“If you want to help this world what you have to do is teach people how to live in it.”
– Joseph Campbell
Essential Conversations
with the Wisdom Keepers of Myth
in Times of Turbulence and Disruption
Hero’s Journey® Foundation (HJF) presents our Essential Conversation Series– a collection of online interviews between HJF Founder and Executive Director, Michael Mervosh and a collective of people whose lives have been influenced by heroism, courage, and myth. The ‘interviews’ are much more in-depth, so we call them “Essential Conversations.” Their purpose is to bring depth and meaning into our inevitable, current times of turbulence and disruption, while awakening and embodying our own personal humanity and human spirit.
Podcasts – Audio Conversations & Interviews
Episode One
Meg Wheatley
“Ethics are how we behave when we decide we belong together”
– Meg Wheatley
Our conversation took place on Saturday, April 10th, 2020 with our host Michael Mervosh and guest Margaret Wheatley.
Since 1966, Margaret Wheatley has worked globally in many different roles: a speaker, teacher, community worker, consultant, advisor, formal leader. From these deep and varied experiences, she has developed an unshakable conviction that leaders must learn how to evoke people’s inherent generosity, creativity, and need for community. As this world tears us apart, sane leadership on behalf of the human spirit is the only way forward.
She is a best-selling author of nine books, from the classic Leadership and the New Science in 1992 to her newest book (June 2017) Who Do We Choose To Be? Facing Reality, Claiming Leadership, Restoring Sanity.
Host: Michael Mervosh
Producer: Anna Noack
Community Chatroom Hosts: Janet Wepner and Josef Beraha
Episode Two
Richard Blanco
“The whole world is writing a new narrative – the myth of our new journey is to get to connection”
– Richard Blanco
Our conversation took place on Saturday January 25th, 2020 with our host Michael Mervosh and guest Richard Blanco.
Richard’s inspiring poetry, writing, and storytelling is deeply woven with themes that speak to us all: identity, community and belonging.
His work asks those universal questions we all ask ourselves on our own journeys: Where am I from? Where do I belong? Who am I in this world?
Richard Blanco is the Education Ambassador of the Academy of American Poets. In his role, he helps champion the organization’s free resources for teachers, student projects, and other education initiatives. He is the author of several poetry collections, his most recent being “How to Love a Country” (Beacon Press, 2019). In 2013, Blanco was selected to read at Barack Obama’s second Presidential Inauguration.
Host: Michael Mervosh
Producer: Anna Noack
Community Chatroom Hosts: Janet Wepner and Josef Beraha
Episode Three
Jim Donovan
Our conversation took place on Saturday April 27th, 2019 with our host Michael Mervosh and guest Jim Donovan
Jim Donovan is a professional drummer and percussionist, a recording artist, writer, teacher and lecturer. He is best known as the former drummer and one of the founding members of the band Rusted Root. He is also the author of the book Drum Circle Leadership: Learn to Create and Lead Your Own Transformational Drum Circles.
His insights have been shaped by his studies in African rhythms with various master drummers such as Congolese master drummer Elie Kihonia, Mamady Keita and Mbemba Bangoura. He also studied African music with noted scholar Kwabena Nketia from Ghana.
Jim, who teaches world music and drumming at St. Francis University, started writing songs for a solo project in 2010 and debuted the Sun King Warriors in 2016, sounding more like Led Zeppelin than his former group.
Host: Michael Mervosh
Producer: Anna Noack
Community Chatroom Hosts: Janet Wepner and Josef Beraha
Episode Four
Philip Shepherd
Our conversation took place on Saturday July 7th, 2018 with our host Michael Mervosh and guest Philip Shepherd.
Philip Shepherd is recognized as an international authority on embodiment and the author of “New Self, New World” and his most recent book “Radical Wholeness: The Embodied Present and the Ordinary Grace of Being.”
His insights have been shaped by his adventures as a teenager, when he cycled alone through Europe, the Middle East, India and Japan; by his deep commitment to and studies of bodywork; by his experiences as an actor, playing lead roles on stages in London, New York, Chicago and Toronto; and by a burning desire for freedom that has illuminated his entire life.
Philip now spends much of his time leading workshops and giving talks around the world. He lives with his wife in a quiet, car-free community in Toronto in a home they designed and built.
Host: Michael Mervosh
Producer: Anna Noack
Community Chatroom Hosts: Janet Wepner and Josef Beraha
Episode Five
Alison Luterman
Our conversation took place on Saturday April 28th, 2018 with our host Michael Mervosh and guest Alison Luterman.
Alison Luterman is a poet, essayist, and playwright. Her books include 3 poetry collections and a collection of essays. Alison has taught at The Writing Salon in Berkeley, the Esalen Institute, and the Omega Institute, as well as at high schools, juvenile halls, and poetry festivals.
Host: Michael Mervosh
Producer: Anna Noack
Community Chatroom Hosts: Janet Wepner and Josef Beraha
Episode Six
Maya Stein
Our conversation took place on Saturday May 19th, 2018 with our host Michael Mervosh and guest Maya Stein.
Maya Stein is a poet, freelance writer, editor and teacher whose work has inspired and informed people across the United States. Her sense of creativity and value of relationship allows her a broad exploration of exchange with the world.
“At the heart of it all, I remain curious, engaged, and hopeful about the world around me, and continue to discover new ways to be a part of it and to share my experiences through writing, exploring, celebrity photo re-enactments, and other outlets. I love leading a life of creative investigation – even with all the uncertainties it comes with – because it helps me connect with and support others who are driven by similar instincts. And I never stop forgetting how lucky I am.”
Host: Michael Mervosh
Producer: Anna Noack
Community Chatroom Hosts: Janet Wepner and Josef Beraha