Nothing is harder to see into thanpeoples nature. The sage looks at subtle phenomena and listens tosmall voices. This harmonizes the outside with the inside and the inside with the outside.
Interpretation
Understanding human nature is complex, requiring deep observation and attention to subtle details.
This quote emphasizes the challenge of comprehending human nature, which is often concealed beneath surface behaviors. It suggests that true wisdom comes from observing subtle cues and listening intently, which aligns one's internal understanding with the external world and fosters a deeper harmony in relationships and interactions.
In practice
In a leadership workshop, to illustrate the complexity of understanding team dynamics.
Opportunistic relationships can hardly be kept constant. The acquaintance of honorable people, even at a distance, does not add flowers in times of warmth and does not change its leaves in times of cold: it continues unfading through the four seasons, becomes increasingly stable as it passes through ease and danger.
To overcome the intelligent by folly is contrary to the natural order of things; to overcome the foolish by intelligence is in accord with the natural order. To overcome the intelligent by intelligence, however, is a matter of opportunity.
First organize the inner, then organize the outer ... First organize the great, then organize the small. First organize yourself, and then organize others.
Strength is but one aspect of power.
Good generals select intelligent officers, thoughtful advisors, and brave subordinates. They oversee their troops like a fierce tiger with wings.
Battles are not won by strength alone!
You've never seen death? Look in the mirror every day and you will see it like bees working in a glass hive.
There are exceptional people out there who are capable of starting epidemics. All you have to do is find them.
Democracy will prevail when men believe the vote of Judas as good as that of Jesus Christ.
We are not without empathetic terror when we open Pascal's 'Pensees' and read, 'I am the great silent spaces between worlds.'
Roughly speaking, I think it's accurate to say that a corporate elite of managers and owners governs the economy and the political system as well, at least in very large measure.
If both the past and the external world exist only in the mind, and if the mind itself is controllable - what then?
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