The roots of the word conscience are "together" and "knowing." There are two parts to every conscience: the reflective conscience (which does the knowing) and the directive conscience (which tells us to get our act together.) These two parts of ourselves [- reflections upon our conduct, and our hypocrisy-avoidance - which directs us to live what we believe, to practice what we preach --] are brought together by our conscienceSelf.

The roles we play in the socio-economic, social/psychological, everyday world - e.g., waiter, barber, teacher, manager, parent, etc. - I refer to as our self. The self is observable. The inner strengths are often not so visible - but come to the fore during a crisis.

A genius is in a continual state of crisis, so to speak, in that s/he gets her power all the time. When asked their secret great men and women of science, of art, of sports, frequently respond the same way: "Anyone can do it who doesn't do anything else day and night.

"I keep the problem continuously before my eyes" they say - whether the "problem" is composing new music, hitting a ball more accurately, finding a new winning strategy, or a new model of cosmology.

[Let's here define a "saint" as a "genius at goodness." Such a person lives deeply and compassionately. A saint puts his whole power, all his resources, into his own goodness. He has an active and sensitive conscience.]

The conscience tells us, as R. S. Hartman explains in this quote: "you must be a co-knower of your Self in order to be your Self, i.e., you must identify your extrinsic self with your intrinsic Self, and at the same time identify your Self with everyone. Conscience makes you one with everybody. When you have done something wrong, even though nobody was there and nobody saw you, afterward you feel guilty and (feel) as if everybody knows what you have done."

If we trace our ancestry back far enough and see the evolution that resulted in the self we have today we may come to realize that we were once fishes - or at lease we may come to appreciate that we are all cousins, since the population of our planet was much smaller years ago. When we come to know ourselves we realize that we are related to other lives and we are grateful for the contribution they have made to our own flourishing.


Guilt is a tension that arises when (the actions of) our outer self does not match the Self-ideal we have (of what we might be, and to what we want to aspire). Our directive-conscience gets us to take steps to reduce that tension, to live what we believe, to become what we are capable of being.


I'd like to know your thoughts on these topics.