Definition: Show them you are not to be taken lightly.
Sacrifice someone close to them to convince them of your intent
The ancient Chinese called this strategy ‘Point to the
Mulberry, Berate the Pagoda’. It means that you demonstrate the lengths you
will go to in the face of failure or deceit of one’s subordinates. There is an
old story that the Chinese strategist Sun Tzu was presented at court and the
emperor said ‘if you can make an army of my concubines I’ll believe that your
skills are indeed formidable’. However, once presented the concubines could not
be brought to order adequately so Sun Tzu ordered that several of them be
publicly executed after which the remainder paid very close attention to his
instructions. The emperor though sad to lose the concubines was convinced that
Sun was the right man to get things done. On occasion one has to demonstrate to
others that you will not be trifled with and that your orders must be obeyed.
Another way to use this strategy is by using oneself as the
example for instance in training leaders the adage is that one must ‘lead from the front’ and the strength
of this is that one’s subordinates see that you don’t ask them to do anything
that you wouldn’t, or haven’t done yourself.
My father taught me when I was young that if you are faced
with having to fight several opponents that you should if you can call out the
biggest and toughest looking and if you can beat him his comrades will think
twice about taking you on. Of course the strategy needs that you pick your
target well. Part of the strategy is to make it impossible for your target to
back down without appearing to be a coward. I have used this more than once and
whilst I risked a lot it was a case of being between a rock and a hard place
and taking the lesser of two evils. If it went badly then either way I’d get a
beating, thankfully I was lucky on both occasions and managed to escape
reasonably unscathed.
If you can set the example by showing one opponent what he
will suffer by beating someone else you can take a significant psychological
advantage.
Part 3 coming tomorrow - don't forget to subscribe for more information on strategy and the martial arts
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Best wishes
Tony Higo
www.nat-mac.co.uk
www.beatboxx.co.uk
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