Self-discovery

A "journey of self-discovery" refers to a travel, pilgrimage,^[1] or series of events whereby a person attempts to determine how they feel, personally, about spiritual issues^[2] or priorities,^[3][4] rather than following the opinions of family, friends, neighborhood^[5] or peer pressure. The topic of self-discovery has been associated with Zen.^[6]

A related term is "finding oneself". There are different stages of finding oneself. Cultures from around the world have developed an array of modalities in the journey to discover oneself. In modern times practitioners and scientists have come together to create a map that brings clarity to the process of self-discovery. This is referred to as the levels of consciousness.

A journey of self-discovery is a popular theme in literature. It is sometimes used to drive the plot of a novel, play or film.^[3][7]

Fiction

A journey of self-discovery is a popular theme in fiction.^[3][7] Some films use similar phrases, such as in the film Petals: Journey Into Self Discovery (2008).^{[8][better source needed]} The drama films Eat Pray Love (2010) and Life of Pi (2012) are also associated with the idea of a journey of self-discovery.^[9][10]

Literature

• Hermann Hesse's Siddhartha (1922)^{[11][12][13][14][15][16]}
• Jack Kerouac's On the Road (1957)
• Cormac McCarthy's All the Pretty Horses (1992)^[11]
• Yann Martel's Life of Pi (2001)
• Alice Sebold's The Lovely Bones (2002)
• Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat, Pray, Love (2006)
• Craig Thompson's Habibi (2011)
• Cheryl Strayed's Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail (2012)

Film

• El Topo (1970) and The Holy Mountain (1973) by Alejandro Jodorowsky
• A film version of Siddhartha (1972)
• The Pillow Book (1996) by Peter Greenaway
• Samsara (2001) and Valley of Flowers (2006) by Pan Nalin
• Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring (2003) by Kim Ki-duk
• Where the Wild Things Are (2009) by Spike Jonze
• Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (2010) and Cemetery of Splendour (2015) by Apichatpong Weerasethakul
• Avalokitesvara (2013) by Zhang Xin
• Voyage (2013), Utopians (2015), Thirty Years of Adonis (2017), and Apostles (2022) by Scud
• The Tree of Life (2011) by Terrence Malick
• Sodom's Cat (2016)
• The Red Turtle (2016) by Michaël Dudok de Wit
• Please Stand By (2017) by Ben Lewin
• Marlina the Murderer in Four Acts (2017) by Mouly Surya
• Humba Dreams (2019) by Riri Riza
• Nine Days (2020) by Edson Oda
• Wendy (2020) by Benh Zeitlin
• Soul (2020) by Pete Docter
• Nomadland (2020) by Chloé Zhao
• Across the River and into the Trees (2022) by Peter Flannery

See also

• Coming of age – reaching maturity, from childhood to adulthood
• Cultural identity
• Existential crisis
• Hero's journey
• Identity (social science)
• Identity formation
• Introspection
• Maturity (psychological)
• New Age movement
• Personal development
• Personal identity
• Philosophy of life
• Psychology of self
• Religious views on the self
• Self-realization
• Self-reflection
• Stream of consciousness (psychology)
• Visionary fiction