Formlessness: The way of the warrior
On navigating life's obstacle. Adaptability. Going with the tide.
But for those that have not already attained mastery, structure and doctrine are needed because formlessness is useless to the beginner.
~ Gereon Hermkes
Systems dictate almost all areas of our life, and whether we like it or not these systems determine by arbitrary reasons the quality of life we get to live. We are organisms that are ranked by hierarchies, from which either order or disorder must rise however systemic. We are a duality of use and function and systems are set in place to achieve this.
Obstacles are part of the human experience and it is pertinent that we must view these situations (obstacles) as surmountable, however paradoxically insurmountable they might seem. Why? Because obstacles have a way of bringing about a solution to them, matter-of-fact solutions tend to be embedded in obstacles. Bacteria can cause harm to us as humans and within the genome of these bacteria lies the cure, example can be found in the case of penicillin.
We make the mistake of being too rigid in our approach which leaves us defenceless against things we can’t foresee, as is the case with uncertainty. We like to be sure therefore we create systems that ensures sustained continuity in what we’ve believed to be what works for us given the situation, nothing can be further from the truth. Evolution has always been a game of which species adapts to what under different circumstances and if anything is going to give us an edge as organisms or institutions, businesses or corporations it would be flexibility.
The greatest fighters aren’t the ones who are most prepared for all likely outcomes, the greatest fighters are the ones who are most adaptable to change. If there’s anything that stales a warrior it would be certainty. Being uncertain and moving ahead is the hallmark of greatness, things change and a warrior must adapt to the demands of the said battle, living in the past would make you stay there—in the past. Moving forward means coming to terms with things like courage, adaptability, and uncertainty.
Our obstacles tend to bring out the very things in us that allows us to survive, we have survival mechanisms embedded in our DNA and our comfort zones would not allow us to hone such skills if we don't put them to the test. Some of us would be warriors who go out to expand our territories and then taste glory, others would watch from the comfort of their castles, protected by things like history, pride, and recognition (trophies). But this means nothing in the face of change, one day is all it takes for all these things to become meaningless. We exist by arbitrary reasons and we die by equally arbitrary reasons, randomness and probability are the bread and butter of opportunists and as such one must be formless equally adapted to chaos and order, one must wield a two-edged sword of certainty and the unknown.
Mastery.
This is a qualitative feature of a warrior/fighter. This is a condition in which the within is in sync with the exterior. That is this is a rock that has been weathered. A seasoned veteran in the arena who has been there many times and can probably recite the creed by heart, the math Olympiad who has seen all equations, the grandmaster who has beaten all who have come before him, the businessman who has built his empire from scratch, the entrepreneur after many false starts now running on a superior model, Mozart, Da Vinci, Messi. This means you’ve gotten skin in the game, far from the naivety that plagues a novice. This is an essential feature of a warrior that translates into formlessness, the exterior is an extension of the interior, emptiness and fullness at the same time, as water takes the form of what it occupies and as it flows in a river.
The advantages of formlessness are numerous, but you have to master the essentials, essentialism has to be the core of your approach, and thers’s no use going to war if you’ve not yet mastered the art of war.
The End.
Side Note.
To my dear readers/subscribers, this is another experiment. I’ve mixed all my knowledge and this is the output, I was bad at chemistry class, and this might be a mixture of the wrong acid and the wrong base but I hope it passes the litmus test which is your opinion, be a sport and either share it with me in the comment section or better still keep it to yourself.
I promise to be more consistent with these.