> If you are watching from a great distance, you might think that an army has conquered a country, but if you listen to the people who are involved in the strug

> If you are watching from a great distance, you might think that an army has conquered a country, but if you listen to the people who are involved in the struggle, then you are aware how much "a country" is an abstraction. Most things of any value are abstractions. You take a country by persuading everyone you've taken a country, the implementation details of that argument might involve some grassy hill tops, some fields and farm buildings, but its absolutely not the case that an army needs to control every field and every grassy hill top that makes up "a country" in order to take it. The abstraction is different to the sum of its specific parts. If you try to invade a country by invading every concrete bit of it, you'll either fail to take it or have nothing of value at the end (i.e fail in your objective). The only reason it has ever been useful or even possible to invade countries is because countries are abstractions and it's the abstraction that is important. > The real work is made up of specifics: buildings, roads, trees, ditches, rivers, bushes, rocks, fields, houses. Specifics are important - failing to execute on specifics dooms any steps you might make to help achieve your objective, but if all you see is specifics you won't be able to come up with a coherent objective or choose a path that would stand a chance of getting you there.