Martial Arts: Winning and Losing in Everyday Life
Or, living in between more than and less than
The Martial Philosophy of Give and Take
In today’s world, winning has become associated with bullying, intimidation, cheating, lying and the hoarding of wealth and power. It’s the tried and true ploy of getting ahead at the expense of others.
There are, of course, many other ways to view winning. For example someone who cares about a social cause or about their family might consider that to be winning at life. But generally speaking, these days winning is often associated with someone else losing.
If you don’t like the idea of winning at someone else’s expenses, then it is important to develop strategies that allow us to win while not causing others to lose. Even warriors consider this.
“When you surround an army, leave an outlet free. Do not press a desperate foe too hard.” — Sun Tzu , The Art of War
Perhaps the terms ‘winning and losing’ are too harsh for this conversation. We could just as easily say ‘opportunists and recluses’. In either case, it’s easy enough to see that some people are highly predisposed to advancing themselves, while others are far more reclusive. They even go on ‘retreats’.
The monastic recluse is an obvious example. Monks and nuns can find themselves with a personality that’s gently predisposed to withdrawal. But the thing is, too much withdrawal can create its own problems, such as the emergence of a resigned and losing spirit, or an intelligent mind whose voice is dampened by submissiveness, or a modest approach that’s lost in the daily stampedes of influencers, celebrities, politicians and other desperate sorts.
At one end of the continuum are people who want to score greater and greater successes, often inflicting bruising and perhaps lasting damage on others. Conversely, the recluse can become equally obsessive through their equally determined focus, that of withdrawing, which includes adopting a persistent insistence on giving up ground, space, and opportunity.
These are really two sides of the same coin, aren’t they? On the one hand we have a group of people who are willing to walk over others to get what they want. On the other hand we have a group of people who are willing to be walked on to allow others to take what they want.
It’s completely unfair to call one group selfish by implying that the other group are givers. That’s nonsense, because neither of these positions is healthy.
To be clear, in some circumstances we often adopt life-positions which are a reaction to the opposite stance. Sometimes it’s a young adult who swears they will never be like their parents. Other times it might be our rationalization to embrace one thing because it’s the opposite of something we detest. Or, perhaps it’s simply because we rationalize that an introvert cannot be aggressive, or that an extrovert cannot be modest.
In reality, what we should be striving for are ways to strike an effective and dynamic balance between these two positions. We see strong hints of this more balanced approach to living in The Art of War, when Sun Tzu instructs us to embrace flexibility in our approach to life:
“Knowing the enemy enables you to take the offensive, knowing yourself enables you to stand on the defensive.” — Sun Tzu , The Art of War
This quote is the sage’s advice to be cognizant of the give and take of things.
Extroversion and introversion do not respectively preclude us from adopting a defensive stance or going on the offensive. Nothing precludes us from being who we are or what we need to be.
We tend to buy into the restrictive and self-limiting notion that what we think we are is all that we are. As James Souttar points out in his essay on Carlos Casteneda and Don Juan, our perceptions of ourselves act “as a functional impediment to the development of consciousness. Address the problem of self-reflection and we can recover [our] fluidity of movement.”
This interesting term “fluidity of movement” is related to notions of suppleness and flexibility. The more rigid we are, the more susceptible we are to attack.
The Inflexibility of the 99%
The majority of everyday people, particularly those who struggle with paying for housing, healthcare and simple everyday necessities, are boxed into intractable positions. All of their energy is tied up in working two, three or more jobs, with a breath here and there for picnics or religious practices while somehow finding time to maintain a home or a family.
As our social structure of fairness and kindness is being swiftly dismantled, how do we fight back?
Both major political parties in America are subservient to money, influence, and agendas that are not considerate of the majority of people. Therefore, it’s not as simple as, “Throw the bums out.”
So who does the responsibility of change fall upon? Certainly not the middle class, because most of them — whether conservative or liberal — are too comfortable with their homes, vacations, portfolios, bank accounts and satisfying life styles. They can afford the better grocery stores, unlike the ‘lower’ classes who barely have room in their lives to plan activities called leisure time.
I maintain that you cannot defeat a seemingly undefeatable foe by using methods that the enemy has superiority in deploying. You can’t fight fire with fire if you don’t own any fire.
“Therefore, just as water retains no constant shape, so in warfare there are no constant conditions.” — Sun Tzu , The Art of War
For many decades, martial arts writings such as The Art of War have profoundly influenced not only generals and military strategists, but have had extraordinarily wide influence in sales, law, business management, sports and more. Can “we the people” find solutions for our current troubles in ancient martial wisdom? We better.
The enemy is…our lack of effective strategy
The defeat of a seemingly invincible enemy requires study, consideration, planning and strategy. It also requires sufficient practice as to become second nature, intuitive.
Rather than adopting a mental approach to understanding what the ‘middle way’ or the ‘in between’ is, it makes far more sense to take a practical approach. Because a practical approach will convert an intellectual understanding into actual realizations. It’s only after we realize that we begin the journey of becoming changed men and women, effective in our battles.
Nick Cassella writes in Economics, Like Religion, Assumes It Knows Everything that “both are interested in establishing dogma, not pursuing truth.” This is because extremes in position often result in stubborn or ignorant refusals to truly practice the advice of the sages.
The elitist rich and powerful are already adept at their game. The comfortable middle emulates the elites in the sense that they never have enough, and will resist any change that threatens their ability to accumulate more. Who’s left?
“Those skilled at making the enemy move do so by creating a situation to which he must conform; they entice him with something he is certain to take, and with lures of ostensible profit they await him in strength.” — Sun Tzu , The Art of War
