True Greatness

What does it mean to be truly great? Have you ever considered it? If you look for answers in media or society, you will conclude that greatness is either one of, or a mixture of, the following:

• money
• fame (prestige, popularity, status)
• power

Due to lockdowns and more idly time it afforded me, I introspected a lot and came to a personal conclusion of what greatness means to me. Before actually telling you what I think of greatness, I’d like you to watch the following video

Not what you were expecting huh? Understandable. The last place I was expecting to be inspired is from a TV series on Vikings. Like what connection do I have to the northmen? Zero! And that’s precisely what I find fascinating about greatness, it transcends all barriers.

I don’t plan to watch the whole series, but the striking performance of the actor playing Ragnar (the king of the northmen), and the story of Ragnar himself, has triggered in me something unexpected (the video editing is god-tier too, which added a lot to the performance, so shout-out to the video uploader).

After watching the video, I asked myself “what does it mean to be great?", “what is greatness?", “what does it mean to be truly great?"

And so my mind raced, trying to put together a coherent answer. Nothing came up. The obvious money, fame, and power were not the answers I was looking for. Then it arrived.

To be great to me means to not only achieve self-actualisation (already discussed here), which in and of itself is a lofty goal, but to reach an ever higher level where others around you, or even yourself, start questioning whether you’re still human or if you’ve evolved into something else.

Sounds heavy, right?

Did you feel a kind of weight on your shoulders while listening to Ragnar’s final speech? Will your death come without apology? And before that, how will you have lived? Will you be remembered after your death?