“By Rational Ambition”
The chapters are not getting longer as we go through this – I’m just digging more into them.
Here, at the end of this chapter, he talks about poverty and riches. He is not saying poverty is evil, only that is the fate at the end of failure to pursue otherwise.
He does acknowledge this about poverty – “Poverty is only allowable if it is voluntary, that is to say, if it is the result of a decision which prefers that condition to another more brilliant but less independent.”
If someone chooses to be humble and live a meager lifestyle, Yoritomo- because he knows that to bring your ambitions into reality takes a lot of work, and with it a loss of privacy and independence. Not in a bad way necessarily, but being successful is not “easy”, and it’s not for everyone.
Do you ever wonder when I write Think Daily? Well, I write them usually on Saturday and Sunday mornings. If not, then on weekday mornings. I have spent 40 minutes writing the last one and perhaps the same to write this one. It’s work. But right now, it’s 9:13 pm, and I am at the end of my useful day. So without thinking much more, I will herein write exactly what Yoritomo wrote about riches and influence, and you can interpret his thoughts yourself.
I will say that as I have matured in my career, I came to understand what he wrote here many years ago. Become successful and share, including ideas and knowledge of how you did it. I have written over 7,000 Think daily messages with great discipline, and I have published how I became successful through my craft at (thesoe.com) my Contractor Nation School of Entrepreneurship, which took me nearly four years to create.
My personal mission statement is “An extraordinary life of shared experiences”.
Watch what the shogun says –
“Nevertheless, riches are the key of many marvels, and they are above all, the key of many influences. Not only is the man of great possessions in a better position to make those whom he patronizes listen to his words, but the prestige of his success surrounds him with a halo of influence, which, if he is wise, he will use to better the lot of his neighbor.”
“We do not receive kindnesses from an empty hand; we have nothing to expect from the man tormented by the care for tomorrow. What words can fall from the mouth sealed by hunger?”
“It is true that fortune, considered simply from the point of view of riches, is not an exalted ideal, but we must nevertheless welcome it as the consecration of success and as a power of which the wise man knows how to dispose for the good of his fellows.”
“It is a means of exciting interest and of influencing the multitude, for the people will always be disposed to listen to the advice of a man who had the ability to acquire great possessions.”
“It is then in then in the power of the man who has been able to acquire this power of money to make use of it for establishing his beneficent influence over the minds of those who are disposed to trust him.”
“Thanks to the prestige which his riches confer on him, he will be able to spread the rays of influence as far as the boundaries of the attraction of thought, and as it displays itself above all in action, he will gather around him a band of brave and intelligent men, ready to imitate him in spreading abroad the ideas which he has inculcated in them and speak as he has taught them.”
“Do not wait for the desired object to come to you, but rise up and set out for it; when you have found it, you will undertake its conquest, and when it becomes your possession, you will gather your friends around to make them share in your good fortune and to tell them by what means it has befallen you.”
“Ambition is a gate opening on magnificent gardens, but fortunate ones who have entered it should not pause there; they will pass beyond the entrance in order to survey the road and to make a sign to passers-by, pointing out to them the way.”
Amen.