Great News About "Mastery"

是好消息

  by Lance Giroux

July 27.  Scottsdale AZ.  Spent the afternoon with Emily Fraim, George Leonard's daughter and Trustee of the Leonard Family Trust.  Surprise!  She handed me two copies of George's book Mastery.  So?  They're written in Chinese.  Wow!  She followed that gift with, "I think it's also now being printed other languages too." Double wow.  (More about that next time.)

Mastery, now in Chinese (simplified); thank you Sterling Lord - George's publishing agent who continues to serve the Trust, owners of the copyrights to all George's written works, including his scripted simulation many readers here have personally encountered: The Samurai Game® (TSG).

While George and Annie, his wife, were alive I pushed them to have Mastery published in languages beyond English and German, especially Chinese.  To me it seemed natural and paramount, having walked neighborhood parks these past years, morning and night throughout PR China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and SE Asia to witness thousands of people engaged in embodied mindfulness practices - tai chi, walking meditations, sword work, breath work, etc.  These practices directly reflect what Mastery brings to the surface and promotes. 

Think "people": 1.35 billion in PR China, add 618 million in SE Asia, plus 24 million in Taiwan, and another 7 million in Honk Kong.  That's a big bunch of folks.  Even if only a small percentage of them were to have the opportunity to gain from this book, that small percentage is significant.  Mastery has never gone out of print and has never been absent from brick and mortar bookstores since it was first published in 1991.  Twenty-three years in continuous publication is an exceptionally long time for a paperback of this nature.

A special smile to Keith Bentz, who, to my knowledge, was the first individual to legally produce The Samurai Game® (TSG) in Hong Kong and Taipei - and with that effort the work of George Leonard was introduced into the greater Asia region.

Legally deliver?  Yes.  Why say this, because illegal TSG knock-offs have sprung up throughout Asia, Mexico, and elsewhere - even in the USA.  Read my blog about shenanigans of this type.  In this regard Mastery in Chinese is again great news; and a definite boon to the legacy of George Leonard.  Those who read Mastery, even if they attended a rip-off, will make the connections for themselves.  People are smart.  They know the difference between what's real and what's fake.  Sad though, given TSG revolves around a code of honor - Bushido in Japansese / Wushitao in Chinese / The Way of the Warriorin English / Camino del Guerrero in Spanish.

Large populations are now being served with TSG, and stand to benefit with Mastery.  Twenty-one of the current sixty-some authorized facilitators live along an arc that stretches from Chengdu, China to Taipei to Hong Kong to Kuala Lumpur to Singapore and then continues south to Brisbane, Australia.  Having Mastery available in both English and Chinese allows for a significant impact.  Think "lessons learned and lessons applied".  Who gains?  Families, companies, universities, elementary schools, training organizations.

Mastery. The Samurai Game®.  Yin.  Yang.  Connection.  One body.  It doesn't matter the starting gate; all one needs to do is step on the path.  Read Mastery and you deepen an intellectual understanding of what is expressed through TSG.  Participate in TSG and you vault into action to embody what is articulated through Mastery.  

Mastery has been promoted in every TSG event that I've been involved with throughout Asia and SE Asia over these past eleven years.  People ask, "When can we get it in our language?"  Now they can. 

Same thing is true multiple time zones away.  The word is spreading in Mexico City, Guadalajara, Monterrey, Puebla and on.  The demand continues.  Inquiries for TSG andMastery are now coming from Colombia, Ecuador and Argentina - thanks to diligence and unselfishness of some really good people, e.g. Jenaro Pleigo of Mexico City and the others living in Mexico who have followed his footsteps.

Back to Asia.  Caroline Su wanted to get Masterytranslated to Chinese so bad she began hammering me about it every time I traveled to Taipei.  Likewise, Lyric Chan of PR China.  A few months ago, when he visited Petaluma for facilitator training, what did he grill us for to compliment his work?  Mastery.  Was it Caroline or was it Lyric who lit the final fuse that eventually burned a path to light a fire under some publisher in the region.  We don't yet know, and that doesn't matter.  What matters: it has happened.

Hopefully Sterling Lord's efforts will expand to translations in other languages, and assist the expansion of George's work through TSG now underway in Russia; well launched and spreading thanks to Konstantin Volzhan and Marina Klimova.  Numerous TSG's have been conducted in Tyumen, Moscow, and Rostov-on-Don over the past year.  This November I go to Samara.  A journey continues. 

Knock on a door long enough, it opens.  

A good and important thing, and something worth sharing.

Mastery.  Published in Chinese. 

J  是好消息(This is GREAT news)

© Lance Giroux, August 2014