I just started rereading one of my all-time favorite books, The 33 Strategies of War
“Enemies also give you a standard by which to judge yourself, both personally and socially. The samurai of Japan had no gauge of their excellence unless they fought against the best swordsman; it took Joe Frazier to make Mohammad Ali a truly great fighter. A tough opponent will bring out the best in you. And the bigger the opponent, the greater your reward, even in defeat. It is better to lose to a worthy opponent than to squash some harmless foe.”
This is exactly what I was talking about in Valhalla. Even the last line of the quote is eerily similar to my sentence, “It’s better to go down swinging against a good opponent than to breeze through a mediocre one.”
Greene’s thoughts on strategy are very interesting and I would recommend this book to anyone. He has a knack for capturing the essence of combat and then boiling it down to simple, yet deeply insightful dictums. These timeless principles are applicable to coaches and athletes just as much as, if not more than, generals and soldiers. His ideas have been extremely influential on me and provide a unique lens through which I view the sport of wrestling.
