Fascination Circle The word mandala comes from Sanskrit and means circle center. In various forms of the mandala can be found in almost all cultures around the world. Treatment of it were recorded in Europe in the 12th century, when it created the abbess Hildegard of Bingen. And the famous Renaissance scholar Giordano Bruno formed a circular paintings (he apparently assisted in the exercise of the imagination and keep it in harmony). In the 20 century, describes the famous Swiss psychiatrist Carl Gustav Jung, personal mandala as an image inside of a particular person. “This is a point inside the soul, which are all related, according to which everything is arranged,” he wrote.

In a cafe in Berlin’s famous boulevard Unter der Linden know the two English gentleman.One Hermeticists most of the time, Alistair Crowley. His fame was at sunset, but he kept expanding the Law of Thelema, free will, greeted everyone with “It seems as thou wilt and it shall be the only law.” For thirty years using drugs as a means of cognition. The second is a tall, skinny intellectual, who speaks impeccable Oxford accent. Curious is, I could see everything, know, experience. Crowley it attracts with its strange philosophy and extravagant behavior. His name is Aldous, and comes from an old aristocratic family of Huxley. In regards Crowlijev “seems to want …” Huxley replied: “I’ve always wanted. But if I did only two hours, or thrown to me in a mental hospital or in prison.” 

Often we, therefore, tend to evaluate themselves according to their own unrealistic perfectionist criteria. Uncritically accepted the criteria of their own culture, and it is not rare that our criterion of “what others say.” 

The couple is normal that our self-image influenced by what other people think about us.The girl may think she was extremely beautiful, but her opinion will likely be undermined if it fails to break even in the finals of a local competition for the “mis coast. Another may believe he has great sense of writing. And that belief will be undermined if no magazine does not publish its story, and friends who gave them to read does not show any enthusiasm. 

The opinion of others can help us to verify the realism of their own opinions and estimates. In addition, there is nothing wrong – until you go overboard and while the opinion of other people do not become the only criterion by which we evaluate ourselves. If we accept this criterion, we can cause great harm to its own image of themselves. 

The first problem is they often do not know what others think of us, rather than just assume. Very rarely will somebody honestly and openly say what he thinks. And so we base our self-esteem to think you do not even know! We think that we let people appreciate and love, and that does not exactly. And conversely, how many times you are surprised when you heard that a person has a good opinion about you, and you always felt inferior to her society? 

Even when you know someone’s thinking about themselves, what is eternal. People are changing attitudes, values and criteria – so I can change my opinion of you. If their opinion was based on your confidence in such a situation will probably “break”. 

The opinion of others about you, whether good or bad, may not be true. People you may know only superficially, all the information you do not have to be available to them. In addition, each person evaluates others by their own criteria and standards that have no absolute value. Some people appreciate the success, money second, third and peaceful family life is very likely that by that judge you. If someone appreciates a quiet family life, will have a bad opinion about you, if you have an advantage given job or career. Someone to whom money is important, it will probably underestimate the person who, for very little reward (Oh, what a small, the telephone help for psychological work without pay!) Dobrotovornom devoted to her work because it brings pleasure. Of course, that is not true for all people. Some recognize and acknowledge the value of others and when they are completely different from them. However, the criteria are strict and narrow them. However, this is their only criteria, there is no reason to hold them better than his. 

No matter how hard you try, you can be sure that all people will never have a good opinion of you. If you expect that you all love the price, you’re in the safest way to becoming chronically and terminally unhappy. It’s just not possible. Some people will probably really impress, others will be nice, much of it will be more or less unbiased, a small portion will love you and someone you might hate it. 

One’s approval is no proof that you are a valuable person. And Hitler and Stalin were around a lot of enthusiastic followers. A Giordano Bruno was burned.

(Mnemonic glyphs from Giordano Bruno’s Ars Memoriae (The Art of Memory) 1582)

Back through the mists of time, we suddenly find ourselves 500 years B.C. in ancient Greece where philosophy and wisdom first took root. This impressive society is also the first to form the concept of civilization and culture, and first to form a nation. Here the first trappings of science can be found.

South lies Athens where wise thinkers spend their time contemplating the nature of the universe. Their thoughts are kindled by what they can see. There is so little light pollution that the stars and the milky way shine bright in the sky. The delicate embroidery of the stars can be seen in humbling detail. Constellations jump out at the awestruck stargazers.

Across the street a man stands at the entrance to the banqueting hall, clearly enjoying the crisp night time air, speaking with a messenger, taking a break from the festivities inside. You recognize the man as Simonides, famous poet, but you do not recognize the messenger who is a stranger to the city. With terrifying suddenness thunder echoes through the streets. Disaster strikes, and the building behind Simonides collapses. A stunned silence permeates the streets as those few who happened to be close by pause and watch, helpless in those moments of incomprehension. Simonides himself stands aghast at the sight of the collapsed hall. He had been inside it only moments ago.

People rush to the scene, and pull the rubble from the collapsed building. They struggle through the night searching for survivors but to no avail. The diners lie crushed under the rubble, unrecognizable. Simonides is the only person to survive the banquet.

Now all that remains to be done is to offer the unfortunate diners proper funeral rites, but this presents a problem. Each is crushed beyond recognition and yet no family wishes to perform the rites for a stranger. If they cannot recognize their loved ones, then no rites can take place. Why should such expensive rites be for the benefit a stranger?

Simonides finds that by mentally imagining the banquet hall the way it was, and taking a walk around this imagined scene in his head, he is able to remember perfectly the position of each of them. Astounded by his own feat of memory, and wondering if he could employ it in other uses, Simonides tries to understand the techniques behind it. In doing so, the ancient and fascinating art of mnemonics is born. What happened next is best told by Cicero;

“He inferred that persons desiring to train this faculty must select places and form mental images of the things they wish to remember and store those images in the places, so that the order of the places will preserve the order of the things, and the images of the things will denote the things themselves, and we shall employ the places and images respectively as a wax writing-tablet and the letters written on it. (Cicero, De Oratore, II, lxxxvi – translation: Sutton & Rackham, 1942).”

In the ancient world such mnemonics became popular, until everyone could remember torrents of information as easily as our computers do today. Unfortunately such techniques died out gradually until at last, during the middle ages, only the scholarly monks such as the Jesuit missionaries were aware of them.

One such missionary was a man called Matteo Ricci, who in 1578 departed from Lisbon in Portugal on a journey to far off lands. He arrived in Goa which was at that time a Portuguese Colony, in September of 1578, where he remained for 4 years. In 1582 Ricci was dispatched to China.

Using the techniques his teachers at the Jessuit college had taught him he learned the Chinese language and became one of the few western scholars to master the very difficult Chinese classical script. Indeed, he was able to read a Chinese book, and then read it forwards or backwards word for word, such was his power of memory thanks to the art of mnemonics. Added to this his own appreciation and respect for indigenous Chinese culture, and one need not wonder why Chinese leaders and scholars were so impressed by him. The powerful Chinese families, noting Ricci’s remarkable feats of memory, all sent their sons to study with him so that they would not be at a dissadvantage. In the course of these lessons Ricci was able to influence them towards Christianity. It has been said that Matteo Ricci was the most successful Missionary ever, in terms of the sheer number of people he converted. He achieved this thanks in part to the ancient art of mnemonics, and the amazing feats of memory that gave him such high standing in Chinese culture as a great Scholar and teacher.

Meanwhile Giordano Bruno, then staying in Paris, published several works on mnemonics, including De umbris idearum (On The Shadows of Ideas, 1582), Ars Memoriae (The Art of Memory, 1582), and Cantus Circaeus (Circe’s Song, 1582). All of which were based on his models of organised mnemonics for knowledge and experience. Thus it was Bruno who finally pinned down Mnemonics, ensuring its survival into the modern age.

It remained a little known, though effectively utilised art, which filted down through circles of learned scholars until finally being popularized, first by British historian Frances A. Yates’s 1966 book ‘The Art of Memory’, and then again by the psychologist, educational consultant (and proponent of mental literacy) Tony Buzan, in a 1970s tv series for the BBC and then dozens of books.

Mnemonics, no longer a dry academic discipline taught by monks, is now popular among children and students, colleges and universities. Amazingly it is possible to teach anyone how to use mnemonics to remember any amount of information, and so it has become another welcome technique to help people learn all the information thrown at them in the course of their studies, and gain excellent results by the end of them.