Your Little Voice

His wish, to ride the horse of day

Instead he burned the Earth away.

The story of Phaeton made me think how stupid it is to ignore good advice. "Don't do it!" was Phoebus' suggestion, but Phaeton decided to ignore his father’s excellent advice and take the chariot anyway. Being impulsive and not taking a moment to think what the consequences could be (even if his father had already warned him it was 100% dangerous), he took the chariot and messed up everything. And his father couldn't do anything, because he had sworn to grant him any wish, and he already had a very bad standard with his son for abandoning him. He couldn’t simply forget his oath, even if it was for Phaeton’s own good.

I many times think on cases like this one, "Where is that little voice that tells you to be careful?" I have that little voice, and it's always warning me to be aware of what's going on. It is important to listen to this little voice that could be called "survival instinct", because listening to it can be useful, and could save your sorry butt from many senseless stupidities. In Phaeton's case, if he had listened to his little voice, maybe he would have paid attention to his father, thought twice about it and saved himself from the terrible catastrophe he caused.

I was amazed how the characters in the story were related and even personified from things that exist in real life. For example, relating the sun to a god that takes a flaming chariot across the sky is very original. Then time (hours, days and years) being Phoebus' secretaries (time is measured by Earth's rotation around the sun) also makes a lot o sense. It's for me a very interesting way to understand the universe and different aspects of life, because that's what myths are after all, "Myths are the earliest forms of science."(pg.67). It is actually a very clever way of understanding life.