Strategy and competition
Miyamoto Musashi
Unattached
Miyamoto Musashi (Japan · 1584–1645) — Unattached.
What actually happened?
At about sixty he withdrew to a cave outside Kumamoto and spent two years writing. He knew he had little time. Five scrolls came out of it, named for earth, water, fire, wind and the void, and the last is a few lines long. There is no boasting in them and no list of victories. What he sets down instead is a daily discipline: rise early, train, keep at it year after year, and understanding arrives by itself. He finished the book and died within weeks.
No favourite weapon
Leaning too hard on one weapon is the same error as not knowing how to use it. A long blade has long-blade weaknesses; a short one has short-blade weaknesses. What he refuses is not the tool but the attachment, because attachment quietly lets a tool decide which fights you can take.
The engineer who knows one framework and the team that only knows paid acquisition both started as specialists and ended as a shape of work.
Perception strong, sight weak
He splits looking into two. Perception takes in the whole and the intention behind it and should be strong; sight tracks the particular movement and should be weak. See distant things as if close and close things as if distant. Watch the sword and the sword sets your tempo.
Reacting to each of a rival's launches keeps you a beat late. Their hiring and where the money goes is the weight shifting before the launch.
Two swords as a way of thinking
His school used the long and the short sword together, which is a tactic and also a habit of mind: hold two views at once, one attacking and one covering, one near and one far. He drilled the refusal of a single viewpoint until it lived in the body.
Running an argument and its inversion at the same time is the same move. The discipline is holding both without collapsing early into one.
The bout was decided before it began
At Ganryujima his opponent carried a famous long sword. Musashi came ashore with a wooden one cut from a boat oar, longer than the blade and belonging to no school anyone could read. Beating a man on the parameter he is proudest of turns years of his training into a liability.
If their strength is response time, open where their response process does not reach. The stronger the strength, the slower the turn.
How do I use it today?
Name the tool you reach for first and write down the situation in which it must lose. Then check this week's calendar against that description. If you are in that situation now, the question is not how to use the tool better.
Deep read
Read alongside
Further
Lines to keep
Do not have a favourite weapon.
In all things whatsoever, rely on nothing.
Perception is strong; sight is weak.