Way of the Peaceful Warrior Read Online Free PDF Page A

was enjoyed throughout the kingdom. The people loved him for his renowned wisdom and fair judgments.  
    One day, tragedy struck the town. The water supply was polluted, and every man, woman, and child went insane. Only the king, who had a private spring, was spared.  
    Soon after the tragedy, the mad townspeople began speaking of how the king was acting “strangely” and how his judgments were poor and his wisdom a sham. Many even went so far as to say that the king had gone crazy. His popularity soon vanished. No longer did the people bring him gifts or celebrate his birthday.  
    The lonely king, high on the hill, had no company at all. One day he decided to leave the hill and pay a visit to the town. It was a warm day, and so he drank from the village fountain.  
    That night there was a great celebration. The people all rejoiced, for their beloved king had “regained his sanity.”  
     
    I realized then that the crazy world that Socrates had referred to was not his world at all, but mine.  
    I stood, ready to leave. “Socrates, you've told me to listen to my own body intuition and not depend upon what I read or what people tell me. Why, then, should I sit quietly and listen to what you tell me?”  
    “A very good question,” he answered. “There is an equally good answer. First of all, I speak to you from my own experience; I am not relating abstract theories I read in a book or heard second hand from an expert. I am one who truly knows his own body and mind, and therefore, knows others as well. Besides,” he smiled, “how do you know that I'm not your body intuition, speaking to you now?” He turned to his desk and picked up some paperwork. I had been dismissed for the evening. My whirling thoughts carried me into the night.  
    I was upset for days afterwards. I felt weak and inadequate around this man, and I was angry about the way he treated me. He constantly seemed to underestimate me; I wasn't a child! “Why should I choose to play a jackass sitting in a gas station,” I thought, “when here, in my domain, I'm admired and respected?”  
    I trained harder than ever in gymnastics--my body burned with fever as I flew and fought my way through routine after routine. Yet it was somehow less satisfying than before. Every time I learned a new move or received a compliment, I remembered being tossed through the air onto the couch by that old man.  
    Hal, my coach, became concerned about me and wanted to know if anything was wrong. I reassured him that everything was fine. But it wasn't. I didn't feel like joking around with the guys on the team anymore. I was just confused.  
    That night I had my Grim Reaper dream again, with a difference. A chortling Socrates, decked out in the Grim Reaper's gloomy getup, pointed a gun at me that went off, shooting out a flag that said, “Bang!” I woke up giggling instead of groaning, for a change.  
    The next day I found a note in my mailbox. All it said was, “Rooftop secrets.” When Socrates arrived that night, I was already sitting on the station steps, waiting for him. I'd come early to question the day attendants about Socrates--to find out his real name, maybe even where he lived--but they didn't know anything about him. “Who cares anyway?” one yawned. “He's just some old geezer who likes the night shift.”  
    Soc removed his windbreaker, “Well?” I pounced. “Are you finally going to tell me how you got up on the roof?”  
    “Yes, I am; I think you're ready to hear it,” he said seriously.  
    “In ancient Japan, there existed an elite group of warrior assassins.”  
    He said the last word with a hissing sound, making me acutely aware of the dark silence lurking outside. My neck started to get that prickly feeling again.  
    “These warriors,” he continued, “were named ninja. The legends and reputation surrounding them were fearful. It was said that they could change themselves into animals; it was even said  that they could