Everyone wants more Power

📖 Book Review – June 2024

Title: The 48 Laws of Power

Author: Robert Greene
Finished on: 2024-06-30

Why I Read It

Nothing particularly special - I just wanted to read the book to get to know the laws, which were described as somewhat "unethical" by some reviewers.

Summary (very long one 😀)

Make those above you feel comfortably superior

This rule is quite straightforward: you would never want to be better or pretend to be better than someone who is above you, such as your boss. The people above you want to feel secure in their positions, and showing off too much or thinking they will like it might be a big mistake that could result in you being replaced by someone else. But it is a different story if the person above you is already falling. If he is weak, then you might outdo, outcharm, or outsmart him at key moments; if he is very weak, then let nature take its course.

Be wary of friends

This law is about why you should not trust friends too much: they can become spoiled and tyrannical, while a former enemy can be more loyal than a friend because he has more to prove. People often don't know their friends as well as they imagine. They tend to agree on things to avoid arguments and cover up unpleasant qualities so as not to offend each other. Friends may say things they mean, but often they do not. The more favors and gifts you give to revive a friendship, the less gratitude you receive. A friend is rarely the one who is most able to help you, and skill and competence are more important than friendly feelings. When you work toward power, you require distance between people, as you are trying to work and not make friends.

Keep friends for friendship but work with the skilled and competent.

The book also explains how you can still use your friends for work, such as doing your dirty work, as they do this the best - so yeah...

However, your enemies are an untapped gold mine whom you can exploit. They expect nothing in return and will work to prove that they are worthy. Our enemies keep us focused and alert; therefore, it is often better to use enemies for your own profit rather than immediately transforming them into friends.

You destroy an enemy when you make friends of him.

Never reveal the purpose behind actions

When you don't reveal what you are doing, people have no clue what you are up to and thus can't prepare a defense. Use this to drive them far enough down the wrong path, and by the time they realize your true intentions, it will be too late. Do not give people the chance to sense what you are up to. Use false sincerity, send ambiguous signals, set up misleading objects of desire, and don't appear secretive - rather, talk endlessly about your desires and goals, just not the real ones.

The best deception also requires a screen of smoke to distract people's attention from your real purpose.

Conceal your purpose and hide your progress

If you have a reputation for deception, no smoke screen, red herring, false sincerity, or any other diversionary device will help you conceal your intentions.

Say less than necessary

Power is, in addition to other things, a game of appearance. When you say less than what is necessary, you will appear greater and more powerful than you are, as it will make other people uncomfortable. If you control what you reveal, people cannot pierce your intentions.

The longer I keep quiet, the sooner others move their lips and teeth

However, there are some times when being silent is not an option, as it can arouse suspicion and even insecurity, especially in your superiors. Being silent and saying less than necessary must be practiced with caution.

Guard your reputation with your life

Your reputation is the cornerstone of power as it can influence whether you win or will be attacked. The people around you, even your friends, will remain mysterious and unfathomable to some extent. Everyone has secret recesses they never reveal. This is why making and maintaining a reputation is important - it has a power like magic. It can increase your presence and exaggerate your strengths without you having to spend much energy. If, somehow, you have already stained your reputation, make sure you associate with someone whose image counteracts your own to whitewash and elevate your name. Reputation is something that should be carefully collected and hoarded.

Everything is judged by its appearance

What is unseen in this world counts for little. You have to draw attention to yourself by creating an unforgettable, or even controversial, image. There is no distinction between kinds of attention - any sort of deed will bring you power. To burn more brightly than those around you is a skill you have to learn: learn to attract attention. This can be achieved by doing something different and odd, as crowds are magnetically attracted to the unusual and inexplicable.

However, you should never make it too clear what you are doing or about to do. Mystery heightens your presence and creates anticipation, as everyone will be watching to see what happens next. It seduces people into believing that it conceals something marvelous. It has to look like a game - playful and nonthreatening.

Be aware that you must pull back if it goes too far. You should never offend or challenge the reputation of those above you; appearing too greedy for attention also signals insecurity, which drives power away.

Use other people for your own cause

The credit for an invention or creation is as important, if not more important, than the invention itself. Therefore, you need to learn to take advantage of other people's work to further your own cause. In this world there are many people who have more wisdom, knowledge, and experience than you. You should learn to get others to do the work for you while you take the credit and appear to be of godlike strength and power.

There are those who live by hunting and killing, and there are vast numbers of creatures who live off the hunting of others. These latter, less imaginative types are often incapable of doing the essential work for the creation of power. However, they understand early on that if they wait long enough, they can always find another animal to do the work for them.

So don't be naive - while you are slaving away on some project, there are vultures trying to figure out a way to survive and even thrive off your creativity. Better to protect yourself and join the game.

There are times when taking credit for someone else's work is not the wise course, such as if your power is not firmly established.

Make other people come to you

The essence of power is the ability to keep your initiative and get others to react to your moves. This way you are the one controlling the situation instead of someone else. To achieve this position, on the one hand you have to learn to master your emotions and not be influenced by anger; on the other hand, you must play people's natural tendency to react angrily when pushed and baited.

Manipulation is a dangerous game. Once someone suspects he is being manipulated, it becomes harder to control him.

Good warriors make others come to them and do not go to others.

However, in some cases striking suddenly and aggressively at the enemy demoralizes him; his energies sink and with no time to think, people make errors of judgment.

Make other agree with you through actions

Gains made through argument are often a Pyrrhic victory (a victory that comes at great cost, making the win not worth it). A powerful move is to make others agree with you through actions rather than words.

Demonstrate, do not explicate

In the heat of argument, people will say anything to support their cause; they will quote many things such as the Bible - who will question this?

There are situations where verbal argument has a vital use in the realm of power, such as to distract and cover your tracks when you are practicing deception or are caught in a lie. When you are caught in a lie, the more emotional and certain you appear, the less likely people will suspect you.

Avoid the unhappy and unlucky

In the game of power, it is critical to know the people you associate with. You could literally die from someone else's misery, as emotional states are as infectious as diseases. If you associate with infectors you will waste valuable time and energy trying to free yourself, and the only solution to such infection is quarantine. People who attract happiness to themselves by their good cheer and intelligence are people you want to associate with, as they will share the prosperity they draw upon themselves.

Always be needed and wanted

Necessity rules the world.

If you create no need for yourself, you may be discarded at the first opportunity. You must make sure that people depend on you for their welfare. To achieve this position, create a relationship of dependence. The master must require your service or he will be weak and unable to function without you. You become entangled in his work so deeply that doing without you will bring the master great difficulty, as his valuable time will be lost in training someone else. Once you have established such a relationship, you have the leverage to make the master do as you wish.

The weakness of making others depend on you is that you are also somewhat dependent on them. If you move beyond that point, you may end up standing alone as it means getting rid of those above you.

Use selective honesty and generosity

To utilize deception you must use distraction. Distracting people gives you the time and space to do something they won't notice. Powerful forms of distraction are kindness, generosity, or honesty, because they disarm people's suspicions and turn them into children eagerly accepting any kind of affectionate gesture.

Few people can resist a gift, even from the most hardened enemy

However, if you have a history of deceit, no amount of honesty, generosity, or kindness will fool people; it will only draw attention to itself.

When asking for help, appeal to people's interest

In your quest for power, there will be times when you find yourself seeking help from those more powerful than you. You must know the art of asking for help so you are not trapped in your own wants and desires. Powerful people are often locked inside their own needs, so you must make an appeal to their self-interest or it will be a waste of time. A key step to understanding the other person's psychology is knowing what he is concerned about (reputation / social standing), whether he has enemies you could help him with, or whether he is simply motivated by money and power.

In some situations, people will see an appeal to their self-interest as ugly and ignoble; rather, they prefer to exercise charity, mercy, and justice in order to feel superior to you.

Pose as a friend, work as a spy

To be a step ahead of your rivals, you must use spies to gather valuable information - better to play the spy yourself. In the realm of power, to have control over future events you need to know people's thoughts, emotions, and plans, which are often the most critical parts of their character. This makes it hard to predict their moves. To find their secrets, you may spy on them by using other people, as this is the simplest method. While you will certainly gather information, you have little control over the people who are doing the work; they might even turn back on you or reveal that you are spying. It is far better to be the spy yourself - pose as a friend while gathering information.

However, while you are spying on them, you must be prepared for them to spy on you, and one of the most potent weapons in this battle is giving out false information.

Truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies

Crush you enemy totally

Those who seek to achieve things should show no mercy

Your enemies wish you ill and want nothing more than to eliminate you in the game of power. If you stop halfway out of mercy or hope of reconciliation, you only make them more determined to take revenge someday. Your enemy will act friendly for the time being, but only because you have defeated them and they have no choice but to bide their time. The solution to this is simple: crush them totally, as they would do the same to you; allow no options, annihilate them, and their territory is yours.

However, sometimes it is better to let your enemy destroy themselves, if possible, than to make them suffer by your hand.

Use absence to increase respect and honor

The market is regulated by supply and demand - more supply means the price goes down. This applies to a person too: the more you are seen and heard from, the more common you appear. Everything depends on absence and presence. While a strong presence will draw power and attention to you, you will eventually reach a point where too much presence creates the opposite effect - the more you are seen, the more your value degrades. You need to withdraw at the right moment before they push you away (a game of hide and seek).

This only applies once you have attained a certain level of power. You should only withdraw once you have established your presence, because if you leave too early, you will be forgotten.

Keep others in suspended terror

Predictability gives people a sense of control. However, you should turn the tables and be deliberately unpredictable, as nothing is more terrifying than the sudden and unexpected. It is a tactic of the master: if you find yourself outnumbered or cornered, throw in a series of unpredictable moves which will confuse your enemies. This can be applied to daily life, where people are constantly trying to read the motives behind your actions and use this against you.

Sometimes predictability can work in your favor: by creating a pattern for people to be familiar with and comfortable around, you can soothe them to sleep.

Isolation is dangerous

The world as we know it is dangerous and enemies are everywhere. A place, such as a fortress, might seem like a good idea to protect yourself. This isolation, however, exposes you to more danger as it cuts you off from valuable information - sources of your power. You won't know what is happening around you and you will also lose sense of proportion.

In times, temporary isolation will seem like a better idea, such as when the weight of society's pressure to conform and a lack of distance from other people make it impossible to think clearly.

Know who you are dealing with

In life you meet many kinds of people and therefore you can't assume that they all react the same way to your strategies. If you somehow offend the wrong person, they may spend the rest of their lives seeking revenge. Here are the five most dangerous and difficult types of people:

The Arrogant and Proud Man - He may initially disguise it but this man's touchy pride makes him dangerous
The Hopelessly Insecure Man - He is related to the proud and arrogant type, but is less violent and harder to spot.
Mr. Suspicion - He sees what he wants to see - usually the worst - in other people and imagines that everyone is trying to get him.
The Serpent with a Long Memory - If this type of man is hurt or deceived, he will show no anger on the surface but will calculate and wait for the right moment.
The Plain, Unassuming, and Often Unintelligent Man - This man is lot harder to deceive than you think. This man will not take the bait because he does not recognize it.

You should never assume that the person you are currently dealing with is weaker or less important than you. If you want to turn people down, do it politely and respectfully even if you feel it is ridiculous. When judging or measuring your opponent, never rely on your instincts; instead, study and spy on your opponent.

Do not commit to anyone

Never rush to take any sides and do not commit to any side or cause but yourself. You should put yourself in the middle between competing powers and lure one side with a promise of help. The other side will pursue you as well in order to defeat its enemy. Always seem interested and supportive when people are having their petty fights, but find a way to remain neutral. With every battle, they will grow weaker while you grow stronger by avoiding it.

In the game of power, even if you can master your own emotions, you can't control the temperament of those around you, which presents a great danger. While you can't let them drag you into their fight, you also can't completely stand aside. To win this game, make sure you seem interested in other people's problems and even appear to take their side while you maintain your energy and sanity by keeping your emotions disengaged.

Seem dumber than you mark

Nobody in this world likes to feel stupider than the next person. The feeling that someone else is more intelligent than we are is intolerable, and we try to justify it in different ways. You can use this to your advantage by reassuring people that they are more intelligent than you are, which will disarm their suspicion.

Revealing the true nature of your intelligence rarely pays, but there is one situation where it pays to do the opposite - when you can cover up a deception with a show of intelligence. People will believe what you say if you have the authority and knowledge.

Transform weakness into power

Weakness is no sin, and can become a strength if you learn how to play it right

In the realm of power we often get into trouble when we overreact to the moves of our enemies and rivals. Such problems are easily avoidable if we are more reasonable. Next time someone pushes you and you find yourself starting to react, instead of fighting, yield and turn the other cheek. This will often neutralize their behavior, as they are confounded by your lack of resistance. If you ever find yourself temporarily weakened, the surrender tactic will help you disguise your ambition; it teaches you patience and self-control.

Surrendering is done to avoid martyrdom, but there are times when your enemy will not relent and martyrdom may be the only way out.

Concentrate your focus

Intensity defeats extensity every time

In the world of power you will often need help from someone else - usually people more powerful than you. A fool flits from one person to another, believing that by doing this he will survive. However, you will save a lot of energy and attain more power by affixing yourself to an appropriate source of power.

There are times when dispersion is a better tactical move than concentration. When you are fighting someone stronger than yourself, concentrating makes you an easier target. Also, tying yourself to a single source of power is dangerous because if that person dies, leaves, or falls from grace, you will suffer.

Play the perfect courtier

The perfect courtier thrives in a world where everything revolves around power. Mastering the art of indirection is crucial to assert power over others in the most oblique and graceful manners.

The Laws of Court Politics

Avoid Ostentation
Practice Nonchalance
Be Frugal with Flattery
Arrange to be Noticed
Alter Your Style and Language According to the Person You are Dealing With
Never Be the Bearer of Bad News
Never Affect Friendliness and Intimacy with Your Master
Never Criticize Those Above Your Directly
Be Frugal in Asking Those Above You for Favors
Never Joke About Appearance or Taste
Do Not Be the Court Cynic
Be Self-observant
Master Your Emotions
Fit the Spirit of the Times
Be a Source of Pleasure

In court, honesty is a fool's game and you must never be so self-absorbed as to believe the master is interested in your criticisms of him. Make the master look more talented than those around him; never impugn or question his taste, don't overstep your bounds, make your master a gift of your talents and you will rise above the courtiers.

Courtiers are like magicians as they deceptively play with appearances. Therefore it is essential to keep people from seeing your tricks and glimpses of your sleight of hand.

Re-create yourself

Do not accept the roles that society foists on you

You should create a new identity, one that commands attention and never bores the audience. You must learn to enlarge your actions through dramatic techniques such as surprise, suspense, or the creating of sympathy.

The world you live in wants to assign you a role in life, and should you accept this you will be doomed as your power will be limited to the role. However, an actor plays many roles - enjoy this protean power or at least forge a new identity for your resentful world.

Keep your hands clean

Maintain a spotless appearance by using others as scapegoats to disguise your involvement. The idea of using scapegoats is shifting the guilt and sin to an outside figure - object, animal, or man. History has shown the value of using a close associate as a scapegoat, also known as the "fall of the favorite." Nobody would suspect the scapegoat of being guilty because who would sacrifice someone so close to them? If there is something unpleasant or unpopular to be done, it is far too risky to do the work yourself. The cat's-paw will do what you need, hurt whom you need to, and keep people from noticing that you are actually responsible.

The scapegoat and cat's-paw must be used with extreme caution as they hide your own involvement in dirty work. If the screen is lifted and you are seen as the person behind it, your hand will be seen everywhere and you may be blamed for misfortunes you had nothing to do with.

Play on people's need to believe to create a cultlike following

Everyone like to believe in something therefore become the focal point of such desire by offering them a cause - a new faith to follow. Here are the five steps of cult making:

Keep It Vague; Keep It Simple - You must first attract attention which should be done through words, which are hazy and deceptive.
Emphasize the Visual and the Sensual over the Intellectual - Once people begin to gather around, danger like boredom and skepticism will present. You need to amuse the bored and word of the cynics.
Borrow the Forms of Organized Religion to Structure the Group - It is time to organize. It need to be both elevating and comforting.
Disguise Your Source of Income - Now your coffers are beginning to fill with your followers' money. However you must never be seen as hungry for money and the power it brings.
Set Up an Us-Versus-Them Dynamic - Now the group is large and thriving yet if you are not careful, inertia will set in and time and boredom will demagnetize the group. To keep you followed united create a us-versus-them dynamic.

Enter action with boldness

You must enter a course with boldness; therefore, if you are unsure of a course of action, do not attempt it, as your doubts and hesitations will infect your execution. Some psychological effects of boldness and timidity:

The Bolder the Lie the Better - The bolder the lie, the more convincing it becomes
Lions Circle the Hesitant Prey - If, in a first encounter, you show your willingness to compromise, you bring out the lion even in people who are not necessarily bloodthirsty.
Boldness Strikes Fear; Fear Creates Authority - The bold move will make you seem larger and more powerful than you are.
Going Halfway with a Half a Heart Digs the Deeper Grave - Do not enter an action with less than total confidence, as this will set up obstacles in your own path.
Hesitation Creates Gap, Boldness Obliterates Them - Taking time to think, you create a gap that allows others time to think as well.
Audacity Separates You From the Herd - Boldness gives you the presence and makes you seem larger than life and what draws attention draws power.

Boldness should never be a strategy behind all of you actions, but rather a tactical instrument, to be used in the right moment.

Plan all the way to the end

Many people are ruled by the heart, not the head. Improvising will only take you so far when the next crisis arrives and should never substitute for thinking several steps ahead. The solution, to aim for a goal and then keep to it, is to plan for the long run. Foresee the future like someone who looks through the clouds and sees the ends of all things.

Plan in detail before you act

However, don't be too locked into a plan rigidly, or you will be unable to deal with sudden shifts of fortune. Have some alternatives and a degree of flexibility.

Make your accomplishments seem effortless

Houdini accomplished many ingenious escapes in his life not by magic but by hard work and endless practice, which he concealed from the world. When trying to do something, you must research and practice endlessly before appearing in public. You should never expose the sweat and labor behind your poise.

The more mystery surrounds your actions, the more awesome your power seems.

There are times when revealing the inner work can be worthwhile. As long as the partial disclosure of tricks and technique is carefully planned, it is the ultimate in cleverness giving the audience the illusion of being superior and involved.

Control the options

The best deception are the ones which make like giving the other person a choice, making them feel in control while they are actually your puppets. Freedom, options and choice evoke a power of possibility beyond the reality but when examined closely, they have noticeable limitations. When saying "unlimited options", it sounds promising but it actually paralyze us and cloud our ability to choose. People who are choosing alternatives find it hard to believe that they are being manipulated. Some forms of "controlling the options":

Color the Choices - Propose three or four choices of action for each situation and make the one your prefer seem like the best solution.
Force the Resister - Push them to "choose" what you want them to do by appearing to advocate the opposite.
After the Playing Field - Here your opponents know that their hand is being forced, which does not matter as this technique is effective against those resist at all costs.
The Shrinking Options - Raise the price every time the buyer hesitates, which is an excellent negotiation ploy - making fall for the idea that they are getting a better deal today than if they wait till tomorrow
The Weak Man of the Precipice - The weak are easiest to maneuver by controlling their options. This is same as Color the Choice but being more aggressive against the weak - using fear and terror to propel them into action.
Brothers in Crime - Here you attract your victims to some criminal scheme(making them think they did it), creating a bond of blood and guilt between you.
The Horns of Dilemma - Key to this is to strike quickly. Deny the victim time to think of an escape.

Controlling the options works best on those, whose power is fragile and cannot operate too openly without incurring suspicion. However it is more elegant and effective to give people the illusion of choice.

Play to people fantasies

Never appeal to truth and reality unless you are prepared for the anger that comes from disenchantment. To gain power you must be a source of pleasure for those around you. Always promise the moon, the great and sudden transformation, the plot of gold. Fantasy requires the backdrop of the humdrum and the mundane and the oppressiveness of reality. A person who can spin a fantasy out of an oppressive reality has access to untold power. To bring power, the fantasy must remain to some degree unrealized - literally unreal.

While there is power in tapping into fantasies, there is also danger, as it is a temporary diversion from the everyday that you are providing. Never come too close to the place where you are actually expected to produce results.

Discover each man's thumbscrew

Everyone has weaknesses, usually an insecurity, an uncontrollable emotion, or a need, and once found, it is a thumbscrew you can turn to your advantage. How to find the thumbscrew:

Pay Attention to Gesture and Unconscious Signals - No mortal can keep a secret. If the lips are silent, he chatters with fingertips. The key is not only what you look for but where and how you look.
Find the Helpless Child - Most weakness begins in childhood. Knowing about a childhood need gives you a powerful key to a person's weakness
Look for Contrasts - An overt trait often conceals its opposite.
Find the Weak Link - In your search for weakness, sometimes the who matters. There is always someone behind the scene who has a great deal of power, over the person superficially on top.
Fill the Void - Two main emotional voids to fill are insecurity and unhappiness. The ability to fill these emotional voids (someone insecure and unhappy) is a great source of power.
Feed on Uncontrollable Emotions People with uncontrollable emotions cannot control them themselves, and this is where you come in.

While playing on people's weaknesses you may stir up an action you cannot control, so look several steps ahead and plan accordingly.

Be royal in your own fashion

The way you carry yourself will often determine how you are treated. If you appear common or vulgar, people will disrespect you; by acting regally and confident in your powers, you will be destined to wear a crown.

If someone believes that he is destined for great things, the belief will radiate outward. This will infect people around you, who will think that you must have strong reasons to feel confident. Be overcome by your self-belief even while you are practicing a kind of deception on yourself. Some strategies to help you create the effect:

Always make a bold demand
Set your price high and do not waver
Go after the highest person in the building
Give a gift of some sort to those above you

The reason for the regal confidence is to set yourself apart from other people - but don't take it too far. You will never elevate yourself by humiliating people.

Master of the art of timing

You must never seem in a hurry, as it displays a lack of control over yourself. Be patient, as if you know that everything will come to you eventually. How to master the art of timing:

Recognize the spirit of times
Recognize the prevailing winds do not necessarily mean running with them
Without patience as you sword and shield, your timing will fail

Kinds of time you have to deal with

Long time - years-long kind of time that must be manage with patience and gentle guidance
Forced time - short-term time that we can manipulate as an offensive weapon
End time - When a plan must be executed with speed and force

Disdain things you cannot have

If you acknowledge a petty problem you give it existence and credibility. If there is something you want but can't have, show contempt for it. Letting things bother you is your choice.

The more attention you pay an enemy, the stronger you make him

You must play this card with care and delicacy. While small problems will vanish on their own, some will grow and fester unless you attend to them.

Create compelling spectacles

Striking imagery and grand symbolic gestures create the aura of power. You must stage spectacles for those around you, full of arresting visuals and symbols that heighten your presence. Using words to plead your case is a risky business and they are a dangerous instrument. The visual, however, strikes with an emotional power and immediacy that leaves no gaps for reflection and doubt. It leaps right over rational, reasonable thoughts.

Think as you like but behave like others

If you make a show of going against the times, people will think that you only want attention and look down upon you. Thus it is safer to blend in and nurture the common touch, sharing your originality only with tolerant friends who appreciate your uniqueness.

We all tell lies and hide our true feelings, as complete free expression is socially impossible. We say things that the prickly and insecure want to hear, which becomes "natural." However, there are people who see such restraints as intolerable and an infringement on their freedom and who feel a need to prove the superiority of their values. In the end their arguments convince only a few and offend many more. People who are wise and clever learn early on that they can display conventional behavior and mouth ideas without having to believe in them. This allows them to be left alone to have the thoughts they want and to express them to the people they choose.

The only time worth standing out is when you already stand out - achieved an unshakeable position of power.

Stir up the water to catch the fish

You must always stay calm and objective, and if you can make your enemy angry while holding that position, you gain a decided advantage. People who are angry end up looking ridiculous as they have taken things too seriously, exaggerating the hurt or insult that has been done to them. Petulance is not power but rather a sign of helplessness. The answer to this is not to repress your angry or emotional responses but to change your perspective - realizing that nothing in the social realm, and in the game of power, is personal.

Playing with people's emotions you always have to be careful - study them beforehand.

Despise the free lunch

What is offered for free is dangerous - it usually involves either a trick or a hidden obligation

By paying your own way you stay clear of gratitude, guilt, and deceit, and it is often wise to pay the full price. Recognize the opposite pole to the powerful - people locked in a self-destructive refusal to use money creatively and strategically:

The Greedy Fish - takes the human side out of money and see only the lifeless balance sheet.
The Bargain Demon - waste valuable time digging for bargains and worry endlessly about what they could have gotten elsewhere for little less.
The Sadist - play vicious games with money to asset their power such as make you wait for money that is owed to you.
The Indiscriminate Giver - generosity need to be used strategically, with a definite end in mind but the indiscriminate giver are generous because they want to be loved and admires by all.

Learn to pay, then to pay well

However this law offers great opportunities for swindling and deception if you apply it from the opposite side. Bait your deceptions with the possibility of easy money, as people are lazy and want wealth to fall in their lap. For a small sum, sell them advice, and that small sum will become a fortune when applied to thousands of suckers.

Avoid stepping into a great man's shoes

What happens first always appears better and more original than what comes after. If you succeed a great man or have someone famous (like parents), you will have to accomplish twice what they achieved to outshine them. Establish your own name and identity by changing course.

Using the shadow of a great predecessor could have some advantage; it can be chosen as a trick. The past often has elements worth appropriating, qualities that would be foolish to reject out of a need to distinguish yourself.

Strike the shepherd and the sheep will scatter

If trouble occurs, it can often be traced to a single strong individual - the stirrer. You should not wait for the troubles they cause to multiply try to negotiate with them. Strike at the source of trouble and the sheep will scatter. Banish them before it is too late, separate them from the group before they become the eye of a whirlpool. Like in the chess, where to try to corner the king, you should isolate the enemy's power.

Any harm you do to a man should be done in such a way that you need not fear this revenge.

Work on the hears and mind of others

In the game of power, you are surrounded by people who have no reason to help you at all unless they have some interest to do so. If you don't have anything to offer that is in their interest, they will see you likely as just one more competitor. Once you overcome this, you will find the key that unlocks their heard and mind. This softens them up, allowing you to seduce them into their corner.

To achieve this, when meeting someone you must take a step back and see what makes this person unique (instead of talking about yourself...).

Disarm and infuriate with the mirror effect

While a mirror reflects a reality, it is also a perfect tool for deception because when you mirror your enemies, they can't figure out your strategy. Here are four main Mirror Effects in the realm of power:

The Neutralizing Effect - Do what you enemies do and they can't see what you are up to.
The Narcissus Effect - Look deep into their souls; fathom their inmost desire and reflect it back on them.
The Moral Effect - "The truth is generally see, rarely heard". Mirror what other people have done to you in a way that makes them realize you are doing do them what they did to you.
The Hallucinatory Effect - By creating a perfect copy of an object, a place or a person it will act as a dummy, which people will take it for the real thing.

Study the world's surface and learn to mirror them in your habits.

While a mirror contains great power it also comes with dangerous reefs like the mirrored situation - a situation that seems to reflect a previous one. You can often back into such a situation without understanding it, while those around you understand it quite well.

Preach the need for change, but never reform too much at once

While change is necessary to develop, too much innovation is traumatic and will lead to revolt. If a change is necessary, make it feel like a gentle improvement on the past.

Human psychology contains many dualities. While people generally understand that change is necessary for institutions and individuals, they are also irritated and upset if a change affect them personally as deep inside they still cling to the past. The change they want is the superficial change, but not a change that upsets the core habits and routines of someone.

However, if something that happened in the recent past was painful and harsh, it is self-destructive to hold on to it.

Never appear too perfect

If you appear better than others it is always dangerous, but appearing to have no faults and weakness is the most dangerous of all.

When people meet people who surpass them, they make it clear that the person is in fact a mediocre and not as brilliant as he had thought. This disturbs the self-image which can't last long without stirring up ugly emotions. We feel envy, as only if we had the skill of the superior person, we would be happy. And showing emotions like this is socially not approved - to show envy is to admit to feeling inferior.

In order to deal with this there are several strategies. First, we have to accept that there will be people who will surpass us in some way, and the fact that you may envy the. And as you gain power, those below will also feel envious of you. Finally, when people envy you they will work against you insidiously - putting obstacles in your path that you will not foresee or trace to its source.

Once envy is there, it is sometimes best to affect the opposite approach - display the utmost disdain for those who envy you. Instead of hiding your perfection, make it obvious.

Do not go past the mark you aimed for; learn when to stop

The moment you achieve a victory is the greatest peril. However in this moment - in the heat of victory - overconfidence and arrogance can push you past the goals and by going too far you will make more enemies than you defeat.

Set a goal, and when you reach it, stop

Those who succeed at the game of power are the ones who control the patterns, keeping people of balance while they set the tempo. The essence of strategy is to control what comes next. Powerful vary their rhythms and pattern, change course, adapt to circumstance and learn to improvise.

You must either destroy a man or leave him alone entirely. If you inflict half-punishment you will only create an enemy whose bitterness will grow over time and who will take revenge. By beating your enemy, you make your victory complete. At the moment of victory, you do not hold back from the defeated enemy, but rather from unnecessarily attacking others-so as not to create new enemies.

Assume formlessness

When you take a shape, have a visible plan, you open yourself to attack. Therefore you should keep yourself adaptable and on the move. We cannot communicate our emotions without a form. However, the form we create, change constantly - in fashion, style and so on representing the mood of the moment. We are always changing our form we have inherited from the previous generation. The forms / things that don't change, come to look to us like death and we destroy them. Your power can only flourish if it is flexible in its form, but since everything has a form, the formlessness of power is a power that is constantly changing and never predictable.

Being formlessness makes your enemy hunt all over for you, scattering their own force. When you finally engage them, hit them with a powerful, concentrated blow.

Personal Reflection

Well, the book didn't change my life. Many people argue that this book is morally questionable, but in my opinion, while that may seem to be the case when reading it superficially, the deeper you go into the book, the more truth there is in some of the laws. However, I won't be applying many of the laws described in this book in the near future... so yeah.

Yes, why not give it a try. But heads up - it is a long book.

Looking Ahead

A famous book for habits / productivity - Atomic Habits