The craft of the Warrior

"Strategy is the craft of the Warrior. [] In strategy it is important to see distant things as if they were close and to take a distanced view of close things. [] [The warrior] know(s) the smallest things and the biggest things, the shallowest things and the deepest things. As if it were a straight road mapped out on the ground. [] The principle of strategy is having one thing, to know ten thousand things."

~

"In strategy, your spiritual bearing must not be any different from normal. Both in fighting and in everyday life you should be determined though calm. Meet the situation without tenseness yet not recklessly, your spirit settled yet unbiased. Even when your spirit is calm do not let your body relax, and when your body is relaxed do not let your spirit slacken. Do not let your spirit be influenced by your body, or your body be influenced by your spirit. Be neither insufficiently spirited nor over spirited. An elevated spirit is weak and a low spirit is weak. Do not let the enemy see your spirit. [] In all forms of strategy, it is necessary to maintain the combat stance in everyday life and to make your everyday stance your combat stance."

~

Miyamoto Musashi (宮本 武蔵) was born in the Harima Province in 1584. A rōnin at a time when the samurai were formally considered to be elite, but actually had no income unless they were landowners, Musashi pursued his spiritual enlightenment through kendō (剣道, "sword way").

Considered one of the most skilled swordsmen in history, he created and refined a two-sword technique called niten'ichi (二天一, "two heavens as one") or nitōichi (二刀一, "two blades as one"), in which the warrior uses both a longer (daitō, 大刀) and a shorter (shōtō, 小刀) blade at the same time (pair: daishō, 大小, "big/small").

[And, yes, you DO understand this reference]

The quotes above, redacted, are from "Go Rin No Sho" (五輪の書, "The Book of Five Rings"), a -messy yet enjoyable- compendium of Musashi's teachings.

Of which, clearly, Thrawn has multiple copies in all his datapads.

[Photo: mindblowing Japanese-inspired Thrawn patch by Patchlab.de]