The irony of man’s condition is that the deepest need is to be free of the anxiety of death and annihilation; but it is life itself which awakens it, and so we must shrink from being fully alive.
— Ernest Becker
What does it mean to be a self-conscious animal?
The idea is ludicrous, if it is not monstrous. It means to know that one is food for worms.
This is the terror: to have emerged from nothing, to have a name, consciousness of self, deep inner feelings, an excruciating inner yearning for life and self-expression—and with all this yet to die.
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