Mfonobong Inyang: How to Develop A Winning Mentality

I was privileged to attend a military school, which is typically located smack in the middle of military barracks. One of the perks of that experience is that whilst you get one type of education within the walls of your classroom, there is another type of education you get from the people and environment outside those walls. Perhaps this is to a large extent responsible for why I pay a little more attention to news, books or movies that have combat scenes or theatres of operation than the average person. There is one episode I came across recently, and although the story was not unfamiliar to me, I noticed some things I hadn’t seen in my previous readings. The story of David and Goliath is a well-documented military confrontation, but there is one overlooked confrontation between David and Saul that changed the trajectory of both men’s lives. What this reminded me of, amongst other things, is that men don’t just need to confront some things they want to change directly, but they must do so with the right mentality if they want to make progress.

Never Let Your Ego Become Bigger Than Your Competence

When I say Saul was an incompetent king, I’m only stating the obvious; it’s never anything personal. Saul had more contempt for David than he possessed military competence; events would ultimately show he clearly had low fight IQ. Ever since David took out Goliath, Saul’s ego had been eating him up. To make things worse, the people started rooting for David to be king even when Saul was still on the throne. When you sink your teeth into the cultural subtext of that song about Saul killing the enemies of the homeland in their thousands and David doing more by the tens of thousands, that wasn’t just eulogy – that’s effectively a vote of no confidence on the incumbent leader. Praising another person other than the king in those days was an act of treason because comparing someone to the incumbent king was a roundabout way of recognising that person as king, but nobody cared, as far as they were concerned, any leader who couldn’t protect the sovereignty of the homeland from such an existential threat was a persona non grata.

First, Saul tried to kill David by pinning him to a wall with a javelin, but he missed – as usual, David was always guiding. This act let David know that his residency in Saul’s palace was no longer tenable, hence he began an itinerant lifestyle as a fugitive from Saul’s pursuit in places like Ramah, Nob, Gath, the Cave of Adullam, Mizpeh and the Forest of Hereth. Finally, Saul got the drop that David was hiding in the wilderness of Ziph, and this is where David decided to draw the line. Saul, in his hubris, thought he could just waltz into the stronghold of a guy like David and pick him up without much thought. Instead of using stealth, Saul decided to bring a squad with him – what a sloppy strategy. This was not a conventional warfare where both armies agreed on a time and place to fight in battle formations; this was guerrilla warfare, and if you’re going to beat David at his game, the last thing you need to do is move around with a 3,000-strong army. He lost the element of surprise because I’m sure David’s spies in the region would have already tipped him off. This was supposed to be a covert mission, but bro turned it into a tour de force like he was trying to impress someone. If he had sent in a ghost unit to do the wetwork, they might have stood a chance of getting a killshot.

Never Let Down Your Guard Until A Mission Is Accomplished

A typical military op has five basic elements: Situation, Mission, Execution, Service (Support) and Command/Signal. Beyond his obvious lack of intelligence, Saul exposes how much of a terrible leader he really is in this botched adventure. He is not layered at all; that’s why the narrative of him being some master strategist always leaves me in stitches. As the supposed C-in-C, he left his secure location to hunt down David, failed to geo-locate or even acquire the target – yet he dares to sleep soundly? This is crazy! Who falls asleep in a hostile territory? You know what’s even wild? All the soldiers with him were also in deep sleep! This sadly includes a decorated five-star general like Abner, so the person who said that everything rises and falls on leadership was not wrong. This gives us an insight into Saul’s style of administration. A seasoned king won’t make such rookie errors; he would divide the soldiers into shifts to keep watch in turns while others sleep. The king’s guards would also form a special security perimeter around him as he slept, after all, he’s supposed to be the most protected person in the kingdom. They were so wasted that David could sneak up on them, take Saul’s jar, cut out a piece of his royal robe, chat with his aide de camp on whether or not to take out Saul and walk away unscathed!

Never Underestimate A Man Who Knows How To Do More With Less

David shows off a signature of his leadership anointing: an ability to do more with less. Just like he took out Goliath with a sling and a stone, where Saul failed with the entire military apparatus behind him, here is David successfully infiltrating the king’s space with just his aide de camp, but the king couldn’t capture David with 3000 of the finest men in the army. This shows that what you need is not just resources but resourcefulness. Saul’s archetype is typified more by revenue than results, as clearly seen here in how taxpayers’ monies are wasted on missions that yield no strategic benefit to the homeland. If Saul had done a proper scouting of the area, he would have known David was hiding in the strongholds of Zikham. David wasn’t going to make himself a sitting duck, which means he mostly lodged in a hard corner. For such a mission, you don’t need an entire battalion; you are better served with a tactical team. This wasn’t just a case of bloated bureaucracy; it was also a classic case of state capture because Saul was using an institution that should serve the public for his political vendetta. More importantly, as a man who was empty on the inside, Saul was overcompensating on the outside with his use of unnecessary military might.

Never Interrupt God When He Is Fighting For You

If David wanted someone dead, it would take God to stop him or save that person. Notice, David didn’t say he wouldn’t lay hands on Saul, he said he wouldn’t lay hands on God’s anointed – those are two completely different statements. The restraint he showed wasn’t so much about Saul but in deference to God. Regardless of what anyone thought of Saul and how he became king, oil was poured on his head by Samuel, so in that sense, he was still God’s anointed. This was an opportunity to snatch power and run away with it, but he didn’t. It takes a powerful man to walk away from something that any lesser person would seize frantically if given the chance. Since David was in the strongholds of Zikham, chances were that he was staking out in a hard corner – the landscape of the place gave David an advantage over Saul because he was basically walking into what we call a fatal funnel. Not only did Saul lack the military experience to know this, but he was also too hubristic to see that he couldn’t win a guy who has God literally running point for him. David was told by God that not only was Saul approaching his location, but also that the locals would snitch on him. How can you beat that?

Never Laugh At Your Enemies When You Should Be Learning From Them

David learned from the mistake of Saul; he didn’t want to be a king without legitimacy, so he was particular about the circumstances that made him king. That’s why he could brag to Saul’s daughter that it was God who made him king. Nobody could say they made David king because they never made another David. Trauma can make people see restraint as weakness. Even David’s aide de camp encouraged him to take out Saul, but David insisted on due process. Trust me, someone who cut off Goliath’s head cannot be described as weak. David’s action also dispelled the lame propaganda that he was somehow desperate to be king. This was a golden chance for him to usurp Saul as king, but he didn’t; he knew he had to win hearts and minds.

Saul was so unpopular to the point that some citizens preferred to stay with David in a far-flung cave than to live under Saul’s abominable rule on the mainland, and that contingent included David’s brothers, who hitherto hated him – it was that bad. Saul was so desperate for a co-sign that even at the last moments of his reign, he went to the witch of Endor to summon Samuel’s spirit. David knew the people should want him to be king more than he wanted to be king, which was ultimately what happened at Hebron when there was a consensus in the land that David be made king. As a patriot, David was thinking about the homeland in that moment, and he felt terrible that his now disgraced country was led by such an incompetent king who didn’t pose any threat to her enemies. No bad actor within or outside the country lost sleep over Saul’s leadership because he couldn’t inflict deterrence. Under Saul, Goliath could rage and rant for days without any consequence. That’s why David didn’t just take out Goliath; he inspired a generation that wiped out that lineage.

Never Do With Swords What You Can Do With Words

Saul wanted to copy David’s playbook; he saw how people loved David when he showed up with Goliath’s head – so he thought that if he could return to the capital with David’s head, it would bolster his political fortunes. When solving cases, law enforcement, especially detectives, typically profile persons of interest by finding out who has the means, motive and opportunity to commit an action. Here, David clearly had the means – the military intelligence and physical strength to unalive Saul, motive – unaliving Saul effectively makes him king, opportunity – Saul literally sleeping on the job provided him with an opening to do the needful, yet he restrained himself.

A really strong man doesn’t have to hurt you physically when he can humiliate you. David had had enough of Saul’s harassment and decided to confront him once and for all. He didn’t just know how to fight; he knew how to talk. Here are the words which David spoke to Saul that broke him, “This very day with your very own eyes you have seen that just now in the cave God put you in my hands. My men wanted me to kill you, but I wouldn’t do it. I told them that I won’t lift a finger against my master – he’s God’s anointed“. Translation: if you keep playing these stupid games, you will end up winning stupid prizes. The fun and games were over; David was in his FAFO-mode. To his credit, Saul could read the handwriting on the wall and said the quiet part out loud: how David would surely be the next king. By the way, that was the very last time Saul tried to fool around with David; he never recovered from the humiliation. One thing men can learn from David is that winning is first a mentality; there are some battles where you don’t need brawn, what you really need is brain because a man thinks in his heart, so is he. Selah.