What exactly is winning? Is it about winning over your opponent? Or winning yourself? Or achieving your goals and aspirations?
To me, winning is about one and only thing: Flexibility. That's right, if you are flexible enough, eventually you will get what you want and want what you get.
The 36 Stratagems is not just a collection of Chinese Wisdom. In fact, if you read the entire book you'll realize that this book appears to contradict itself and different people interpret the stratagems in different ways. Isn't this book just about one thing: Change?
Change is the name of the game in The 36 Stratagems
One can be flexible and change his tactics but there is one thing that one cannot change: his Dao or Moral. This stated very clearly in the preface of this book:
六六三十六， 数中有术， 术中有数，
The 36 stratagems have many different permutations.
阴阳燮理，机在其中，机不可设，设而不中
Because of nature's ever-changing nature, one cannot set things up to trap people.
In short, one cannot be cunning. This is my inference from the preface here.
If The 36 Stratagems is not about being crafty and trap people, what is it about? What's the benefit of knowing them?
To me, knowing The 36 Stratagems will help one to be flexible and change with the situation, and that is the greatest intelligence of all.
In the next article, we shall look at how one can change and win just by knowing and applying one stratagem: Remove your cover to Reveal Inside
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