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Stratagem And Persuasion
"So it is said that if you know your enemies and know yourself, you will win a hundred times in a hundred battles. If you only know yourself, but not your opponent, you win one and lose the next. If you do not know yourself or your enemy, you will always lose." -Ancient Chinese Proverb
“So it is said that if you know your enemies and know yourself, you will win a hundred times in a hundred battles. If you only know yourself, but not your opponent, you win one and lose the next. If you do not know yourself or your enemy, you will always lose.” -Ancient Chinese Proverb
Learning is one of my main passions in life. For many years I’ve been intimately involved with learning and utilizing the ancient Chinese proverbs called the Thirty-Six Chinese Stratagem. Cunning and pervasive, these stratagem are similar to the strategies in the Art of War and while their main focus is warfare or military activities, these stratagem can be applied to politics, business, negotiations of all kinds, romance, sports. . .almost all aspects of modern life.
A stratagem is not a strategy. This is a common mistake. Stratagem is more akin to a ruse, something that is done to intentionally deceive. With the intention of deceiving, we can see that these are not always nice. They are at their core manipulations and psychological warfare. In the West we have our own version of this as ‘all’s fair in love and war’. These stratagems can be cold and cruel.
Sounds a little sinister, doesn’t it? Yes. And no. As with all my work, with the thirty six stratagem, I want to stress and emphasize the importance of integrity above all else. If we are not honest with our prospects and clients, if we are not congruous with ourselves, everything that stems from what we do will be tainted. There are definitely ways to use the thirty-six stratagem for good if only to protect ourselves from others who are trying to use them against us. It is my feeling that these tools bring persuasion (which consists of influencing others and self knowledge) to a whole new level. Once these become a part of your conscious thoughts, you will see how they illuminate all aspects of life.
There are six categories of stratagems corresponding to six conditions or situations. They are: The Stratagems of Winning; The Stratagems of Defending; The Stratagems of Attacking; The Stratagems of Scuffling; The Stratagems of Merging; The Stratagems of Losing. If we can comprehend what they describe, we can reverse engineer them, pull out the parts that work, and decide when and how others are going to be able to use them against us, and decide when it’s ethical and honorable to use them on others.