Dear Mr. Chairman of the Ephorate of the Greek Schools of Limassol,
Dear Mr. Chairman of the Board of the University of Nicosia,
Dear Mr. Hair,
Ladies and gentlemen,
Stories have always been a privileged attraction for human existence. Expressed through language, the stories we make are one of the capital ways of accessing reality. In the religious and cultural field, stories have invested archetypes with symbols and interpreted the Cosmos and the Sacred, as well as man's destiny in the context of eschatology. From the 20th century onwards, grounding the collective in the now individual myth, Freudian psychoanalysis recognized in the story of Oedipus the primordial universal pattern of identity formation. So what is it that attracts us to stories, what drives us to create or read them, why do we tell them, dramatize them, unravel them, crave them, retell them or even invent them?
The answer cannot be unambiguous, but we can certainly start somewhere. We can start today or tomorrow, or we can start yesterday, as the title of Savvas Trichas' book Start Yesterday: 52 True Stories of Inspiration and Motivation playfully challenges us.
Savvas Trichas is an internationally acclaimed speaker and author, best known for his influential book The Power of Communication. With a PhD in the decoding of human behavior, he is equally prolific in the field of scholarly publications and public lectures, having particularly distinguished himself in a number of interventions, from the National Academy of FBI Cyprus Police Alumni to the international TED organization (Las Vegas, Lausanne) and elsewhere, with lectures in 19 countries so far in total, where he has been a source of inspiration and reflection in front of large audiences. With a research focus on the importance of emotional intelligence in leadership and communication, Savvas Trichas has shared, among other things, valuable thoughts and practices around body language and the psychology of communication.
His new spiritual work Start Yesterday, which inoculates the reader with readable, clear and easily applicable self-improvement tips, is undoubtedly part of this expertise, that contribute to mental empowerment, enhance resilience, improve our interpersonal relationships and detach ourselves from negative feelings of rejection and unshakeable surrender to life's adversities. "Life is not a sprint, it is a marathon," he reminds us, suggesting that "he who has no stamina loses."
Although interspersed with fifty-two, as the title suggests, self-contained stories, Sava's book maintains an original and stable structure. The interest arises more from the fact that each chapter includes a personal experience and a fictional story, which functions as a complementary or illuminating allegory, "two different narratives," as the author writes, "which converge in the final distillation."
Moreover, the book's fifty-two narratives are introduced with a recognizable quote from the world cultural map, which functions as a thickening, foreshadowing, or ingeniously as a primer for the story to follow.
So what can the world's tallest tree tell us, how a hug can reset the human pulse and the functioning of our vital organs, how a flea, a wolf or a fox can contribute to our understanding of ourselves and our limits? Often, one might say, in the spirit of the myths of Aesop or La Fontaine, or even the healing stories of Jorge Boukai, whose style one can recognize in the pages of Tricha, each story in the book concludes, if not with a moral lesson, at least with a great truth, so polyphonic that it concerns no longer the fiction writer, but the universal reader of the story, in whom the individual experience flows out and is assimilated, or from whom the individual's own story is emanated, filtered through the prism of a particular temperament, and finally poured out and purified.
Real and imaginary, experience and invention, literalism and metaphor complement and coincide, converge and dramatize a great truth about human existence. These stories, as tools for spiritual growth, exploration, expansion and recognition of the human perspective in general, push the reader towards self-knowledge and self-esteem, encourage self-observation and strengthen our will not only to become aware of the facts of our life and situation, but also to take action to build a better relationship with ourselves and those around us.
Friends,
Sava's book, our Sava, is both a journey of stories and a guide to navigators, indicating the difficult path to happiness - not success - and reconciliation, the acceptance of realities and their transmutation into a psychic narrative, the revolutionary role of self-awareness in regaining functionality, health and our inherent creative powers.
Above all, the stories in this book invite us to explore the virtues of self-discipline, faith, courage, and empathy; they cultivate inner perseverance, self-acceptance, counting, and capitalizing on every small victory, rewriting the narrative of our lives from the beginning. The stories we tell are the mirror of ourselves, often with our backs turned to the future, pushed violently into the past or clinging barren and acne-ridden to our present. Savvas Trichas' book invites us to consider not so much how we can make a story, but how history can make us, not how to experience happiness somewhere far away in the trails of imagination, but how to activate it in the here and now.
My Sava, may you continue to inspire us and contribute in your own way to upholding principles and values, but also virtues to cultivate courage and empathy.
Thank you and I declare myself proud.
(Text as sent by the House of Representatives)
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