There are many possible moral applications to this adage, one of which is flexibility. The taller the bamboo grows the more flexible it becomes, thus enabling it to bend and sway before the storms and winds which come against it. Its survival literally depends upon its flexibility. So also does our own.
Many people snap in the face of the storms of life.
When the winds of adversity come upon them they are soon broken, and their lives come tumbling down. The rigid, unyielding dogmatist, legalist, and traditionalist, who is unwilling or unable to bend with the winds of necessary change, will soon break under the strain, and may well bring down younger, less mature trees, in the wake of his fall. The real message of the proverb, though, seems to pertain to the nature of true greatness. Those who would be regarded as great in any field of endeavor, must be those willing to bow themselves low in humble service to others. The true test of greatness is not how high one can grow, but rather how low one can bend.