Correctly credited to Joseph Campbell — but not in these words. What is actually documented in print is “We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us,” recorded by Diane K. Osbon and published in A Joseph Campbell Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living (HarperCollins, 1991); the widely shared “let go of the life we have planned” form is a later smoothing that no primary source pins to Campbell.
“We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us” Joseph Campbell, A Joseph Campbell Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living, selected and edited by Diane K. Osbon (HarperCollins, 1991), pp. 8, 18. The widely shared "let go of the life we have planned" wording is a later paraphrase, and the E. M. Forster credit is spurious. Via Quotle.info · Verbatim: “We must be willing to get rid of the life we've planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.”
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In context
Evoking the world of Joseph Campbell — American writer and professor of literature at Sarah Lawrence College; comparative mythology. Theme: "We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us". Atmospheric and restrained, cinematic directional light, a muted period-appropriate palette, fine grain and texture. Compose with generous empty space for the quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.
Minimalist
Minimalist editorial slide for the quote "We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us". Clean background, a single muted accent color, generous negative space, subtle paper or linen texture, no literal illustration — let the words carry it. Reserve clear space for a serif quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.
Provenance
Where the line actually appears
Work
A Joseph Campbell Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living
Selected & edited by
Diane K. Osbon, from journals of Campbell’s Esalen Institute lectures
Published
HarperCollins, New York, 1991 — posthumous; Campbell died in 1987
Located at
pp. 8 and 18
We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us. The old skin has to be shed before the new one can come.
as printed, 1991
This is the wording as printed in the 1991 book, quoted by Quote Investigator ↗ and cited independently by Wikiquote ↗ at p. 18. Note “get rid of,” not “let go of.”
1991 — The sentence reaches print in A Joseph Campbell Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living, selected and edited by Diane K. Osbon from what she described as favorite expressions of Campbell’s recorded in her journals. The Internet Archive catalog record ↗ describes the book as Campbell’s words from his Esalen Institute lectures.
1998–2000 — The saying enters newspapers. Quote Investigator ↗ records a December 1998 Anniston Star item using a “let go” rewording with no author attached, and a February 2000 Asbury Park Press piece crediting Campbell with the original “get rid of” phrasing.
2002 — The E. M. Forster credit appears, in Michael Gurian’s The Soul of the Child and in the Orem-Geneva Times of 20 March. QI finds no basis for it ↗ and calls the linkage spurious.
Today — Both the Campbell credit and the smoothed “let go of” wording circulate together. Wikiquote ↗ lists only the “get rid of” form, cited to p. 18 of the 1991 book.
The line was first published in A Joseph Campbell Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living (HarperCollins, 1991), a compilation issued four years after Campbell’s death. A book first published in 1991 is firmly under copyright in the United States, so quote the sentence briefly with attribution rather than reproducing the surrounding pages. Campbell’s work is preserved and published by the Joseph Campbell Foundation ↗.
Rights status is our research, not legal advice — and copyright varies by country and edition. For commercial or published use, confirm with the rightsholder. See terms.
Fact-check
Two things go wrong with this quote
This is an unusual case: the famous name on the card is the correct one. What has gone wrong is the wording — and, for two decades, a second author’s name attached to it entirely.
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Wrong authorE. M. Forster spurious
Forster is credited with the line in Michael Gurian’s The Soul of the Child (2002) and in the Orem-Geneva Times of 20 March 2002 — the earliest Forster credits Quote Investigator ↗ could find. Forster died in 1970, and QI found no support for the attribution in his writings, concluding that “the linkage to E. M. Forster appears to be spurious.”
✕
Wrong wordingJoseph Campbell reworded
The sentence as printed reads “We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve planned” — see Wikiquote’s citation to p. 18 ↗ of the 1991 Companion. The gentler “let go of the life we have planned” appears in newspapers from December 1998, at first with no author attached at all.
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Implied sourceCampbell’s books not-in-his-books
The line is not from The Hero with a Thousand Faces or The Power of Myth, as it is sometimes captioned. It reached print in a posthumous compilation of his Esalen Institute lectures ↗, assembled from an editor’s journals four years after his death.
✓The person is right; the words drifted. Campbell’s line, as recorded by Diane K. Osbon and published in 1991, is “We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us” — per Quote Investigator ↗.
Context
Why the line travels so well
Campbell spent a career arguing that myths are instructions for living, and that the hero’s journey always begins with a departure — leaving the known arrangement before the new one is visible. This sentence is that whole argument compressed into one line, which is why it turns up on graduation cards, redundancy notices and mid‑life pep talks far more often than it turns up in Campbell’s actual books.
The reason it is hard to source is that Campbell did not write it for publication. The Internet Archive’s catalog record for the 1991 book describes its contents as “Words of Joseph Campbell from his Esalen Institute lectures ↗,” assembled by Diane K. Osbon from what she called favorite expressions of his recorded in her journals. Spoken lines transcribed years later are exactly the kind of text that drifts.
The old skin has to be shed before the new one can come.
How “get rid of” became “let go of”
Quote Investigator’s chronology shows the drift happening in the press rather than in print. A December 1998 item in The Anniston Star carried an unattributed “We must let go of the life we planned so as to accept the life that is waiting for us.” A February 2000 piece in the Asbury Park Press credited Campbell using the original “get rid of” phrasing. By October 2014 The Morning Call was crediting Campbell with a “let go” version.
“Get rid of” is blunt and a little unlovely; “let go of” is gentler and scans better on a card. That is almost always the direction quotes travel — toward the smoother sentence — which is why a wording that sounds too polished is worth checking.
Explore
Filed under
More provenance-checked quotes on the same theme, each with its reuse status.
1904–1987 · American writer and professor of literature at Sarah Lawrence College; comparative mythology
Joseph John Campbell (1904–1987) was an American writer and scholar of comparative mythology and comparative religion who taught literature at Sarah Lawrence College for most of his career. He is best known for The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1949), the Masks of God series, and the posthumous television conversations with Bill Moyers published as The Power of Myth (1988) — and for two ideas that escaped academia entirely: the monomyth, or hero’s journey, and the maxim “follow your bliss.” Much of the aphoristic Campbell that circulates online comes not from his books but from transcriptions of his spoken teaching, which is exactly how this sentence reached print.
For writers & researchers
Cite this
Primary source
Joseph Campbell, A Joseph Campbell Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living, selected and edited by Diane K. Osbon (New York: HarperCollins, 1991), 8, 18. As printed: “We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.” Earliest appearance documented by Quote Investigator ↗.
This verification page
Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us’?” Last verified 24 Aug 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/we-must-be-willing-to-let-go-of-the-life-we-have-planned-so/