The strategy of the Iron Curtain for (doom) couple.

The Iron Curtain concept was developped in the climax of the cold war. The Communist East european countries, lead by the Soviet Union, litterally and physically separated Europe into two parts. The West: the decadent capitalists (so they said). And the East: the brave new world of communists.

Nothing was coming out the communist states. It was hard to know anything. How they live? What they were up to? What’s their thoughs and trends? Etc… We only knew what they allowed to west to know. And then. They were surprising every ones at the Olympics with the quality of their athletes. Or at Universal Expositions, they were stunning the world with their technological, social, education breaktouts…

In short. The Iron Curtain strategy implies that you develop, grow and improve better than your opponent. But you let know nothing of your improvements to your opponents. So while they sleep and think that every thing is good under the sky, you on your side, are deploying massive efforts to eventually overcome your opponent.

A few years ago one of my good friend had a wife (noticed the verb time here?).

She was one of the worst bitch I have ever seen, She took him for granted. She was complaining all the time. Nothing was too good for her or well made enough for her. My friend could not talk to her. Every time he did so, it was turned against him. She took all opportunity she had, even publicly to morally emasculate my friend. Here is a few examples he told me:

He decided once to take boxing class (nothing to do with her). When he happily announced it to his wife, she looked at him scornfully and said something like “you wouldn't be able to strike a mouse…” Every time my friend talked about a project he had, she turned it down. Every time he proposed an idea or a solution to what ever situation in the house, for the kids, etc… it was never good. And she always reproched him his opinions as stupid, unclear, unrealistic, what ever.

So my friend closed himself. For five years that this situation went on before the break up, he took boxing class, got promotted, proposed stuff that were accepted at work or in his cummunity, went to movies with friends without sharing toughts and opinions about it to his wife, he read books that he ketp for himself. He trained his body. She probably had noticed the change but didn’t say a word about it. He even took salsa class and became good at it. Without his wife knowing or caring. And that is where he met his current girlfriend.

All along he never shared a single thought, opinion, suggerstion with his wife. The conversation was to the effect of mundane things: “pass me the milk please… don’t forget to cut the grass… bla bla bla…” No shouting, less complaints and critique from his wife because she had nothing, no ground, no material on which she could critique.

On his side my friend was evolving, learning new things, meeting new people. He improved his finances and managed to make some savings on his side. His self-esteem increased because he was not slaped on the head anymore at every breath he was taking. And at one point he got enough self-esteem, accumulated enough pride and confidence that he left his wife and started a new life with salsa girl.

See what my friend did is to use the Iron Curtain strategy. In the face of total adversity. Some times it is better not to fight up front. There is no use. You will end up depleting your energy and that’s it. Instead, stay quiet. Mind your own business. Do not offer any thought, any opinions, any help that would be scornfully dashed anyway. Evolve the way you want to evolve without sharing it with the source of your… resistance.

You will come to a point in which you will feel more full, more accomplished. And you will feel higher self-esteem because you will have accomplished all that by your own, without help or support (help and support that would have not come anyway). And you will accomplish all that without the critique, complaints, the derision from your “opponent”.

When you start such a strategy. It must be clear in your head that the relationship you have with the “opponent” is seriously severed. Some time to the point of no return. But for some reasons, you cannot quit, leave, let go or break the relationship all together for now. Therefore you rely on the Iron Curtain strategy for the time it serves your purpose.

Poor choice of strategy.

The other day I was tired so I decided to play couch potato and flip the channels on the TV. I got to the season premiere of a show we’ve got here. They place six guys and six girls in a house and the couple that comes out of it with "true love" gets to win a house, furniture and money.

On the season’s premiere the girls gets to pick the guys that are going to be allowed in the house. There is about 12 guys and only 6 will be chosen. But this year they introduced a twist. In the previous season, I’ve been told by a girl friend of mine who watch the show, that the guys presented themselves one after the other and all the girls decided together if they want to keep the guy or not. This year, once a girl decided to keep a guy, she then lost her "vote" to keep any further guys. She then had to rely on the remaining girls’ choice for further candidates. Each girl had to choose one guy and by doing so, loosing their right to choose for now on.

So the first guy comes along, presents himself and then while the girls were deliberating, they passed a little clip of the guy before he met the girls. The guy said "I want to be the first to pass because in the previous seasons the first was always selected". When the guy came back on the stage to get the girls’ result, what I suspected happened.
The girls decided to let go of him and not to choose him.

I knew it! This guy made a very bad choice of strategy. What he did is to ignore the state of the environment. The rules had changed and he played his strategy by the rules of last season… and lost.

See. Since the girls will loose their right of choice as soon as they choose to keep a guy, then they won’t want to waste their right on the first candidate. There is still plenty of men to come therefore the cost of letting go of the first one is minimum for the girls. The guys should have fought to pass somewhere when around 2/3 of the guys were passed. Because by then the girls’ choices would become scarce and would practically take anything that comes that fits their lowest standard, based on their fright of the next candidate being worst than the present one. Know what I mean?
So unless you are a drop dead Calvin Klein model, don’t pass first on those condition.

This set up is the same thing as in life. And several studies had been made on this. See. When women are young, they are picky. They play difficult. But as time past, when they see all their friends getting married and getting kids, while the only thing they can rely on is… they carrier. Then they get less picky. Their clock is ticking and the studies shows that as more the time past, the lower the standards gets.

So you want to get a gorgeous woman on your arm? Look at those single 30 to 40 years old women. There is less competition in that niche and women are more willing to bend their... rules of choice.

To finish with the morale of the story: When playing a game. Any games. A game of love on TV or the game of life. Make sure you understand on which rules you are playing. And to get an advantage over your opponents, understand the others’ responses and behaviour under those rules. By not understanding the rules of his game, our first guy got dismissed and lost.

My 100th post!

This is my 100th post!

I am very proud because starting a blog is fairly easy. Keeping it alive and up to date is an entire ball game.

Consistancy. That is what is required. And my experiences so far has thought my that, in most undertakings, often the winner is not the strongest or the smartest, or the one with the more experience. No. it is the one with the more consistancy.

Patiently but surely...

As per my blog stats. I haven't advertised my blog anywhere. And I did that in purpose. I wanted to know how it would grow by the force of its content uniquely. And I must say I'm impressed and satisfied. But I wonder if I can do more. I am going to do two things.

1. I will make my intervention more... sound. Based on facts and studies. Relevant information.

2. I will ask the pulse of my readers. What do you want to hear and know about strategy?

The ball is in your camp now. The question is out. I'll wait for your responses.

Tribute to 9/11

Today no post.

But a tribute to the victims of the worst terrorist attack of modern times.

A day that will live in infamy. A day that really brought to the world the meaning of terror.

Thoughts... following Quest for fire

I watched an old movie this week-end. One I've seen some 30 years ago: Quest for fire.

If you haven't seen it. I highly recommand it to you. You can watch it by following this link.

Don'worry about the language. There is none all along the movie. It is the story of a cave men clan that is been attacked by a horde of other... cave men or monkeys... And they have been stolen their fire. So they send a party of their best warriors to a journey to find fire (they have not found how to make fire yet).

The movie is very interesting on several levels. But there is one that stroke me. At one point they encounter a clan. You can see that it is a more advanced clan: they know how to make fire. Thus they can allocate their time on other endeavour. For instance, they know how to build huts (while the "hero" ' s clan live in a cave). They dance, they paint. They surrounded their village with an intricate network of quicksand. So they don't get anoided by invaders...

So this accumulation of wealth and power over the other tribes brings them more leasure time. And I wondered. Is this all it is? Wealth and power brings leasure? That's it?

Well it looks like it. When you watch most of the empires that have risen. Wealth and power have brouth more leasure to its population. But then I asked myself. So why is it that a significantly advanced civilizaion always end up declining and desapear?

That is when it struck me. Any empire get destructed by the very thing that wealth and power brings! It gets more powerful and wealthier. This brings more leasure to its population. Then abundant leasure brings boredom, lasiness, idleness and procrastination. And then slowly the empire gets cracked and at one point, it breaks appart. We tend to think that its this horde of civilization A that brought down the empire B. Or the nation of C that overcame empire D. But in fact they were all able to destroy the empire after it was weaken from within.

That is what happened to the Roman empire. That is what happened to the British empire. And that is what we see happeneing to the American empire right now.

I rest my case!

I've talked before on this blog about my philosophy of getting out of the corporate slavery reality. But who I'm I really to have an original idea and original thought about the subject right?

I mean I am a nobody. I didn't write anything of any importance, I never atchieved anything of significant national or human scaled value... so who I'm I to question the status quo?

But at last I am not the only one now. Some people more influential than me are getting the point.

Read this: from Seth Godin' Blog.

Now if you want to be a sheap. Well by all means go ahead and be a sheap. But please do know that you are a sheap. Don't fool yourself and don't live in denial. Accept the fact consciously: " I am a sheap. I have no inclination of being my own boss. I follow orders. That's the way I am. Its my nature".

There is no shame about it. As long as you don't try to fool yourself. You might be able to do so. But you won't fool others.

Do you remember my case study Eric? Eric is my friend and I love him dearly as a friend. But there is one thing that is bothering me with him. As per his job, he lives in total denial.

No later than last week he told me that he had to go to his company's head office with the rest of his team. This was the equivalent of going to the slauther house. They told them that they had to cut half of the staff and that the remaining people will have to swallow a pay cut. Know what he told me when he got back? He said:"you know what, I am greatful. I still have a job in these difficult times".

WHAT!

You lick the hand that just smashed you!? I can`t believe it.

I've explained my corporate philosophy to Eric and he rejected it entirely. He prefers to live in the model that we've learnt at school and from our parents:"go to school, find a good job, and work hard until you die".

Now I don't argue with my friend anymore on that subject. But I can`t help it but feel sad for him. A few weeks ago, before going to the head office, he cancelled going to climb mount Kilimandjaro with me because he said that his job was too uncertain to do such travel and make such expenses. I mean is this just me but how can you let an outside party decide for you what you are going to do or not?

And listen. In one way I am no better than my friend either. I still work for someone else for a living. And loosing that job will be a financial blow to me, I must admit. But at least I consider that I am awake. And that I am deploying energies in order to get rid of my employer. Instead of doing nothing.

But getting back to our main subject, don't be fooled my dear readers. You are a corporate slave until the day you get to the office day and realize that, if you still go in there to work, it is because you like it. Not for financial aid. When you realize that you still go to work because you like it and you like the people, and that if you wanted. Or if you were obligated to leave, this wouldn't affect you financially. THAT is when you`ll know that you are not a slave anymore.

And a good strategy of life is to either maintain this state of being. Or gain it back.

The shock doctrine

Ok I'm back!

The summer vacations are over. Lets resume on the Strategy blog.

I suggest to you a very good book to read on strategy that has ramification in economics, war, espionage and psychology.

It suggest that a massive collective trauma makes people become like kids. And then they are more willing to give up their rational thinking and give in to anyone who would come and lead the way.

Take this simple example. I'm sure it happened to anyone of us. There must be a memory that you have in which you screwed up. And some adult shouted at you something like "There! You see! I told you! Now you will listen to me and do as I say!" And you did comply.

The shock doctrine works on the same principle. "But it cannot be applied to an entire population" You would say. Think again.

On September 12th 2001. And the following days. Did the Bush administration had any problems in passing laws that restrict people's freedom for the benefit of national security? No it did not. In normal time this would have generated a scandal and a wave of protest against the federal government stating that it want to destroy the constitution and enslave the population. What happened instead? People thought that the government took a sound decision and population was reassured.

Lets take another example. In the fall of 2008 after the collapse of the financial market. Did the population scream that their government were turning communist? That the government was trying to put its hand on everything that counts in the economy? No. Everybody took it as a salvation act by the government. But look what has happened this last summer without a massive crisis when it was time to vote a government extension right on borrowing. The entire nation closely came to total stall.

No major crisis, then no easy acceptance of massive measures.

Now I don’t say that those crises were provoked by the government. I don’t say that there was a conspiracy behind that. But was I do say is that some instances in the government are well aware of the shock doctrine. And since we have a crises, lets use it to our advantage to make our way…

Want to make your way? Wait for a major crisis. Be patient, it will come. And then speak loud and clear when it happens. People will follow your footsteps.

I recommend you watch this movie. Its part in French but most parts are in English.

Its very good.

And what did I tell you about languages? First knowing more that one language is giving you a strategic advantage over people who knows only one. And second, Lord Francis Bacon said that the knowledge of the world starts by the knowledge of languages.