We are aided on our journey by inner travel guides, or archetypes, each of which exemplifies a way of being on the journey. The Hero’s Journey explores twelve such inner guides: The Dreamer, the Independent, the Warrior, the Caregiver, the Discoverer, the Rule Breaker, the Lover, the Creator, the Ruler, the Alchemist, the Sage and the Player. Each has a lesson to teach us, and each presides over a stage of the journey.

The inner travel guides are archetypes that have been with us since the dawn of time. We see them reflected in recurring images of angels and demons in art, literature, myth and religion and we know they are archetypal because they are found everywhere, in all times and places.

Because the guides are truly archetypal, and hence reside as energy within the unconscious story of all people everywhere, they exist both in the internal as in the external stories people tell. The stories live in us, but even more importantly, we live in them.