Resistance leads to success

One of the greatest virtues of all successful people is the ability to resist. Many of you may have learned this as perseverance, but I prefer to use the word perseverance. What is the difference? Well, perseverance means constantly fighting forward against the opposition, while resistance is, well, resistance. With resistance there is no need to fight forward. Sometimes it even means backtracking, moving away from your goals. This does not mean that you give up, you are just waiting for the optimal or most opportune moment to act.

There is an old fable by Chuang Tzu, who was a philosopher in ancient China some 2,200 years ago, that illustrates the magic of endurance. He starts with a fish named Kun. Now this fish is not just an ordinary fish. It is thousands of meters long. Kun evolves into Pung, who is a huge bird, thousands of meters wide. Dont ask me why. For Pung, success means flying south over the great sea to the Heavenly Pool. Pretty easy task, don’t you think? Nope! First, Pung furiously flaps his wings and soars to a height of ninety thousand kilometers. It takes him 6 months to do this. Only then can he begin his journey south towards the Heavenly Pool with nothing in his way.

A boat cannot float if the water is too shallow. Empty a glass of water on the floor and you can make a straw float in the water, but the glass will sink. Similarly, if there is not enough wind, it cannot support large wings. Only when the Pung is sixty thousand miles high can the wind hold it up.

When the grasshopper heard this story, it said to the dove: “When I want to climb the elm tree, I fly and try to reach higher ground. Sometimes I miss and fall to the ground, but slowly and surely I go forward. Why Pung have to travel thousands of miles without making any visible progress?

So there it is. Pung’s fable. I hope you get the moral of the story because it captures the essence of resistance. If you don’t, keep reading. I have identified two pearls of wisdom in this story:

1. When a person wants to take a short tour of the bay on his sailboat, he will have to pack enough food for a few hours. When a person wants to have an epic journey across the Pacific Ocean, he will have to pack enough food for a few months. If you aspire to a great achievement in life, you need extensive preparation. This doesn’t just mean gathering enough resources; it also includes waiting for the right moment to act.

2. When you prepare for your epic journey in life, you will criticize. That’s why you need to be true to your conviction and believe that, in the end, you will get what you set out to do. And you will. Only then can you lightly ignore criticism and endure criticism because you know you are a Pung Bird and the others, well, not Pung Birds.

Is all for today.

Happy life,

establish