Mission Statement
In a time of strategists and in a land of swordsmen, Miyamoto Musashi reigned supreme. Born in 1584 in Feudal Japan, Musashi is recognized as the greatest swordsman in all of Japanese history. Undefeated in over 60 lethal contests, at 61 years old, Musashi retired to a mountain cave and wrote what has become known as one of the greatest works of strategy in human history: the Book of Five Rings. After having lived a life in pursuit of a warrior’s ideal, and just weeks after giving birth to this great and historic work, Musashi passed away, entering the mist of legend to become recognized as a Kensei or ‘Sword-Saint’.
In a time and land so struck with conflict that it was named the ‘Warring States Period’, one general reigned supreme. This general, Sun Tzu, wrote the work that is the most widely read strategic classic in human history – Sun Tzu’s Art of War.
Dealing with subjects from successful action in the world all the way to the nature of existence itself, the books of Taoism, such as the Tao Te Ching and the Chuang Tzu have been revered by spiritualists and strategists alike.
The strategies contained and hidden within these works are profound to such a degree that they are regarded as universally applicable to all areas of life and all disciplines involving strategy. Used in business and leadership to great effect in Asia, the true strategies of these works have been translated many times but are rarely fully explained. This blog with depth fully but plainly explain and explore these great strategies and their applications to modern business, leadership and life.
Business and leadership books are all over the place out there grandly expounding the sayings of Asian philosophers. But while at first they seem profound, we are often left wanting more. Reading these books, I often feel like one of those cartoon characters that run off a cliff — for a few seconds they sit up in mid air, their legs keep moving and they feel like they’re still doing great. When I read these books and some of their pseudo-profound explanations, I feel like that too — I feel like, at least for a split second, I’ve read and understood something really deep. After the cartoon character is off the cliff for a few seconds, with his legs spinning around in a wheel, he always looks down realizes there is nothing underneath him and plummets to the earth. After a few seconds of being impressed with these philosophical books, I suddenly realize that the things they’re saying are really quite obvious or quite hollow, and just like the cartoon character, I feel my enthusiasm go plummeting away! Restatements of proverbial sayings, the books out there are often too obvious or too general to be of any real use, as the writings explaining Asian thought today ignore the deeper meanings of these philosophies as well as the practical ‘on the ground’ ideas of their use and effectiveness. “Know your enemy”, but how? “Attack unexpectedly”, but when? “Fake with great deception”, but where?
Big time western business theorists are not much better. ‘Vertically Integrate’, ‘Develop a Niche’, ‘take note of barriers to entry’ they say! But these are actually pretty darn obvious to the leaders and workers slugging it out on the hard streets - from Wall Street to Main Street – streets which, just as the worlds of Sun Tzu and Musashi, are a matter of real success or failure, existence or extinction, life and death.
What is wanted, what is needed and what this blog will deliver are explanations that are real and useable strategies for success in the hard-nosed combat of business and leadership. In reality, these works of philosophy are timeless work of strategy, forged through the test of steel to stand the test of time.
