With Memorial day coming up I am reminded of a distinct and timeless rule for victory in any area, and that rule is “Set Your Own Patterns”
In a fight, this would be breaking the rhythm and asserting your own tempo. It’s the same in
a verbal negotiation. It’s the same in all of life. Patterns are essentially “territories.”
The Art of War tells us much about victory being assured when the terrain is controlled. In other words we call this “the home court advantage.”
When I see a holiday approaching, I hear the small talk “will you barbeque today or tomorrow?” etc etc, and I notice that everybody is doing what everybody else is doing. They aren’t necessarily celebrating what the particular holiday was designed to honor.
Many of the revelers barely know what the holiday is for, they just celebrate that it’s a “day off.”
The truth about Memorial Day is that it means “in memory of our honored dead.” We should be paying our respects to those who died in the service of our country. I found a great site
about Memorial Day here
http://www.usmemorialday.org/
Send it to as many young folks as you can, especially folks who’ve had it conditioned
out of them through the “party” crowd, or who never knew it in the first place.
You see, the partying youth and vacationers lined up along the freeways and at the airports
this weekend are often following a pattern.
I sometimes refer to this as Style without Substance.
Even at a young age, I always felt differently about such things. Running with the crowd and
going “whoop! whoop!” just because it was St. Patrick’s Day, or just because it was some other holiday didn’t make sense to me.
I had my own plans. And I made sure to understand a holiday’s true substance if I were going to celebrate it.
And most folks didn’t have a clue what the true historical meaning of these holidays
were really about anyway. It was just an excuse to ‘party’ or go along with what everybody else is doing.
Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not the grinch. I love the spirit of Christmas, Thanksgiving
and other fun holidays that gives us a little time off to kick back and enjoy our family and friends.
But “just going along because that’s what we always do” is something herds of sheep and
cows do. That’s not intentional living by design, it’s living by default.
And when you live by default, rather than design, you end up broke, weak and unhappy.
Or worse – fat, dumb and happy.
By staying self-contained and in your center, you can delightfully smile as others squirm in
shock when they see you are not bound by the constraints of the Style.
And, you continually intuit the Substance of something, rather than simply swallowing the Style like a cow feeding at the troff of convention.
Once you intuit substance, you can set your own patterns, your own course, and you begin to see life in a whole new way, literally controlling the outcome with only the slightest of effort.
Possibilities open up like never before, you reach a state of calm and cool in any circumstance, and you find you have much more energy, lasting peace and true freedom.
And speaking of freedom, let’s take time on Monday to sincerely thank the people who died
for our freedom, okay? Here it is again, go check it out and spread the word
Sincerely,
Scott Bolan
© 2008 Masters Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
