You are impatient and hard to please. If alone, you call it solitude: if in the company of men, you dub them conspirators and thieves, and find fault with your very parents, children, brothers and neighbours. Whereas when by yourself you should have called it Tranquillity and Freedom: and herein deemed yourself like unto the Gods. And when in the company of the many, you should not have called it a wearisome crowd and tumult, but an assembly and a tribunal; and thus accepted all with contentment. What then is the chastisement of those who accept it not? To be as they are. Is any discontented with being alone? let him be in solitude. Is any discontented with his parents? let him be a bad son, and lament. Is any discontented with his children? let him be a bad father.-'Throw him into prison!'-What prison?-Where he is already: for he is there against his will; and wherever a man is against his will, that to him is a prison. Thus Socrates was not in prison since he was there with his own consent. (31 & 32)
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- You label solitude as discomfort but should see it as tranquility; similarly, crowds can be seen as a tribunal rather than chaos.
- In plain terms
- Reinterpret solitude and crowds positively.
- What can you take from it?
- Shift perspective on social situations.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- How does your labeling affect your mood?
Another view
External pressures may still cause genuine distress.
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