The Eternal Hourglass

In Nietzsche's section there is a paragraph titled The heaviest weight. This paragraph goes to explain the story of a demon telling a person that the life he/she lives will be repeated countless times. The demon explains how every moment will be relived exactly as it occurred. Nietzsche then pokes fun at how people would react to such a scenario: some will curse the demon for such bad news, and others will take the word of the demon as one would take the words of God.

            My question now is “How would you let the words of this demon affect you?” “How would you manipulate the situation to best suit you?” “Would you continue to live as you are now or change things drastically?”

I for one would continue to live my life as I have thus far. I say this simply because I see a situation like this as something I cannot let deter the path of life I have already chosen. I cannot live life in fear of something occurring again that I did not like the first time around. One thing that I can do is choose my decisions wisely. I would think about my actions beforehand, however, I will not make every single moment of my life dreary by adding the melancholy feeling of “What If”. Another thing is that I believe that we only have one life to live. Anything afterwards is unknown, so how can we possibly be worried about something we know nothing about.

It is obvious from his other short paragraphs that Nietzsche does not have a belief in a higher power. However, for those of us that do; we have been taught that living a good life now will ensure a good afterlife. So, maybe the eternal hourglass won’t be so bad for those of us that have lived a good life that wouldn’t be so bad to experience again.