My 围棋(圍棋)weiqi(go) new ladder reading techinique

I have my own ladder reading technique, that’s sometimes very useful to read the difficult ladders. There’s a go proverb “If you don’t know ladders, don’t play go”. And is very difficult to beginners get lost on the path of long ladders.
If you start a ladder with white stones in coordinates b16 and b17, all liberties surrounded except c17 (the lower-left corner is a1 and the upper left corner t19), this ladder path, if you alternate one point in one direction and other in another and do again the same movements, will end in d19. Now, the ladder not just progress toward the center of the board, it goes back to the near edge of the board, in our case, a16. Look, the same distance, 4 points, in a16 from a19 in the beginning of the ladder, and the 4 points to d19. This is not a coincidence; because of the symmetry, the ladders start and end on the same location.
Now, the long, difficult to read, ladders. If a ladder starts at c4 and c5, with the only liberty being d5, it is difficult to read its path because it is too long, and, since the center of the board is generally not populated in the beginning of the game for example, there is no point of reference and is easy get lost; this ladder will end in r19, 3points from the upper-left corner, the same 3 points (a3) from its path toward the edge of the board. If there is a stone for example in o17 is much simpler read the ladder c4 and c5 backwards to the point a3 and, once knowing there is a 3 spaces from a1, start a ladder going backwards from the three points from the upper-right point r19 (a straight line parallel to the diagonal of the board) and then see if o17 breaks the ladder (it breaks); it is easy because you have stones and references of the board as guides.

阴阳(陰陽)Yin yang, easy and simple: the main difference between the forces

Yang is easy, it is a force that keep going no matter what in its way, but complicated, not simple; yin is simple, find the paths of less resistence, but is hard, difficult to do, not easy. Sorry to use war as an example, as I’m a martial artist and student of war and most of you maybe are not, but conflict is all over our lifes, in business, our jobs, sports, games, life managment ( the different goals in a couple, the discipline of children, the short and long term goals, pleasure and responsability), that is why the art of war is such a fantastic book, A conflict is the easiest way to show the difference against the two fundamental forces, that are described as “two opposing but complementary forces”, exactly as I would describe war .

A strong fighter (yang) will win fights with easy most of the time, but with complicated(not simple) actions(not covering vital points, not using the opponent force agains them, sometimes even oposing that force in a not much effective way, but will most of the times win; and the weak(yin) will win with some difficult, with sometimes close to lose (as dodging a punch close to hit, or entice a devastating blow of the enemy to counterattack it, but requering a great knowledge to win, but will win with simple, moving with the energy of the opponent and not against it, doing the less obvious strategies.

Yin is not easy and is important to say this as some philosophies portrait it as such. For example, during night you will not have light to do manual work or hunt (in older times), in modern times mean danger of being attacked, you will have to have electricity, pay for it; in winter there’s no food and you need fire and make clothes to maintain you warm (in older times), you will need to pay for warm clothes and heater will use electricity in the winter in modern times. The weak will defeat the strong in fights but is not easy to dodge or defend a series of boxe punches, at least as show for example in some demonstrations of certain martial arts, generally with one single straight punch and no variety , with a slow, telegraphed(Sun Tzu said “war is based on deception”, a punch that you know when and how it is coming is useless), I’m not saying you can’t succeed with yin, or yin is inferior to yang, yin is just not easy as some people portrait, and I prefer the wrong view of the westerns as yang as good and yin as bad then the contrary; it is wrong but shows more respect to what yin represents.

The seemingly frivolous Analects of Confucius

The Analects were, to me, in part, seemingly superficial; what the master ate, how he sleeps, how he dresses… But now I understand that a opportunity of having a Sage should not be missed, and we should try to grasp any meaning, any opinion he has about the world around us, like seem in the Analects “someone asked the master about …” and learn学(學)xue. It is sad that we don’t give attention to Sages, or should I translate as thinkers, as people gave before.

Of course we have to have care to not go too far, an error made for example using the Yi jing; when you receive a reading of the fifth line of 1乾qian “a dragon flying in the skies”, don’t mean you will see a dragon that you will try to capture and sold such a rare creature; don’t hunt dragons. If a situation is represented by one of the trigrams of the 八卦bagua or one of the five elements (better translated as phases), the fire, water, or mountain, is not important, this don’t mean water means that will rain, that you’ll have to go uphill to a mountain during a trip or that someplace will burn; it is just an indication of something more profound. An movement of the form of 太极拳(太極拳) taijiquan (taichichuan )is not made to be mimicked, they are there to show a greater truth that cannot be shown in one million of movements.