Stinging retorts only stir up further controversy, where as light-hearted banter, or the humble submission of alternative ideas can have a tranquillizing effect—like throwing water on a blazing fire.
If one wants to start one’s career as a general, one will be hard put to it to do so. It’s just like a race where one can’t leap straight from the starting point to the finishing line. To succeed in anything, we have to be like the tree, starting from the seed, growing slowly and putting out branches, twigs, leaves and flowers when the appropriate times come around
All too often, we have to lose in order to gain. We have to resign ourselves to our lowly position until we can work ourselves up to more satisfactory heights.
Those who have some goal or the other before them never allow themselves to become enmeshed in such things because that would mean being diverted from their objective. A purposeful man always looks ahead to the future—straightforward and not towards right or left. He always thinks of long-lasting consequences rather than momentary considerations. He looks at things not from the point of view of personal desires and whims, but from the point of view of reality.
