Checking Their Pulse
To gather information on our partner’s intentions we need to be open to receive them. We can grip them for control or we can grip them for intel.
Their intentions can be shown with the slightest of touch. We should let them show their cards (as Master Pedro Sauer says), see what they are working with and what we’re up against.
It’s better to let them show their cards through acceptance than to shut their hand down with insistence. By repeatedly letting them show their hands we begin to see patterns, and can better predict how others might play the same hand. Instead of pinning them down allowing no movement, we should give them room to move to see the play.
Like checking someone’s pulse, we need to have contact for feel, without pressure to stop the flow. Too little or too much gives no pulse.
Let them move their pieces, there’s obviously no game development if we don’t move our pieces, but also none if we don’t allow theirs. Most of our active training should keep us in a state of pulse checking. To achieve the prize objective of stopping blood flow for the finish, we must first allow it to flow freely, monitoring movement and intention to finally and predictably seal the deal with grace.
