“When an army is confused and perplexed, the feudal princes will cause trouble; this creates chaos in the ranks and gives away victory,” Sun Tzu said in The Art of War on page16. But how confusion and perplexity can be arranged? In a dialogue, for example, these two states of mind can be created with complexity and exhaustion. This is illustrated, as far as I am able to assess the situation, in The Art of War, namely, by showing and not by telling, as an aside. Sun Tzu said seriatimly the following: “A ruler can bring misfortune upon his troops in three ways: Ordering them to advance or to retreat when they should not is called hobbling the army; ignorant interference in military decisions confuses officers and men; ignorant meddling in military appointments perplexes officers and men. When an army is confused and perplexed, the feudal princes will cause trouble; this creates chaos in the ranks and gives away victory.” In my opinion, the first paragraph is suitable to confuse and perplex because the terms in use are abstract, complex, and uncommon. Thus, the reader is, on the one hand, exhausted and perplexed; meantime, the reader is distracted or even well-prepared for the subsequent lines. These lines, then, are not fully grasped by the reader. Here we have come full circle: a confused enemy is attacked successfully. Conclusively, a prepared, i.e. confused and perplexed, enemy is easier to defeat then a fresh one – men and weapon still keen. Confusion, by the way, can be established by complexity based on uncertainty etc. What does this all mean for everyday business? First of all, confusion could be established in a long-term setting. In other words, it is possible to expose a target person to a variety and subsequent events applying confusion and perplexity. This, for example, could start with a meeting on Monday morning and end with an event on Friday evening. This, of course, must be confusing and destabilizing. Furthermore, the discussed approach could be used in a single setting but radically and extensively. This means, the target person is exposed to the confusion over a longer time, and the confusion is piled-up strategically and successively. This could happen in a meeting too, but the degree of confusion is more extensive there. Finally, it might be possible to arrange complexity in a multilevel dialogue setting. Such a setting could include more than one party, while all parties are well-prepared, as the Harvard speaker is prepared in the movie Good Will Hunting – see previous post. So, eat a book (the one your enemies read and understood), learn it by heart, and confuse – confuse not only your grandmother but also the men behind the post office counter because exercise is essential. Do it on a regular basis, and you will succeed. Remark: do not confuse the bus driver on your way to work – never – because this could be connected with some danger.
Posted on: Fri, 07 Nov 2014 10:17:41 +0000
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