The Socratic Daemon
Have you ever asked yourself? Why does the divine creator allow suffering? The answer I’ve heard often is to bring you closer to him. My take is there’s a small voice of God within us all ( the conscience) which tells you what not to do. This small voice has been drowned out by all the noise of the materialistic world.
Let your conscience be your guide is sound advice. Socrates was labeled the wisest man in Athens by the Oracle. Socrates’ favourite line was “I don’t know.” It really works wonders when this phrase is inserted with an argumentative party. Socrates credited his Daemon for his sound decisions. His daemon was actually his conscience. It would tell him what not to do and he would listen. Though he was sentenced to death and had a chance to run away and live, he did not. I’m sure he grieved the whole ordeal, yet He still listened to his daemon and stayed the course. He was killed by ingesting Hemlock which is apparently a very painful way to die. The “Socratic Daemon” as it is known is nothing more than let your conscience be your guide.
In life, traumatic grief can cause us to cycle (sometimes quickly) through the stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.
These stages are our attempts to process change and protect ourselves while we adapt to a new reality. Many are at stage 1 denial.
It’s not rocket science, but perhaps we can learn to be a little more like Socrates. Let conscience be our guide.
Soylent Green (1973) - Takes place in 2022 (Interesting choice of years) How did they know?