“Control comes from almost letting go, holding the reins so lightly that the horse feels no tug but senses the slightest change in tension and responds as you desire.”

The 33 Strategies of War, Strategy 5, The Command-and-Control Strategy

When seeking to guide a horse, our instinct is often to exert force, pulling hard on the reins to establish dominance.

We assume that by overpowering the animal, we can impose our will, ensuring it moves exactly as we intend.

In practice, however, the opposite is true.

The more forcefully we pull, the more resistance we encounter.

The horse, sensing its freedom being stripped away, rebels against the constraints, fighting to reclaim its autonomy.

Rather than achieving obedience, we create defiance, and in doing so, we find ourselves losing more control than we originally possessed.

At first glance, this may seem like a trivial or irrelevant observation.

In reality, this dynamic extends far beyond the stables—it is a profound analogy for leadership.