same plot. And that is our hero, who doesn't know who they are Well, they don't know they are one yet Goes on an adventure he or she was not expecting or even wanting. Then some kind of crisis or protagonist comes along and makes things exceedingly difficult along this journey that they didn't want to be on, sometimes to the point where it doesn't seem like there is any possible way out. Then, when things are at the end of their rope, our hero comes to a sudden realization about himself or herself. Empowered with this knowledge, our hero saves the day, or sometimes even the world, and returns home a changed or transformed person. Sound familiar?

Bart:

It's our life story.

Sunny:

That is what we're getting to. So there is a Sufi poem that's 4,500 lines long, called the Conference of the Birds. In the poem there are hundreds of thousands of birds and in the midst of them all they find a gold feather. They all take a look at themselves and around themselves all breeds of birds in about every color imaginable, and discover that not one of them has a gold feather. They decide whatever bird this feather came from must be the greatest bird of all time. It must be a king. And they decide they be a king and they decide they need a king Following me.

Bart:

I got you.

Sunny:

So a longing and a yearning starts to burn within them and they decide to go on a journey to find this king, which they named the cymor. Now imagine 300,000 birds of all shapes, sizes, breeds and colors taking flight, riding on something similar to a magic carpet, throughout the air, to the point it would cast like a great shadow on the ground below it as it went by. Then, throughout their journey, they begin to encounter trials and hardships, such as a monumental storm. Some birds die. Some of those who make it through the storm start to question whether such a bird as a cymor actually exists.

Sunny:

With every ensuing challenge, others start to murmur and say the journey isn't worth the cost and, one by one, birds start to give up the quest, until only 30 birds out of 300,000 are left to discover the cymor, the great golden bird, which turns out to be a phoenix. He can burn down to ashes and be reborn from them. And even further, as they look deep inside themselves, they see that they too have had a golden feather within them all along, and they can do the same. So this poem has a lot more to it than that quick summary, let's be clear. But we've discussed the underlying theme inside of it and we're impressed to share a few insights that we have. Amen, so I would say first is the longing for something great. What does that mean to you?

Bart:

What that means to me is that I think all of us deep inside know we have a purpose and that's your. That's your purpose, right? Is that golden feather? And sometimes that purpose actually gets buried and or literally cut out of somebody to where they're just so beaten up that they they can't fulfill it or don't want to fulfill it. But to answer your question, the golden feather, in my opinion, is purpose and purpose of life.

Sunny:

I agree with that. It's like we have this longing inside of us. We're not always quite sure where it is, so I think we kind of start to look on the outside for it. We look for the perfect relationships or maybe the perfect body or the perfect clothes or money or status whatever, but it doesn't like quiet that longing inside of us.

Bart:

So if you yeah, I got to cut you off. But one of the ways you find purpose, I think 99% of the time and I mean 99% of the time is by having others describe to you what they see. Because what happens with ourselves is we get so in our way. We cannot, for some reason, understand our purpose, but it's very evident to others and I even have an exercise where I draw a circle, I put a Y in the circle and I go through the plus minus all these things, and if you ever want to see that, we'll go through that exercise. But it helps you to figure out what other people see in you and then what you can see in yourself to define your purpose. So if it's something that you're really struggling with a lot of times, if you start to ask others what they see your purpose is, it's amazing that they can see it. We just get in our own way.

Sunny:

Yeah, I love that. Okay, so the slonging of our purpose. I'm going back. So the second um, yeah, we start to kind of journey and dance, I would say, with adversity.

Sunny:

I like that word. So we're journeying through life and, sure enough, our challenges, trials and tribulations pull the rug right out from under our feet and smack us face down onto the floor. I think that's happened to everybody. We get hurt, sometimes when it is our fault and sometimes when it isn't, and our hearts are broken. Some of us don't make it. Those who do start to question this life and start to give up on themselves or those around them, and they give up on that grand journey of the purpose and they go back to simply pushing through their day to day. Do you agree with that?

Bart:

A hundred percent. I've seen it so many times.

Sunny:

So then, the third would be the reframing to empowerment and discovery. Those who do keep pushing forward, finding their purpose, fulfilling their purpose, like trying to figure out that longing and calling inside of them, continue to face challenges, but with each one they start to come to an understanding and they realize their journey has happened for them instead of to them, because what they discover is a strength and power they didn't know existed. They find the greatness they didn't know was there, and the long yearning inside of them is finally answered.

Bart:

Yeah. And so this is when God or universe is being your mentor and they're taking you through certain things that we look at as trials or beating us up or whatever it might be. But it's like you would hire a bodybuilding trainer. What he's doing is getting you to do the reps and the things that create this magnificent body. But there's a lot of pain, there's a lot of discipline, there's a lot of everything that goes along with that to get that outcome. So that's the same thing that the universe and God is doing to us individually. But we look at it sometimes not as a gift that we've hired this amazing coach because we haven't hired them, but they're gifted to us to coach us through that, to become that. So we just give up and say nope, not done, don't believe in it, don't want to become that bodybuilder, I'm just good with lifting weights.

Sunny:

Yes, so good, and I recently heard something and I wish I could remember the root word. But basically, the wound means a door and when we walk through that door we find, like you said, all these treasures and things that were there, that we didn't know were there had we not gone through the door. But you have to go through it.

Bart:

Very good.

Sunny:

So final thoughts, there's a reason we all love to hear the hero's journey over and over and over again, and that is, like you said right when we started it's our journey too. So we're all on a journey through life, just like the birds. If the 30 birds didn't stick it through and conquer their struggles and challenges to make it all the way to the Symore, they would never have discovered the power within themselves, they never would have been able to see the greatness that was with them all along, and they would never have had the opportunity to realize that in every phase of life, no matter how broken, how hurt, how horrible it's been, you can resurrect yourself and come back again. Not the same, because we're never the same when we go through these things, but better. So we're changed, transformed, wiser, stronger, more beautiful than we were before, if we choose to go down that path, Yep, and I feel like if we already knew what the end was, it wouldn't be a struggle.

Bart:

And I think if we can reframe that and say I see the end In future pace, we will look at it as a lot more joy. Not that we're going to say or not have down days, whatever, I'm just saying, but I think we'll have way more happiness and enjoyment along the path.

Sunny:

Yeah and I don't think it was the last episode, but maybe the one before we talked about making life more like a game. Right, it's like okay, if we just approach it as we're just trying to level up, if we approach it as wow, we made a mistake, but it's not the end of the world, like we just get a retry, then it makes it a lot lighter. And then also, you know, just thinking it's easy to like, let's say, be a bodybuilder and go into it, expecting hard days, because when you expect them it's not going to be a shock to you. Right, but sometimes in life, like we just think it should be smooth sailing and like what we're going through we shouldn't be going through. But if we expect it, we just know that there's going to be things that we're going to have to work through. Then it just seems like it takes the pressure off of it.

Bart:

Yeah, 100% yeah. And I think the other thing that we have a problem of is we don't think our purpose is worth anything to anybody else, and we've got to realize that you only have to affect yourself. It's you that's just accomplishing your purpose, no matter if anybody else sees it or doesn't see it. It's you, that's the one, it's you that needs to fulfill that, and that's why you're here. So I won't get into much of that rant.

Sunny:

Well, no, it's good, and I mean purpose is a big thing, and we just finished talking about purpose a lot in our presentation that we will be giving at Funnel Hacking Live International. And I feel like we had some really good insights there that are pretty game changing. So, like if finding your purpose or figuring out your purpose is a big deal to you. Highly recommend you tune into that, because we're really shining a light on some things that took me a long, long time to discover.

Bart:

Specifically, yeah, you were very vulnerable and authentic in that. It was awesome, thank you.

Sunny:

So funnelhackinglivecom forward slash Bart dash Sunny, dash Miller. I think I got it right that time. If you want to tune in, it's happening next week.

Bart:

Love to have you, Love your support out there and a lot of fun coming up yeah yeah, Okay, just really quickly some life updates.

Sunny:

Friday found us traveling to Las Vegas for our daughter's Vegas wedding reception. Her new husband's family is from Las Vegas.

Bart:

They decided to throw a reception there for them and it was a lot of fun it was a ton of fun, it was very beautiful and, just you know, it just fit our daughter really really well. The whole wedding receptions, photographers, everything. And one thing that she does so well in her life that I'm just amazed and in awe at is she just lives for the moment and what happens in it is just beautiful yeah it's awesome, and then we'll probably talk a little bit more about this on our podcast this Friday.

Sunny:

But we also did some shopping with Xander, which was really fun, and we'll get into that. We kind of planned around that so we did do that and then, as I mentioned, we put the finishing touches on our presentation. So that took quite a bit of time this last week to just wrap that up and you know, practice it together and do all the fun things that we got to do around that. And then we got to give an update on the 21 Pilots concert. The problem for me is there just aren't words to express how insanely awesome it was To me. Tyler and Josh just never disappoint. It was off the charts, and spending the time with the family there just was next level for me.

Bart:

Yeah, it was amazing. Once again, they know their demographic extremely, extremely well. They even played against the dads. We've talked about this before but they did all the things that they know their clientele, their demographics so well, even as much as they can go, put themselves in the middle of their demographic. Let them surround them and know they're going to be safe. They love their people, they believe in their people and they empower their people at a level that is very awestruck to watch from a distance and just watch them play full out very awestruck to watch from a distance and just watch them play full out.

Sunny:

Yeah, so good, and we may or may not had had seats on the first and second row, which were horrible seats. Somebody had to have them, and I'm grateful we got the opportunity to do that.

Bart:

And uh, sonny like has got a birthday coming up, if you guys don't know, September the 14th put it down on your calendar, so it gives her Got a birthday coming up. If you guys don't, know September the 14th, put it down on your calendar. Some gifts are away and all the things, but she loves to get concert tickets for her birthday and so we know that's a great thing. I'm all about buy what you want for your birthday, because it's your day and get out there, celebrate at the highest level you want to.

Sunny:

So yeah, I was spoiled, rotten.

Bart:

It was fun.

Sunny:

I love it. Okay, I think that's kind of a wrap for today then.

Bart:

Good, yeah, lots of good things. Like I said, this week was amazing. It went by really fast. We had a group call with all of our people, which was awesome. This week is one-on-one coaching for me and once again getting prepared for Vegas and Funnel Hacking Live International. So lots to get done this week, lots of clothes to dig out, lots of things, because magnetic is also on the front end of that which.

Bart:

That program is so fun. But, uh, it also gives me the opportunity and the ability to style and help people with becoming and designing their attractive character. So, yeah, um, with that, uh, if you guys aren't a part of our networking and accountability groups, we'd love to have you part of them. You can go to idoepiccom, you can find our playbook, you can find all the things there and join this. But the biggest ask that we have and we ask it every week and I hope that you take us up on it we cannot spread the word without you.

Bart:

So, please, please, please, if you will give somebody else the link to this, send them the podcast, let them listen to it, let it make a difference in their life, and if there's things that you feel like, we can go in more in depth and or help you like, see maybe from a different perspective, or understand how we see it. We would love your feedback. The more feedback we get, the better we can make this podcast for all of the listeners. Once again, we'll be coming up, we're going to do some interviews with some other people that we're shouting out and things to that nature, to make the podcast more insightful for you on how other people play full out in their lives. So with that, this segment is brought to you by, I Do Epic.

People on this episode

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Bart Miller

Host
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Sunny Miller

Host