The lived experience of courage in the seriously mentally ill: A hero's journey

Little is known about the importance of courage in serious mental illness. The purpose of this study was to discover whether courage was a significant variable in clients struggling with mental illness. The phenomelological approach and research method was used and the question was asked: What is the essential structure of the lived experience of courage in serious mental illness. Five seriously mentally ill adults participated in an open ended, recorded interview, recounting their experience of courage. Phenomenological analysis was used to derive 69 theme clusters and 13 categories. An essential structure of courage was drawn from the clusters and categories. The 13 categories fell so naturally into the stages of Joseph Campbell's Hero's Journey that the stages were incorporated into category headings. In this study courage played a significant role in the ability of the participants to live successfully with serious mental illness