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We’ve all been there. Denial. A few white lies. Maybe a bigger lie if the situation warrants it. The problem is, even little lies have consequences. Just ask Oedipus.

Video Transcription:

Up next: Why you should be paying attention to Oedipus. Hint: It’s not just because you’re going to have write a paper about it.

Oedipus’s fate may be controlled by the gods, but he’s still human. Which is why it’s so easy to relate to his fear of the truth.

Now don’t blame Oedipus for his fear. The desire not to face the truth—that’s human nature. And that desire stems from the fact that the truth is often unpleasant—and it’s often more unpleasant the longer we’ve been avoiding it.

The action of avoiding the truth is so common—and so deadly—that psychologists even have a name for it. You got it: Denial. And really, isn’t that what Oedipus warns us against?

Oedipus’s destiny isn’t his fault. Maybe he couldn’t have escaped it. But think back to the beginning of all the horrors—if Oedipus had just accepted the truth right at the beginning, if he’d accepted, not run away from, the truth that his father wasn’t his real father—maybe things could have turned out very differently. It’s only when Oedipus denies the truth by running away that the real trouble starts.

That’s the message of Oedipus: Denial doesn’t work. It’s truth that saves us.

Thanks, Sophocles, for the kind of wisdom that never grows old.