Before You Attack a New Challange Commit to Paying the Price The Art of War

vii Life-Changing Lessons From "The Art Of War"

I recently read the book "The Fine art Of State of war", which is an ancient Chinese military treatise, written past war machine strategist Sun Tzu. Even though its focus is on military strategies, the lessons from this volume have been practical to many areas, such equally legal situations, pedagogy, and businesses. Information technology also contains lots of great advice on how to make the best out of life.

If y'all acquire to embrace the lessons Sunday Tzu shares in his book, it can exist a life irresolute one!

1. Earlier you attack a new challange, commit to paying the price.

Whatever you are trying to achieve, whether that is running your first marathon or earning an additional $twenty,000, realize that you lot will take to pay for it in the grade of fourth dimension, attempt, hurting, and sacrifices. Anything worth having comes at a price. The bigger the goal, the greater sacrifice is necessary.

As James Allen said, "He who would accomplish little need cede picayune; he who would achieve much must sacrifice much. He who would attain highly must sacrifice greatly."

In other words, if you set up your goals high, exist prepared to pay the toll. Failure to practise and then tin can lead to excuses and a lack of follow-through when the going gets tough.

Before you lot set out to achieve anything, think of the time, effort, and sacrifices information technology will

accept and commit to paying the price alee of time. Write it down on paper below your goals, and determine whether you are willing to exercise any it takes to get the results you lot want.

Whenever you are struggling, don´t just revisit your goal, but besides your commitment to exercise whatever it takes. When you have a goal worth fighting for, never surrender!

2. Planning and preparation are the key to success.

As a military strategist, Sun Tzu knew that planning a battle and preparing for it thoroughly were necessary on the battlefield. He would spend countless hours refining his knowledge and agreement of boxing strategies and wrote down everything he learned to be improve prepared for the next claiming.

This abiding learning of his craft gave him the power to empathise the fine art of state of war better than nearly anyone else at that time. However, Sun Tzu too knew that planning lonely isn´t enough. Even the nigh perfectly laid out plan would inevitably fail if his soldiers weren´t prepared to actually make his ideas happen. Simply knowing something is not enough, yous need to apply information technology.

To do that, he would drill his soldiers until every formation and every move was repeated so ofttimes that it became second nature. His soldiers became so disciplined that they followed every order he gave. Merely through this constant preperation and repetition of the aforementioned things did his soldiers learn to fight together, besides as to follow their orders no matter how frightening the boxing was.

Ultimately, what decides between success and failure in the defining moments of your life is the amount of preperation you put in beforehand. As Arnold Schwarzenegger put it, "There are no shortcuts — everything is reps, reps, reps."

No matter whether you lot are preparing for a new project at work or your offset marathon, repetition is key. The more than you practice something, the better you get at it. If yous run l miles every week, you will probably shell someone that is more talented but doesn´t put in as much work. Constant repetition is your opportunity to seperate yourself from the masses. If yous are willing to put in the work, there is nothing you cannot do.

Equally Benjamin Franklin noted so wisely, "By failing to ready, you are preparing to fail." Never make that mistake.

three. The boxing is won in the listen long before it is won on the field.

Before yous set human foot on the battlefield, know in your heed that you will win. Develop the belief in yourself and your abilities that yous can succeed at whatever challenges life may throw at you. The hardest role of whatever challenge, whether that is an important presentation at piece of work or the weekly soccer game for your son, is getting in the right state of mind.

Information technology´s about developing the calm conviction in yourself and your preparation so that y'all know there is no way other than to succeed. Equally legendary basketball game jitney John Wooden said, "Success comes from knowing that you did your best to become the all-time you are capable of becoming."

In other words, information technology means to know that yous did everything in your ability to set, and that the cognition and expertise you take gained forth the way will comport you through even the well-nigh challenging circumstances.

Before y'all have your side by side "battle" in life, whether big or small, win in your heed first before you really do it. Visualize your victory and see yourself succeeding in everything you do.

4. Intermission down large tasks into smaller ones.

In his book, Sun Tzu repeatedly talks about directing whole armies of over 100,000 men. How on earth could you do that in an era without internet and mass communication technologies? How could you possibly command that many men at the same time?

According to Sunday Tzu, it´south uncomplicated: You group a few hundred or even one thousand men together and care for them as one. Suddenly, instead of having to direct a 100,000 men individually, you can control them by directing a few big groups. Substantially, you lot break downwards a big job into many smaller ones to make them more manageable.

Sounds elementary enough? The aforementioned concept can be applied to tackling any goal that may seem a bit overwhelming at first. When you gear up your goals loftier, you often have no reference point for succeeding yet. What I mean past that is that you have never done anything similar, and then y'all don´t know if you are truly capable of making it happen.

Let´due south say you merely started to run regularly, just your ultimate goal is to run a marathon. Evidently, that would be a huge challenge to most of us, particularly when we are simply starting out. When y'all are barely able to run for three miles in a row, running a marathon may seem impossible.

That´south when breaking downwards your big goal into several smaller ones comes into play. For example, you could practice decide to run a 5k first, so a 10k, a half-marathon, and but so, later you take mastered all of those, attack the marathon. By doing this, you will not but proceeds the physical fitness, but, even more than chiefly, the conviction of having mastered many smaller goals along the way. Suddenly, the huge goal of running a marathon becomes manageable considering you know that yous are preparing yourself with every stride along the way.

5. Exist flexible in your methods, merely not your results.

In the fine art of war, as in life, it is necessary that yous are able to suit to circumstances that prevent you lot from doing the things you planned on doing. Sun Tzu describes many times how he had to change his programme due to unforeseen circumstances. Whether that was the weather, the battle ground, his enemies, or sickness in his own troops, he had to adapt to the new reality and deal with it.

The reality of life is that adversity does occur, and when that happens, y'all demand to alter your plans. Exist flexible in the methods you utilize, but not in the results you work for. If ane manner seems to fail, endeavour another one. There is e'er a way, your task is only to find information technology and then pursue it with all your ability.

Never give up on your goal merely because it got harder, only instead inquire yourself: How can I utilize this? How can this help me in the future? And what tin can I do right at present to arrange and succeed anyways?

If you make this a regular habit, you will soon detect that every obstacle also contains the opportunity to better yourself and your life. Information technology is in defying the storm that the sailer becomes groovy, and then tin you.

6. If you want to accept the island, fire the boats!

This brilliant quote goes back to Julius Caesar, the Roman emperor who sabbatum out to conquer England 2000 years ago by boat. Upon landing at the coast, his soldiers soon realized that they were by far outnumbered by the Celts, and fright started to spread. Instead of preparing for boxing, Caesar establish his soldiers preparing the ships for a quick and easy retreat.

The brilliant general he was, Caesar knew that in the condition his men were in, the battle was already lost. Just instead of joining the ranks of fearful men, Caesar decided to do something else: He burnt the boats, and therefore whatever hope to ever leave the island unless they conquered the whole country. This sent a powerful message both to his army and his enemies. From the moment he ready the boats on fire, everyone knew that in that location was just one outcome: to fight until death. The simply style for the Romans to live was to win the boxing, and then Caesar gained 100% delivery from his fellow soldiers.

Now, what can we learn from this? If you have a big dream in your life, burn the friggin boats! Destroy every possible excuse and brand success the only option there is — only then will yous enjoy the kind of success you are capable of. Commit your unabridged beingness to making your dreams come up true, and never take failure as concluding. If you take a gunkhole to save yous from failing on your dream, the all-time thing you can do is burn it. That is obviously non always easy, but will allow y'all to go all-in and brand it happen while others are however looking for excuses.

Burn down the boats, and never give up until you succeed. In the words of Les Brown, "Information technology´south not over until I win!" Keep playing the game until you lot win, no matter how many times it may take.

7. Expect the all-time, but set up for the worst.

When planning for war, Sun Tzu always had to ready for the worst. No matter how greatly trained his soldiers were, the possibility of surprise through their enemies was always there. Going into battle, in that location were countless variables and tactics to consider. Just by preparing for and anticipating his enemie´s moves would he be able to succeed. Information technology was therefore disquisitional that he considered the worst-case scenario with possible solutions at all times. For every move his opponent might brand, he had to find a counteraction.

When working on a projection at work or doing anything else that is important to the states, we have to use the same kind of dedication to detail sometimes. In that location are often a dozen things that tin go wrong with any plan, so anticipating this in advance and coming up with possible solutions to either prevent it or minimize the damage tin can prove to be very helpful.

Nevertheless, this is non to say that nosotros should always be looking for what could go incorrect in life. Clearly, that kind of mindset would non only hinder success, but also all happiness in life. If all y'all do is imagine the things that could get incorrect with everything, the world will look like a rather dark and frustrating identify. Information technology is therefore critical to happiness in life that you e'er go on a positive mental attitude and wait things to go your mode — while at the same time preparing for possible issues.

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