Thread by @ThyConsigliori

John Minford, #SunTzu 7: 30 "In daylight, use banners and flags; so as to transform the ears and eyes of the troops."

Let's try to remember that Master Sun actually did write this verse 2,500 years ago, and never claimed to be a prophet, or to foresee the rise of @realDonaldTrump in the 21st century AD. Doesn't it just sound like a Trump rally though?

As I've shared, for me, it was his first speeches upon announcing, then, reading all his books, followed by complete conversion during the debates, leading to coming out for him after the New Hampshire primary victory. These were the flags and banners that transformed my sight.

I've also shared that the vicious, truly vile attacks of my soon-to-be former friends and clients upon coming out in 2016 hardened my heart. It broke my heart, not to mention my pocketbook! But more, it enraged me in ways I didn't know I could get angry.

Actually, it revealed to me - transformed my ears and eyes - of a deep, old, hellacious heartbreak I'd been suffering, unwittingly, for decades. There was an America I loved with all my heart. It was gone. Dead to me, actually, but I'd never grieved its loss, never realized.

It was only @realDonaldTrump's Make America Great Again message that cut through to my heart, not only forcing me to realize how utterly heartbroken and hopeless I'd become for my nation, but somehow worse, heavier, forcing hope to come back to life again.

It's not really that I didn't want to hope, but hope really can be the most terrible burden, you know, when it gets crushed again. You have no excuse but to say, idiot me, there I went believing again. I get tired of the bumps and bruises on my forehead from smacking myself.

So, against my will, following the banners and flags of Trump's campaign, and hardened into rebellion by the shellacking I took, I started building new hope. Do you see? His banners and flags transformed my eyes and ears, exactly as Master Sun commanded, so very long ago.

Meditate with me on that phrase, "so as to transform the eyes and ears of the troops." I just looked in up in Giles translation, and he uses the less dramatic term "influences," as opposed to Minford's brilliant choice, "transforms." Yet another point to Minford!

By implanting hope in the hearts of millions of us - and how powerful has been the red hat banner of MAGA? - @POTUS has made us believe we can, whereas before we knew we couldn't. He has converted loss into victory, despair into faith, hope and dedication. Wow. Thank about that.

That's more than mere influence. It is transformation, and more, it is transformation of our collective ears and eyes. We hear differently now. We see differently now. We are transformed. One of my favorite phrases is that the sleeping giant has awakened.

"Chang Yu says: If sight and hearing converge simultaneously on the same object, the evolutions of as many as a million soldiers will be like those of a single man."

Honor to Giles for that amazing quote! Next, we'll apply the same principle to, instead a million, just 9 souls.

If you're going to lead, you must decide to build your message, decide your mission and your battlegrounds. Then, you must use your banners and flags to transform the ears and eyes of just 8 followers, in building your team. Mind now, NO MORE THAN 8 FOLLOWERS!

Perhaps I've skipped a step, maybe the most important one. Can YOU be a follower of Donald Trump's? That is, can you, as he did and does, have the faith in your own ability, perhaps your own stable genius, to step forward and lead? Can you put risk aside and carry the burden?

We'll talk about the soul, the spirit, the identity, the strength and risk bearing capability of leadership many, many more times. For now, let's just assume you're there, already. So then, why ONLY 8 followers and no more? In a word, to get stuff done, that's why!

One by one, as you share your mission and recruit a follower - and I do mean one by one, one at a time! - you must test to determine if your banners and flags succeed. That is, do they transform the ears and eyes of your follower? But we must flip this around, the other way.

We live in a society and time when leadership is worshipped, and followership is dismissed. We live in a time when ego is everything, and soul, dedication to a cause, humility, readiness to make sacrifices, and especially, readiness to accept the guidance of a leader is shunned.

Living on the pedestal of our hypertrophied egos - you know, what happens to muscles on steroids - who among us takes pride or ambition in followership? Who finds their own standards of excellence, performance, learning, expression of capability in being a great follower?

Perhaps there are more of us who do so than are seen or recognized. I do. I am an amazing follower and damned proud of it. Yet, when I convert from follower to leader, as I often must, my dedication to transform ears and eyes pushes me well past my mastery zone, I assure you.

I believe Master Sun anticipated all this back in verse 1: 2, with his list of fundamentals which I surely hope you've memorized by now: The Way, Heaven, Earth, Command, Discipline. It's those last two, command and discipline that he's smacking us with in today's verse.

Where command fails to instill discipline, it has failed utterly. Yet, once it has instilled it, discipline becomes the art of followership amongst the followers. It becomes their great pride. The spirit of this was seen, many verse ago, when we discussed The Forlorn Hope.

In case you missed it, in days of old, when for instance about to scale a castle's walls with a ladder, men fought for the privilege to be first up, in the face of greatest probability of death. Our warriors today still understand this. But, in our society at large, we don't.

Believe it or not, you too can inspire this very transformation among your followers. They can build the discipline to follow your lead, to execute your commands. I know that's hard to believe, but who'd have believed it of Trump before he did it for all of us?

I say yet again, this is precisely why the MAGA movement requires Master Sun's teachings. We're on a worthy mission, and as we look backward in history, there is no other document so mighty in creating our very own individual and movement-level transformation of ears and eyes.

183 verses completed, 239 to go.

To return to previous sections in our #WarForAmerica2020 and #SunTzuForMAGA series, don't forget to head over to @WarForAmerica21. You'll find the digital table of contents for this series, there. Please retweet each entry you enjoy.