Follow Your Myth

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When I was in grad school I was watching the film, 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi late one night as I was finishing up papers that were due. While listening to the film, I heard them quote Joseph Campbell. I had been writing and looked up to see the Power of Myth in the unlikely hands of Boon (actor David Denman).  Rone (actor James Badge Dale), passing by said, “lay some wisdom on me, Boon.”  And Boon proceeds to quote Campbell saying:

 “All the gods, all the heavens all the hells are within you.”

I’d seen this film before, but I was hearing this differently through the lens of depth psychology which I was currently studying at the time. That late night film overlapped with some of my thought processes about trauma, depression and addiction.

13 Hours, is an intense action film, with great dramatic performances. The film allows us to vicariously live through the harshest 13 hours of the security team called GRS. The GRS was stationed in Benghazi (2012) and were pinned down and massively outnumbered at the “secret” CIA compound, after very nearly getting killed trying to save the US Ambassador to Libya, Christopher Stevens.

The moment in 13 Hours when Boon quotes Campbell tees us up. It tells us this is a mythological moment that is approaching, it is an archetypal crossroad for these men. It isn’t here yet, but it is coming.  

This moment may have been fictional altogether, but we can read it as a moment to see what these soldiers are approaching, not just physically but psychologically, and spiritually.  

Michael Bay and the screenwriters likely wanted to inject some of what they knew about mythology and archetypal struggles into this film.  Afterall, screenwriters study Joseph Campbell’s writing on mythology now as part of the screen-writing craft. Regardless, it is a powerful statement because it points to some underlying themes. They are archetypal because they speak to the universal theme of a life and death struggle.

It speaks to the universal struggle in all of us. We are all struggling in some way and grappling with this concept in our lives, when are we the creator or the destroyer in our own lives? 

All the gods, all the heavens all the hells are within you.

Is that the exact quote from Campbell though? Well, not exactly. 

Let’s look at this discrepancy a little.  Here is the actual quote from Joseph Campbell. 

 

All the gods, all the heavens, all the worlds, are within us. They are magnified dreams, and dreams are manifestations in image form of the energies of the body in conflict with each other. That is what myth is. Myth is manifestation in symbolic images, in metaphorical images. 

Boon as a character misquotes Campbell, but the quote may get to the takeaway that Campbell was communicating more accurately. This is a conscious choice by the writers to replace the word “Worlds” with “Hells.”

All the gods, all the heavens all the hells are within you.

In a way it is a better quote. It offsets the fact that we carry heaven within us, and we carry hell within us as well. For some of us, we likely carry a little more hell than heaven. 

We also carry how we face the world, and whether we despair and torture ourselves. Boon has not just read this passage by Campbell, but he felt it deeply and then he passes it to Rone who again passes it to Jack (actor John Krasinski). 

Rone delivers the line again in a quiet moment between attacks when he is wondering if he will make it home to his wife and son.  He repeats, “All the gods, all the heavens all the hells are within you.”  

“What’s that?” asks Jack.  

“Something Boon dropped on me earlier.  It’s just been going around in my head all night.”

We return to the touchstone of the film. 

This is not just about men fighting a war, but men making decisions in their lives and trying to be good husbands and good fathers while they serve our country. They are wondering if they will make it, but also wondering about their place in the world when they come home.  There is something Stoic in the way these warriors approach these thoughts. They are not just thinking about the moment but reflecting on their lives in those in-between moments.

WARRIORS AREN’T TRAINED TO RETIRE

One of the last things Rone says to Jack in the film is this, “Warriors aren’t trained to retire Jack.”  This I also agree with.  Our warriors are trained like no other armies on the planet. We are the most well trained, the most effective and yet when our warriors return home, they may feel abandoned.  The military does do work to try to help our warriors transition out of the armed services, but it may not be enough considering the experiences they may have.

We know this because far too many of our veterans struggle with physical injuries, and the spiritual injuries such as anxiety and depression. These injuries may lead to things such as joblessness, divorce, homelessness, and even suicide.  

All the gods, all the heavens, all the hells…

It is heart-breaking, and as a son who saw my own father struggle with what it is to re-enter the world after World War II – I now wonder what it will be like for my own son who is only at the beginning of his service, and just about to enter NROTC in the fall of 2023.  At some point my son and this next generation will reintegrate, with others who serve our country.  They will explore the heavens and hells within themselves and that is also within the others who sow chaos on the world stage.

In the end, although this film is a metaphor for all of us, and it is why it resonates with us deeply, it is also about our warriors who may wish to come home and have a hard time reintegrating, after their service as warriors is done.