In The 33 Strategies of War, there are several chapters that pertain to relationships. One of the most important is Strategy 22: Know How to End Things - The Exit Strategy.
Here are some snippets:
1. You are judged in this world by how well you bring things to an end.
2. The worst way to end anything – a war, a conflict, a relationship – is slowly and painfully.
3. Short-term defeat is better than long-term disaster.
4. Wisdom is knowing when to end.
5. "To go too far is as bad as to fall short.” –Confucius
6. Understand: in any venture, your tendency to think in terms of winning or losing, success or failure, is dangerous. Your mind comes to a stop, instead of looking ahead. Emotions dominate the moment: a smug elation in winning, dejection and bitterness in losing. What you need is a more fluid and strategic outlook… nothing ever really ends; how you finish something will influence and even determine what you do next.
7. Look at your opponents and decide whether you might do better to be generous to them at the end, taking a step back and transforming them into allies, playing on the emotions of the moment. Keeping your eyes on the aftermath of any encounter, you will think more of the feeling you leave people with – a feeling that might translate into a desire to see more of you.
8. By understanding that any victory or defeat is temporary, and that what matters is what you do with them, you will find it easier to keep yourself balanced during the thousands of battles that life entails. The only real ending is death. Everything else is a transition.
9. Imagine everything you do has a moment of perfection and fruition. Your goal is to end your project there, at such a peak. Greed and delusions of grandeur will make you go too far. Overstaying your welcome, boring people … is the deepest failing: you should leave them wanting more of you, not less. You can accomplish this by bringing the conversation or encounter to an end a moment before the other side expects it.
10. Since defeat is inevitable you must master the art of losing well. See it as a temporary setback, something to wake you up and teach you a lesson. You must see any defeat as a way to demonstrate something positive about yourself and your character to other people.
11. Planting the seeds of future victory in present defeat is strategic brilliance of the highest order.
- Robert Greene
Many of us have gotten that "bad feeling" about a relationship and I think that is when we have already gone too far. We should have ended things before that point. Also in bold face I underscore a bad tendency many of us on the forum have to "snap to" an extreme of judging whether a relationship was won or lost, or being over forever, and to end things on a sour note.
Here are some snippets:
1. You are judged in this world by how well you bring things to an end.
2. The worst way to end anything – a war, a conflict, a relationship – is slowly and painfully.
3. Short-term defeat is better than long-term disaster.
4. Wisdom is knowing when to end.
5. "To go too far is as bad as to fall short.” –Confucius
6. Understand: in any venture, your tendency to think in terms of winning or losing, success or failure, is dangerous. Your mind comes to a stop, instead of looking ahead. Emotions dominate the moment: a smug elation in winning, dejection and bitterness in losing. What you need is a more fluid and strategic outlook… nothing ever really ends; how you finish something will influence and even determine what you do next.
7. Look at your opponents and decide whether you might do better to be generous to them at the end, taking a step back and transforming them into allies, playing on the emotions of the moment. Keeping your eyes on the aftermath of any encounter, you will think more of the feeling you leave people with – a feeling that might translate into a desire to see more of you.
8. By understanding that any victory or defeat is temporary, and that what matters is what you do with them, you will find it easier to keep yourself balanced during the thousands of battles that life entails. The only real ending is death. Everything else is a transition.
9. Imagine everything you do has a moment of perfection and fruition. Your goal is to end your project there, at such a peak. Greed and delusions of grandeur will make you go too far. Overstaying your welcome, boring people … is the deepest failing: you should leave them wanting more of you, not less. You can accomplish this by bringing the conversation or encounter to an end a moment before the other side expects it.
10. Since defeat is inevitable you must master the art of losing well. See it as a temporary setback, something to wake you up and teach you a lesson. You must see any defeat as a way to demonstrate something positive about yourself and your character to other people.
11. Planting the seeds of future victory in present defeat is strategic brilliance of the highest order.
- Robert Greene
Many of us have gotten that "bad feeling" about a relationship and I think that is when we have already gone too far. We should have ended things before that point. Also in bold face I underscore a bad tendency many of us on the forum have to "snap to" an extreme of judging whether a relationship was won or lost, or being over forever, and to end things on a sour note.