Thread by @ThyConsigliori

John Minford, #SunTzu 6: 35 "Exploit the enemy's dispositions to attain victory; this the common man cannot know. He understands the forms, the dispositions of my victory; but not how I created the forms of victory."

It may not be the first time that I disagree with our translator, but it is HIGHLY uncharacteristic that I say - as I am - he kind of missed the mark on this verse. So, I'm going to simply work out the logic better in a moment.

I don't think I'm quite alone in this, as, when I checked other translators, they didn't quite roll the same way. So, without further ado, I'll offer a rework right now, below...

Exploit the enemy's dispositions to attain victory; this the common man cannot know. He can sometimes see the forms, the dispositions of my victory after the fact; but he can never see how I created the fluid forms of victory. He can never know my contemplations.

In a moment, I'll number the points of my own version for you. Here, please allow me to emphasize that YOU, you yourself, MUST master the ideas of forms and formlessness. You must learn to see your enemy's forms, and to cloak your own. There's more.

You must admit you start out with hardened forms of mind, of thinking, of automatic assumption. You never saw it happen, but your mind has fossilized into hardened certainties that are the very basis of your limitations and defeats. Master Sun demands you kill these certainties.

We all start out as the common man. We do not see forms, least of all our own hardened forms of thinking. We are not fluid. We do not exploit our enemy's dispositions to attain victory. It's a type of thinking we lost by the time we attained kindergarten. Hardened forms dominate.

This is why I constantly reduce Master Sun's counsel down to a single individual. It's personal. It is NOT just business or war. It is YOUR forms of thinking that Master Sun challenges, laughing with joyful delight. You don't see your own forms of thinking. He understands this.

Let's say this one more way, before we number our points. Challenge the obvious. Question all certainty. Take nothing for granted. Prove everything. Test everything. Fight mental attachments. Open your mind. Learn to observe, to see what you see, not what you assume.

1) Exploit the enemy's dispositions to attain victory.
2) This the common man cannot know.
3) He can sometimes see the forms, the dispositions of my victory after the fact.
4) But he can never see how I created the fluid forms of victory.
5) He can never know my contemplations.

From that list, I propose that numbers 1 and 4 are the most important. There's no need to go over @realDonaldTrump's mastery of each, but the reference point is a good thing. He is the great master of both. Application to yourself is what matters most.

Let's not apply this to politics. Let's apply it to your own very real life. This is so personal. This is about you. So, to begin, I ask, have you accepted that you have enemies? Often your enemies are your family members. I have a story to share to illustrate. Or, yourself.

Once upon a time, I had a client who'd lost track of his beloved son, to the combinations of a cult, and to drug addiction. He didn't know where his son was. He had not spoken to his son in over 10 years. Wrongly, he thought he had no power to affect this situation.

Try to imagine his heartbreak. Try to imagine his pain and agony. It was this that was his hardened form of thinking. He completely believed he could do nothing about this. The answer, the way to break his hardened form, comes from network theory, of all things.

I knew with certainty that he knew people who knew where his son was. Have you heard of the six degrees of separation that connect everyone on earth? This is one of the most fundamental concepts of network theory. You know someone who knows someone. That's one degree.

Repeat that process five more times, and you have access, with NO MORE than five iterations, to every person on the planet. In case you're interested, that is precisely how I found and built a working partnership with @GenFlynn. Network theory converted into practice.

I explained to my client that he absolutely DID have the power to find his son, almost immediately, if he would only choose to do so. If my recollection is correct, he reached to two, surely no more than three people before his next call was to his son.

They spoke. The son cried, and shared that his life was broken. My client called me and shared the information. My counsel was so simple. Buy an airplane ticket. Go meet your son again. And bring him home. Home to your own home. Bring him home. That's what my client did.

How did my client create the fluid forms of victory? He broke his own hardened forms of thinking. He reached out. He found his son and won him back. Do you see? This is precisely what Master Sun would have had my client do. He wrongly thought he could not find his son.

Most of my work is done over the telephone. I do not usually meet my clients in person. However, afterwards, I was at a conference where my client was also in attendance. He walked up to me. He hugged me. We both cried. Not one word was spoken. His son had returned. That was all.

My client's son was his enemy. But, far worse for both of them was my client's hardened forms of thought. My client, in accepting the false belief that he could not find his son, was his own, and his son's worst enemy. All it took to solve the problem was to break the form.

When you reclaim your power, no one will be able to see the forms of your victorious dispositions. Let me finish by speaking to my married male friends. Men, you love your wives, I know you do. But does she? If you recommit to your romance, she'll never know what you did.

Consider all the obvious things. When was the last time you bought her flowers? A card that was NOT for her birthday, or Mother's Day? When was the last time you bent her over for a passionate kiss? When did you tell you her love her with all your heart?

Here's a hint. No woman has ever owned too many earrings. And if she doesn't have lovely pearls, where have you been spending your money? She'll never see the forms, the dispositions of your new commitment to romance. But, I promise, you'll certainly enjoy your victory.

145 verses completed, 277 to go.

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