Life Changes

Yes, so it does. In The Hero of a Thousand Faces, Joseph Campbell points out that the changes of life are standard stations in the path to becoming something greater than merely human. This is true in all the great narratives. It is only in the last couple of centuries that life-changes, i.e. events which seriously perturb the course of life, have been given greater psychological weight.

We've all seen these lists of stressors before: moving house, death of spouse, other deaths, violent crime, change of partner, change of job, birth of child – all these things are added up by some sort of tally of points, and the total is supposed to say how stressed you are.

But the fact is that some people rise to the occasion, some are occasionally buried. Some survive and thrive, some arrive and dive. We are all different; some of us are apparently destined to be yet another of the thousand faces of the hero, while some of us are lucky if we feel a thousandth of the hero's face.

I have to say that I've experienced only a few of the major changes on the stressor list. I've been at the deaths of each of my four grandparents; I've moved house a few times; I've changed job several times, and changed workplace five times at least. Recently, I left a place I'd been working at for 12 years; but even then, I'd changed cubicle several times, changed apartment a few times, lost colleagues, gained colleagues... got used to changes, perhaps.

But recently, the question was asked, indirectly and indeterminately: "What if you were never a teacher again?"

I don't know. I feel unsettled. What if?