‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend’
Just one of the quotable lines and philosophies found in the book ‘Art of War’
It’s been a while since I read it, and by a while I mean at least 5 years or more
But I do remember many things from it
The main point of the book being, no action you take should be done without thought to the consequence or the outcome. Every move you make should be executed with the precision of a chess master running a check mate move
Some consider it a very manipulative piece of literature
Others consider it a bible for success
Guess it just depends on perspective
What I do know is that philosophy in life is needed – having clear ideas for how you want your life to be, the way you want your life to run and the principles you aim to live by and stay true to – all of it is important
A famous radio personality once said that he lives by the principle given to him by his father which goes along the lines of “you’re never as good or as bad as they say you are” meaning, stay neutral
Don’t believe the ‘hype’ about yourself and with the same attitude don’t fall for the exaggerated criticism you hear being said about you either
Ever felt like “life’s a bitch and then you die”?
How about “all rich people are crooks and all nice guys finish last and whoever smelt it dealt it” – those are all some forms of philosophical ideas that, believe it or not, if you have those thoughts in your head then to some degree, you live by those thoughts
There is an art to war
It doesn’t matter what form the war comes in or what type of war it is – a war is a war and nobody in history ever selected to lose
So how do you handle your wars? Do you whine, moan, complain? Do you do as the Christians advocate and turn the other cheek or do you get even?
Each response is as unique as the person reading but also each response will highlight to you what your philosophy on life really is
How you handle conflict is probably more telling of who you are as a person than anything else in your day to day ordinary life
The only thing more revealing of your character than how you handle conflict, is how you handle success
But , we’ll leave that for another day
Be well
SRZ
Published by