The Entrepreneur’s Hero’s Journey: Stage 1 — Ordinary World

Dr. MJ Yang
Jan 10
4 min read

This blog is part of The Entrepreneur’s Hero’s Journey, a 12-month Entrepreneurship series in 2026 that explores business ownership through a Jungian lens, drawing on Joseph Campbell’s (1949/2008) Hero’s Journey and the twelve stages refined by Christopher Vogler (2007).

Each post corresponds to one stage of this inner journey, offering a reflective map to help entrepreneurs recognize where they are and understand entrepreneurship as an evolving process of individuation.

12 Stages of the Entrepreneur's Hero's Journey

Departure (For the Aspiring)

Stage 1 — Ordinary World
Stage 2 — Call to Adventure
Stage 3 — Refusal of the Call
Stage 4 — Meeting the Mentor
Stage 5 — Crossing the First Threshold

Initiation (For the Active)

Stage 6 — Tests, Allies, and Enemies
Stage 7 — Approach to the Innermost Cave
Stage 8 — Ordeal
Stage 9 — Reward

The Return (For the Established)

Stage 10 — The Road Back
Stage 11 — Resurrection
Stage 12 — Returning with the Elixir

Why I Started This Series

After reflecting on the 2025 year-end post, Your 2025 Entrepreneurial Review: A Hero’s Journey–Inspired Year-End Reflection, I felt a strong call to explore this territory more deeply.

This series is designed to help business owners move beyond external strategies and metrics, and to learn from the rich inner journey that unfolds alongside building and leading a business.

By tracing each stage of the Hero’s Journey, we can better understand the psychological transitions, tensions, and growth opportunities that accompany entrepreneurship.

Ordinary World in the Entrepreneur’s Hero’s Journey

The "ordinary world" is the starting point for every entrepreneur—stable, familiar, but often quietly limiting. It is where your current skills, roles, and routines exist, offering a sense of comfort while also highlighting the subtle tensions that hint at untapped potential.

In this stage, the ordinary world is both a foundation and a mirror, showing what you value, the constraints you accept, and the internal conflicts shaping your choices.

Reflection Exercise:

Where do you feel constrained in your current professional life?
What subtle nudges hint that something more is possible?

Elements of the Ordinary World

1. Environment

Your immediate work environment—company culture, industry norms, and organizational structures—provides stability and a sense of order, which can feel comforting. However, these same structures may also impose invisible boundaries that limit creativity, innovation, or autonomy.

By examining the environment closely, entrepreneurs can identify which elements support their growth and which may need adjustment or release in order to pursue a larger vision.

2. Heredity / Background

Family expectations, cultural values, and early life experiences shape the way you perceive risk, security, and success. These inherited patterns can guide your decisions in ways you may not consciously realize.

Becoming aware of them allows you to distinguish which values are authentically yours and which are carried over from external influences, helping you build a more self-directed path in business.

3. Personal History

Every past achievement, failure, and formative experience contributes to your professional identity. These experiences can provide confidence and competence, but they may also create self-imposed limits or habitual patterns that no longer serve you.

Reflecting on personal history helps clarify which strengths to leverage and which outdated beliefs or fears to release as you step toward growth.

4. Polarity / Tension

Entrepreneurs often experience internal conflicts—such as the pull between stability and autonomy, certainty and creative freedom, or obligation and personal vision. These polarities create tension that can feel uncomfortable yet are crucial signals that transformation is possible.

Recognizing and exploring these tensions prepares the mind and heart for the challenges and opportunities of the journey ahead.

Signs You’re Ready to Leave the Ordinary World

Sometimes, subtle signs signal that it is time to move beyond the ordinary world and embrace the next stage of the journey.

These signs often appear as feelings or patterns rather than explicit decisions:

Restlessness / Subtle Dissatisfaction
You may feel a quiet unease or boredom with routine, noticing that your current role no longer fully engages your talents or passions.
Daydreams / Curiosity About Alternatives
Your mind frequently wanders toward possibilities outside your current work environment, imagining projects, roles, or business models that excite you.
Misalignment With Current Responsibilities
Tasks, roles, or structures may feel restrictive, leaving you aware that your values and work priorities are diverging.
Internal Tension Between Values and Expectations
Conflicting desires—wanting both security and autonomy, certainty and creative freedom—create a sense of internal friction, nudging you toward exploration and growth.

Reflection Exercise: These feelings and patterns are not obstacles; they are invitations from your inner entrepreneur.

What signals are emerging, and how might they guide your next step?

Transition Toward Stage 2 — Call to Adventure

Understanding the Entrepreneur's Hero's Journey: Stage 1 — Ordinary World is the essential first step before any change occurs. Observing your patterns, feelings, and pressures now allows you to step consciously into the next stage: Stage 2 — Call to Adventure.

As you leave the familiar behind, know that you are not alone on this journey.

Together, we will explore each stage with curiosity, courage, and reflection, embracing the opportunities and growth that entrepreneurship brings.

Let this moment be a warm welcome to your own unfolding adventure—the ordinary world is the foundation, and your journey is just beginning.