Kirk’s thoughts about a steady habit of failure analysis, without victory celebrations are too tempting to pass up. Let’s turn there, for your daily journal work right now, team!
Kirk, here’s my own failure, and not just in the work you and I have done on this practice together, either. I’ve analyzed my failures to teach proper failure analysis, and this is one of the biggest, most painful lessons. I have often simply failed to even share, let alone drive home, the actual reason FOR failure analysis, at all. Here it is: (Continued)
* * * In order to separate out what is quite simple from what is complex, and to arrange these matters methodically, we ought, in the case of every series in which we have deduced certain facts the one from the other, to notice which fact is simple, and to mark the interval, greater, less, or equal which separates all the others from this. * * *
We have worked on the practice of flowing from a general rule to a specific instance and back again. If you have any science or logic training, the terms induction and deduction give us what we require. But sadly, most people today simply do NOT have such words ready for use. Still, to go from general to specific, from specific to general, back and forth, this is simply a mandatory skill if we’re actually going to think about what we do; if we’re going to listen to and possibly even obey Rene.
Let’s try an example. Your face affects your voice. We know that you sound very different on the telephone when you smile. (Continued)
“Note to train this:
cut, thrusts, guards—soft and hard.”
Johann Liechtenauer – 1389
Let’s first look at soft and hard. Our master has chosen a slight variation on The Strong and The Weak, and has opted for “soft” and “hard.” This really is very telling. The Strong, and The Weak, albeit places, are also ways of doing things. You hold your sword more softly or harder, in various moments. But now let’s back up. We cut more softly or harder. We thrust more softly or harder. We even, can it be?, we even guard more softly or harder? That’s a bit more difficult to picture, isn’t it? We’ll come back to that. (Continued)
Motivation in place, decision in hand, I executed. I immediately knew to give up my Cracker Jack, of course. All sweets gone – unlike now, I got to eat fruit plentifully back then, it was only processed sugar that I excised – I started reading labels. One of the surprises was that I had to stop eating bread, since every loaf we could find listed sugar in the ingredients. If it said the word “sugar” I didn’t eat it.
That summer, between 6th & 7th grade, I lost 10 pounds of weight. But, fortune’s wind blew my way. Or, stopping my sugar intake functioned in some strange way as a beneficial trigger (more on that in a moment). But, I grew 6 inches that summer and returned to school a different boy. (Continued)
Finally, here below is our Unpublished Rule 6 put back together again. Please do work with it though. Let me guide you just a bit before we turn to it.
First, read it slowly, even word by word, but don’t stop at any word or phrase. Why not? So as to let the whole emerge as the parts gel back together again.
Second, you’d do even better to read it out loud. This works just fine in a whisper, but I recommend actually reading out loud, as in OUT LOUD. Don’t be embarrassed. You’re working on the most important material ever constructed. Be bold. Be LOUD!
More, think about the benefits of reading out loud. When you read with your eyes alone, who knows what’s going on in your mind? (Continued)
1. That which cuts from above, the Wrath Strike threatens him with the point.
2. If he recognizes this, so lift off above without danger.
3. Become stronger against and thrust!
4. If he marks this, take it below.
Johann Liechtenauer – 1389
See if you can’t follow the back and forth now, in this first actual sequence or encounter that our maser walks us gently, wonderfully through!
In step one, he struck at you from above and you threatened him with your point using your simple Wrath Strike.
In step two, he felt your point’s threat and you detected this. That means you could tell he was aware of your point, so you simply lifted off above without danger. (Continued)
Girls always had something to do with it. Specifically, we had a sports day once per year, where participation was required. The worst thing, and I do mean worst, was the running race in which everyone, boys and girls alike, ran to the end of the playground and back. We didn’t actually compete, the three of us, but there were three poor bastards who always came in last. If we’d been a bit wiser, we actually would have competed not to be the last, but none of us had that insight. And yes, when I say last, I mean including all the girls, who beat the three of us roundly every year, year after excruciating year. I didn’t know it yet, but that was motivation. (Continued)
The Godfather Commentaries #39
The Godfather, Chapter 1, Page 44, Paragraphs 6 & 7, Sentences 23 – 26.
“He had understood immediately…” Easy to believe, isn’t it? Don Vito reads people, and he does it in the moment, real time, in the very instant of encounter. No detail is too small. No emotion is too short, fleeting or unimportant. Don Vito reads emotions as others read letters. Don’t forget that. If you would build your powers as a Don, you must learn to see, to read, to understand and ultimately to feel other peoples’ emotions.
What did he understand so quickly? (Continued)