Jeff Smith, Joseph Campbell, and Me.

When you travel, Joseph Campbell advises, stay out of the valleys. That's where the darkness is. Go instead from peak to peak; the journey will be better. He was writing about traveling through Ireland, but I think it's a good way to live your life as well.

Another thing to learn from Campbell is to go ahead and be delighted with the world you find and the people who are in it; whatever they show you is a story to be told, a narrative to be treasured. Reading Campbell describing the landscape...