In empires at one time it was customary to raise a triumphal arch. Anyone can see that there was a pressing social need for an institution where the emperor could parade his army after a winning battle, with chariots laden with plunder, generals of the defeated enemy in chains, masses of slaves herded along. The essence of being a ruler is not so much about hand-wringing as about assertiveness. While we cannot claim that this approach to life is to be emulated in all respects, rulers, just like everyone else, have something to teach.
Source: Jakub Kroul, Unsplash
In Eastern Europe, the inverse triumphal arch has, for quite some time, been trending. It’s not built by emperors, but by ordinary folks, and it’s not found in the outside world but in the heads, where people hoard all their failures, sorrows and miseries into a heap. The result is a true masterpiece of interior design, and a perfect recipe for despair. As we have mentioned before, depression can be experienced in a very artistic way, but after a certain period of time it stops offering new excitement.
Source: Gerd Altmann, Pixabay
Once you tire of the great edifice of gloom, you could draw inspiration from imperators to construct a structure representing your victories. “What victories?” people ask. Because by ‘victory’ they mean something like the conquest of Carthage, a moon landing, or at least winning a lottery jackpot. Ah, the ovation of the cheering crowds as they receive their Oscar and Nobel prize with a modest smile, along with an Olympic gold medal. Well. Monumental victories such as these are quite spectacular. If that’s what you aim for, go for it. Most of us are not willing to put that much energy into one thing just to stand on that podium one day. We’re too lazy. Or just normal.
But we all possess smaller, everyday victories. Like when at the hundredth slash of our axe that nasty locust tree stump finally splits into two. Or when that saleswoman so grumpy with everyone else gives us a smile. Maybe we do well in an exam we didn’t study for, or solve a problem at work. The possibilities are endless. Everyone has an immense amount of small successes, lots of medium-sized ones and a few big triumphs in their lives. People tend to take these for granted. “Yeah, it’s not a big deal”, they say. “Look at what Steve has achieved!”
Steve’s triumphs are for him to collect. Because the trick is to store up all your successful moments, amazing occurrences and great periods, whether they are big or small, and put them together. You want to focus on a whole bunch of them to give you strength. When you see yourself in your best form, the world looks different, and waking up on Monday morning is way more attractive. You just fly out of bed in order to experience something great.
Source: Darius Bashar, Unsplash
“O.K. but what can go into my Hall of Triumph?”, people ask. “Does the time count when…?”
Yes. Anything that you consider a success, that gives you a good feeling, fits into your hall of triumph. Whether it’s a moment when everything went super easy or a moment when, after a long struggle, you finally got what you wanted. It could also be that you haven’t achieved what you had originally wanted, but something more important. You can also include those occasions when unexpected luck has struck. Western people are go-getters who want to do everything by themselves. In the East, people allow more space for the manifestation of the forces of the Universe.
And work is also O.K. Einstein, for example, produced not one, but two theories of relativity. Why settle for less? You shouldn’t reduce yourself to a single collection of triumphs. In addition to general grandeur and exultation, you can also build specific edifices of accomplishment, assembling all your successes in a particular field. When learning something, it will be useful to recall all the situations in which you’ve mastered something easily. When losing weight, you can recall positive experiences when you did manage to get rid of the fat that had crept up on your body. You can collect your successes for any field, be it relationships, finances, skills, communication with others and countless other areas. You know what you want to improve, in what area you want to think well of yourself and your abilities. It doesn’t matter when these events happened or how colossal they were, the point is that you’ve done them. When are you going to assemble them into a whole?
Take health, for example. Or an aspect of it, healing. For every time you have been ill, there are hundreds and hundreds of times your body has successfully fought off some potential disease. In most cases you didn’t even notice. Maybe you were a little more tired, went to bed early, and in the morning it was as if nothing had happened. It takes a pretty sophisticated inner awareness to notice these things. However, there are also a lot of spectacular recoveries where there was something wrong, but this wonderful body-mind-soul you are the happy owner of, has nicely warded it off. Remember when you almost cut your finger off and now you don’t even know which finger it was? You look closely to try to see if you can find a scar, but it’s long gone. When you want to heal from something, why not look at your poster flaunting a host of these real, personal healing memories in your face? And when you are well, a collection of cases of excellent health is worth keeping in your field of vision.
Source: Gerd Altmann, Pixabay
Are you saying that one shouldn’t be too complacent? That there are already too many psychopaths revving their engines on the streets and we shouldn’t increase their numbers? You are a true master of NLP ecology. Yes, you don’t want to get conceited. Or imagine that you can jump off the Eiffel Tower without a parachute. One thing you can do is place only real successes in your collection of triumphs. And actually, you’re not that special. It’s also possible to build a triumphal arch for your loved ones, to remind them of their best selves. And for everyone you’re in touch with. I think really good leaders do something like that naturally.
And, of course, there are also collective triumphs. What positive family traits do you have? Even though we are individuals, one can observe positive patterns in families and extended groups of relatives that are missing in other families. You might even compile the great qualities of your circle of friends. What positive traits do you collectively possess? And even larger communities can benefit from positive images. Of all the cultures I’ve lived in, Hungarians have the least favorable opinion of themselves. I don’t mean we should embrace the plastic government success propaganda. But when a culture keeps positive examples of the past, present and future in mind, overcoming challenges is easier. Not to mention how uplifting it is when members of a society have love for each other. One of the things that might facilitate that is focusing on the positive things we have in common.
Source: Lezo, wikipedia
There are as many kinds of triumphal arches as there are imperators. I wonder what shape yours would take. It could be a literal triumphal arch or a different structure of some sort, perhaps a huge hall in which you can walk around, your eyes feasting on all your successes. Those events can be represented by many forms: the images may line up neatly next to each other like a photo album or they may all be mixed together like a collage. They can be three-dimensional, appearing as some sort of hologram. The larger victories could be the highlights, the multitude of small ones a kind of background pattern. The images are, of course, just the carriers. There are more experiences here than the visuals. In those images there are feelings, sounds, smells of joy, tastes of success, the music of triumph.
I know, I know, this is all too American, way too simplistic. It doesn’t take into account the tragedy of existence, the misdeeds of the government and the neighbour’s cat. I just thought you could try it if you had nothing better to do.
