Good Commanders eat last. They live on scraps knowing well fed privates win more wars than fat officers. Someone needs to remind the President to eat, because they should be busy making sure the Generals had dinner. Ideals. The Chain of of Command is a bottom up thing. All hierarchy that fails, fails when it doesn’t take care of their lowest rung of membership. When America and Michigan fail, it is when the people with the food forget their supposed to feed people. They get caught up in shiny bullshit and mausoleum decoration. As a leader in this organization, you can have anything you want – as long as your people have everything they need.
When you look out on a sea of people or just across the room to another person, see that extension of yourself that gets the real work done. This group that feels like friends, feels like family, feels like an army, is people. People of the standard issue people-pattern, printed in hospitals, barns, and taxis across the globe. Each of us little naked screamers borne from woman portal. Ripped from oblivion into history and back into oblivion. See them as a basket of puppies, or as a room full of newborns in various states of growth. Little cribs with long legs and arms hanging out. Unheld, unloved babies, left abandoned in a crowd.
A monster sees opportunity there. However, where there are sheep there are wolves. Where there are those that need aid and guidance, there will be those that hunt the meek and lost. There is the strategy of kindness and good leadership to combat attrition in the ranks. It is simply more valuable to the company, a better stewardship of resources, to ensure everyone is taken care of. A troop that is fed, paid, and rested, is ready. It’s that simple. A troop that is hungry, broke, and tired, is not mission ready.
Leaders eat last to ensure their people are cared for. Leaders eat last to ensure their people are ready for war.
Too many people have awful advice and expectations about avoiding failure. A fear of failure causes people to stay stagnant in their lives. Often people will say things like, “there is no excuse for failure,” and things like that.
We will fail first and make it clear to subordinates that we expect them to fail. We expect them to waste our money, break our equipment, and loose radios and cars in a swamp. We expect them to test us and test themselves. We expect them to try new things and explore new ideas and places. All of those expectations mean that first, we expect them to fail.
Members must be used to failing, being embarrassed, and having their hopes dashed – more importantly, they should expect to fail first and be supported always. If we expect failure then we plan for failure. If it’s in the plan, then it’s supposed to happen and nothing is really a problem.
Risk should be mitigated to allow for engagement in higher levels of risk. Long term and strategic thinking will give people the insight they need to look past their immediate woes and to be comfortable moving towards further goals. There is the comfort aspect of allowing and expecting failure, but there is also the strategic advantage. Planning for failure means we end up doing things over and repeating. If we document these do-overs well enough, this iterative process will more quickly allow sections to determine more effective ways to manage their shops and to adapt to rapidly changing conditions.
Any organization that’s good at failure is also good at recovery and rebound. Every failure is exactly what we need on our way to victory. We get good at debriefs, we get good at hot washes and pow wows. We document everything. We learn from our mistakes. Planning to fail so as intently we will no doubt learn and grow rapidly. (edited)
I won’t quote the dictionary or even try to be true to whatever you think parody means. I will start with a point I leave out until last, then get into what I mean when I say Parody and what I plan to do with it. More people have seen someone do an impression of any US President than see that president speak.
There are twists and turns in my language describing how to make a bed, let alone this. Hang with me, and for the love of God, if someone gets it, please help me to articulate it better.
A parody of a thing, if additive, is more powerful than the original. It’s kinda sorta math. To do an impression of the President, I have to do what the president does plus what I’m going to do. The more of the original in the parody, the more added to the original, the more substantive it comes.
Parody doesn’t have to be funny, but it helps. In my mind I speak of the idea of mirroring a thing with a purposefully altered reflection. Humor helps because if something is fun people are more likely to do it again, but kindness, sweetness, joy, all keep people coming back. People only go back to abuse if they think enduring that abuse will unlock a state of non-abuse. Things like heaven create hell and devils. All too often if you are mired in hell you can’t see angels or earthly beings, you see devils because you’re looking for devils. If we make parody spaces and parody powers who seek to delight and seed joy, and if we have enough of the original, we will become more powerful. We will have the connection of a congregation without the guilt and shame, the benefit of education without the cost of college, warm filling meals without having to choose who gets to eat.
To conquer the world we just tell them they are conquered and set them free. I, the Great Khan, claim all of Earth as my domain and realm, and I hereby set her free. (edited)
April 3, 2022
The armies that win wars don’t follow orders. The armies that win wars aren’t issued orders – not like how you would imagine. Sure, there’s the occasional “that’s an order” but in all reality good commanders never tell their people what to do – only what must be done.
We must have confidence in our community, training, and doctrines, but that confidence must be expressed through trust. We need to have teams that are ready, not to follow orders, but to see that we’re on the move. Don’t plot a map to the enemy capital, just point the tanks and tell the boys the fight is that way. Feed them intel, let them be as smart as you in the field. Give them the tools before the fight to entrust them with whatever fight they face.
Micromanagers are awful. They lack confidence and often lack skill. If you are supervising someone, it’s not because you are better than them. You are assigned a supervisor because someone needs to be supervised. This is a trust matter on them too. No on is interested in helping you elevate your ego by pushing others into “their place.” Just the same as our troops should know their role, supervisors must as well. If you are a general it’s because there are so many privates – not because we need more people with stars on their collar.
Trust yourself and trust your people. Practice and train. Prepare to fail. Send your troops to their target with the knowledge to defeat it before they get there. No surprises other than the ones baked in. Don’t try to conduct an orchestra. Lead a jazz band. Teach them the notes they’ll need to improv their way to victory.
Do the thing that makes you feel like a warrior. If you feel powerful creating, well it’s probably because you’re a powerful creator. If you feel weak while doing taxes, you’re probably a weak accountant. That’s fine.
To be an independent person does not mean you are alone. Being independent simply means you can be left alone. You know what makes you feel like a Viking and an Immortal, and you know what doesn’t. Yes, some stuff just needs to get done, but we are a team and a building team. Every job you hate to do is a task you are stealing from the one person who loves to do it. When you stop doing warrior stuff and just start working, you deprive someone else of the opportunity to do their warrior stuff.
Some stuff just needs to get done. Part of my warrior stuff as an artist is the maintenance of equipment and files. The same as a soldier mopping the barracks or a pilot doing a few extra sit ups, there are some tasks that on the face of it don’t look exactly like the warrior stuff we’re into. That’s also part of the warrior bit. Do you think I liked marching? Ironing? Wrecking my body lifting caskets the wrong way because there are like two right ways and no churches designed for it? No – well kinda. To be a warrior you need to be ready for your fights. So yeah, there may be a time sheet or two in your future, but make sure you’re punching in to your warrior stuff.
Get help. Be a squeaky wheel. A shield wall with one person is technically just some asshole in the middle of a field. Warriors are components of armies. We are your army. Warriors helping warriors do warrior stuff.
To all human problems – any event that causes humans to suffer wherein they can do something about it – three things will always find you your solution. A combination – never in isolation – of Education, Experience, and Communication will find the answers you are looking for.
Humans learn best through master/disciple mentor/mentee relationships. In these relationship, at their core, three things happen. A person is educated via communicating personal experience. Yes there are still books and papers and all the associated paraphernalia of learning, but the real work is done in facilitating those three pillars.
If a person or organization is continuing to struggle with a concept or task – an appropriate level of education, experience, and communication will always begin to generate solutions.
Education is the process of transmitting knowledge from one person to the next. Experience is just that, going out and doing the thing. Communication is that critical bridge between the learner and the teacher. How does one articulate the task at hand? What do we call this? Show me. Very good.
Where ever there is training, education, or problem solving to be conducted, utilize the Doctrine of the Three Pillars as a guide to help flesh out what must be done.
What is it that we strive for, work for, bleed for? What do my Veteran brothers and sisters die for? What do civilians pine for? Kindness. The world is awash in cruelty. Weak men and women, false alphas, bad moms and dads, lead by the poorest of examples. People torment their children and torment each other like children. Why? Because there is a series of myths that have arisen from ages of misinformation and poor leadership. The myth that the strong of the world hold power over the weak. That I’m the boss and you do what I say. That a real man…blah blah.
The cruelty in the public comes from one place – unraised children. We live on the island of Lord of the Flies but the kids just so happen to have a defense and energy budget. Weak willed and minded boys and girls rush to the top of businesses and governments because we’ve left the rest of the world equally as weak.
Kindness is not politeness. To be polite is to be cruel in a different language. Demanding deference, demanding opinions be respected – these are no marks of kindness. These are marks of control. It is kinder to free people of their delusions than to let them suffer in the hells they made for themselves. Kindness is about compassion. It’s about knowing each of us is one of us. None of us are exempt from suffering, succeeding, or sounding stupid.
The Doctrine of Kindness at All Costs is a hope that whatever decision you have to make, let’s hope it is the kinder one. Be kind to yourself – don’t take shit from people. Be kind to others. Be sweet when you can and stern when you must. Make each decision about any person, place, or thing be based on your love for it. Quite simply, in the Doctrine of Kindness at All Costs, if I call you an asshole, it’s because I love you dearly and do not wish you to suffer looking like an asshole any further.
Conflict begets conflict. Funerals and marches leave orphans and widows and bitterness in their wake. The League of Extraordinary Beings will commit itself to no violence. No member shall, as a function of The League of Extraordinary Beings commit violence on another human being and any violence towards other living beings must be a matter of life and death. If a League Member feels the need to commit themselves to violence, they cannot be supported by the League other than in helping them find other organizations to support their passions in alignment with our overall goals.
In practice this means that the League itself cannot be armed or possess arms. Citizens who wish to express their rights and bear arms will not be denied their rights, but will be asked to confirm their understanding of our Doctrine and may be asked to check arms when entering certain areas with at-risk populations.
Violence is a real and often unavoidable consequence. You may have the wherewithal to maintain your composure, but some humans prefer to live like animals and will come at you with violence. There is no peace with the violent on the loose, and so to maintain peace and maintain victory, you may be called upon to defend yourself. Self defense is an unalienable right and defending yourself you defend the peace, but always do your best to ensure all parties in any conflict are afforded the opportunity to walk away.
It is more difficult not to shoot. It is more difficult not to yell. It is more difficult not to fight back. You have millennia of pre-programed monkey fights built into the back of your brain. There will be failures, there will be fights, but the Doctrine of Victory Through Peace is a guide, a hope. It is a difficult doctrine to maintain, but ultimately worth the suffering.