FenixUchiha Know Yourself, Know Others (知己知彼) (V1)
Referencing
Victory Without Battle (不戦而勝) (V1) VOLUME I Chapter III Victory Without Battle (Fusen ni Shōzu) 不戦而勝 The best victory is the one that leaves no battlefield. Humans seem to be weirdly fond of u…
FenixUchiha · Discussion · on 9/12/26 27 17 Volume I
Chapter II
Know Yourself, Know Others (Chiki Chihi)
知己知彼
The world becomes difficult when we enter into it without first understanding the person through whose eyes we see it.
To know yourself is not merely to know your strengths. Anyone can admire their virtues. Far harder is to recognize the fears which disguise themselves as the principles, the pride, which calls itself dignity, and the desires that quietly dictate our decisions pretending to be reason.
Socrates made self knowledge the beginning of wisdom. The Stoics taught us that we suffer not only from events, but from the judgments we place on them. Nietzsche warned us that beneath our conscious explanations, there are deeper forces of instinct and desire. Each points toward the same uncomfortable truth: a person can be strange to themselves too.
Understanding others require equal discipline too.
People rarely reveal themselves by the what they claim to value. Watch out what they repeatedly choose in the face of comfort, fear, pride, and interest. Character is not what a person says they are. It is what remains when the pretending becomes inconvenient.
But knowledge of others should not turn into suspicions of everyone. To understand human nature is to understand that people are contradictory, frightened, ambitious, loving, selfish, generous, and uncertain, often within the same hour.
The wise person therefore studies neither themselves nor others to control them.
They study both to stop from getting deceived by either.
Next Ch-
Chapter 3 - 不戦而勝 (Fusen ni shōzu): Victory Without Battle
Chapter II
Know Yourself, Know Others (Chiki Chihi)
知己知彼
The world becomes difficult when we enter into it without first understanding the person through whose eyes we see it.
To know yourself is not merely to know your strengths. Anyone can admire their virtues. Far harder is to recognize the fears which disguise themselves as the principles, the pride, which calls itself dignity, and the desires that quietly dictate our decisions pretending to be reason.
Socrates made self knowledge the beginning of wisdom. The Stoics taught us that we suffer not only from events, but from the judgments we place on them. Nietzsche warned us that beneath our conscious explanations, there are deeper forces of instinct and desire. Each points toward the same uncomfortable truth: a person can be strange to themselves too.
Understanding others require equal discipline too.
People rarely reveal themselves by the what they claim to value. Watch out what they repeatedly choose in the face of comfort, fear, pride, and interest. Character is not what a person says they are. It is what remains when the pretending becomes inconvenient.
But knowledge of others should not turn into suspicions of everyone. To understand human nature is to understand that people are contradictory, frightened, ambitious, loving, selfish, generous, and uncertain, often within the same hour.
The wise person therefore studies neither themselves nor others to control them.
They study both to stop from getting deceived by either.
Next Ch-
Chapter 3 - 不戦而勝 (Fusen ni shōzu): Victory Without Battle
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