At the height of the Greek Empire, there was a young man who responded by the name of Narcissus, he was handsome, cheerful and above all elegant, which made Greek girls crazy for him, however, one of the great defects of Narcissus is that he He only knew what to love himself. No matter the beauty or wealth of women who approached him, he always rejected them. His ego and vanity prevented him from loving anyone but himself.
A clear example of this was when Echo, a nympha on Mount Helicon tried to draw the attention of young Narcissus with his beautiful and innocent voice, in fact, ancient myths and legends said that the voice of this female deity could use the most beautiful However, a fatal curse falls upon Echo. Hera, jealous of this nymph, did not want her husband Zeus to dazzle and therefore curse her, taking her voice and provoking him, being able to use only the last word of the person she spoke to.
- But as we all know.
- Love is such a strong feeling that Echo could not afford to lose Narcissus.
- So one day he followed him stealthily through the woods to tell him his deep and true feelings.
- But of course this seemed impossible because of his most horrible curse.
- And what did Echo do? He used his agreement with nature and animals to tell Narcissus that Echo loved him deeply.
Narcissus didn’t take this nympha’s statement very seriously. How could he fall in love with a stupid girl?She was the most beautiful and charming in the entire Peloponnese peninsula. The one who could have the most beautiful and charming girls in Athens, Sparta or Corinth. Him, who had no rival on earth? Narcissus clearly didn’t understand how this could happen.
After Narcissus’s sarcastic reaction, Echo retreated to the caves to spend the rest of his life, sad and suffering for his lack of love, however, before his death, the nympha prayed for Nemesis, the deity of vengeance and divine justice, who cursed Narcissus. to fall in love with his own reflection.
And how did this curse work? It just happened when, one day, he went to the River Styx to cool off a bit, he came closer and found himself reflected in the water thinking: “Wow, how cute I am!”, I’m going to come closer and see. my beauty a little more. Narcissus approached the edge, fell into the water and drowned. The curse proposed by Echo worked perfectly and Narcissus transferred the rest of eternity to the underworld full of pride and vanity. Throughout the centuries , the story has spread that a In this place grew a very particular flower, which was distinguished by its enormous beauty and the color of its petals, it was called Narcissus.
If we had to bring this account of Greek mythology to the present day, we would tell everyone to flee from vain and narcissistic people because they would only bring headaches, because these are people who do not think, most of the time, only for themselves. Their ego and pride often prevented them from feeling empathy for others; Something that Echo has suffered, protagonist of this sad story, with which many can relate.