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All ethics, decency, courtesy and fairness falls out of the Golden Rule – “Treat others as you would like to be treated”. So the question is what happens when we are all those things, for the best of our ability, but we get treated poorly by a narcissist that abuses our kindness. Do we the embrace the psychology of our abuser and accept that is how the world is and that it was OUR fault for being naive?These rules are the revenge fantasy of a wounded child archetype. They are highly dysfunctional in any healthy community, relationship, friendships of family. If you practice them, you will end up losing the most valuable of friendships and other relationships that would have helped you out the most in life, and keep you in that hell.If you want to be able to recognize psychopathic indicators in others, read up some books on modern psychology that addresses that directly. It is not very hard to recognize such people.I heard this is the most popular book ordered in US prisons. That should tell you something.
there seems to be a lot of love and hate surrounding this book, so if you are curious but unsure, this review should help you decide whether or not to buy the book, and how it will impact youFirst, to understand the 48 laws of power, you must know two key ideas1. you CAN NOT escape the power game. thinking you can “not participate” is as foolish as thinking that you could somehow escape gravity or make the sun stand still. Robert Greene explains why in the intro with some excellent examples2. the 48 laws of power are neither good nor evil; they are just LAWS. If someone pushed a man off a cliff would you blame gravity for for his demise? This is the mindset you must adopt in order to learn a lot from this book.Things I Liked- NEW PARADIGMafter reading the 48 laws, you will never see the world the same way again. once you understand some of these laws you will see many underlying currents and motives you did not see before.- INCREASES POWERone of the main reasons to buy the book. you wil become exponentially more powerfull by knowing and understanding these laws-CRYSTAL CLEARevery law is clearly outlined with “transgression” of the law, “observance” of the law, keys to power, and a “reversal”-GREAT STORIESthe 48 laws are packed with mindblowing and sometimes humorous stories of people in history practicing these laws. this is helpful as some of the concepts are quite abstract.What I didn’t like-RISKYan old proverb says ” A man who plays with snakes will eventually be bitten”. If you begin to use the 48 Laws improperly, you could get yourself in some dangerous situations, lose friends, piss off a lot a people, and destroy relationships- REQUIRES DISCERNMENTif you you are looking for a highly concrete book that the says “do xyz and you will accomplish vyx” look elsewhere. the Laws require good judgement and and and prospecting nature to practice and apply-NOT FOR EVERYONE If you are aghast at the idea of manipulation and deceit then read with caution.OVERALL: If you want to have more power or a better understanding of why different situations turn out the the way they do, you should definitely read the 48 laws of power by Robert Greene. If you want to be naive, easily manipulated, weak, you should ignore this book and go watch some netfilx.Thanks for reading
This book has controversy, but most of it stems from reviewers that believe all people are good inside and unicorns deliver their vegan low fat cappuccino with cream. Well, most people aren’t kind, and this book prepared me for reality. It doesn’t teach one to be self absorbed or evil or a heretic. It teaches one to stand your ground and to protect yourself from taking unnecessary burden, unfair treatment, and manipulation from corrupt people.
This book takes the worst parts of the human mind and drags them down into the abyss. And then thrives there. When you open this book, it’s akin to stepping at the edge of the cavern. You don’t notice how its stalactite-filled ceiling echo the horrors and the gore and the piss and the vomit of others that came before. Its passages are full of the bodies of good men and women who were caught by the beasts that live there. You know you should turn back after seeing the first mangled corpse, but you’re enthralled by the journey. It may come off as exciting. “What harm can it do?” you might think. “There’s treasure at the end,” you might think.Then you see the first demon of forty-eight. It doesn’t do anything. It stands, however, at the centre of the first level. It stares at you, its black eyes full of emptyness. You may grow scared. And you’d be right to. Or, like a fool, you will approach this horned burnt skin creature. It stands tall and appears almost as if it were a part of the cavern itself. Its transparent nature, made to lure you into thinking it does not exist, makes it even more dangerous. And when you are well within its reach, it seizes you with its mighty clawed hand and eats you whole. But something strange happens. You don’t die. You fall. And you fall far.When you finally come to, your body, full of pain, and soreness, and that horrible feeling of nausea explodes inside you. As if a piece of your soul was eaten away. It takes you a while before you realise that you are now deeper into the abyss. There’s less light. But you still hear some of the comforts of nature. The rushing water into the bodies of aqua. The sound of drops from the stalactites. The distant birds chirping. You would think that what you saw was some illusion. That you slipped and fell. Or that some other thing occurred. A bad lunch; a meal that made you ill. If you were smart, you’d turn around and go home. But most people aren’t smart. They keep going.You hear a fox’s cry suddenly. You can’t believe your ears. A fox? Here? And you follow the sound. When you arrive to where the fox sits, its back to you. You might say, “Oh you poor creature. Are you lost? Do you need any help getting out?” Then it turns. It’s not a fox. It’s not….an animal in the normal sense. The world around you suddenly grows colder and darker. You may take a step back. But the fox, with red eyes, eyes that are bleeding and putrid and full of maggots, follows you. It’s screeching. Loudly. And you cover your ears. But that doesn’t help. And when the fox reaches up to you, it lunges at you. And eats its way into your heart. And you black out. When you awaken, the cavern is different. As if you were moved elsewhere. The walls are growing a faint red. Your chest feels like it’s on fire. And you can’t feel your arm. But it slowly begins to regain its feeling. Then you puke out blackness. It’s not a puke like anything you’ve seen. The human body isn’t made to expel something like this. Something is clearly wrong. That was the second demon. You might panic and run. Or you might not. If you were smart, you’d turn around and go home. But most people aren’t smart. They keep going.You rub your head, then your arm. You get up to your feet and look around. Things seem hazy. Much darker than before. You’re confused. You don’t know what you saw. You look around. Maybe try and find a way out. Suddenly you see a light at the end. You decide to follow it. And you spot an old man sitting on a small mound. He had a long flowing white beard, a grand white gown with the names of holy people written and he wore a crown. Much rather, he wore seven crowns made of gold, silver and copper, and each crown was full of diamonds of various colours and shapes. His eyes were gentle. And smiled, like a father does to his child. His presence gave off something warm about it.”Who are you?” You might ask.”I am the last of all that is good. Turn ye back and never return. Ere thou too shalt be consumed,” the mysterious fellow said, in a loud and booming voice. You might think the old man mad, others might think the old man illogical, and finally others might say that he’s ignorant or outdated or that he can’t understand the intricacies of the new world, the modern world. He is a relic of the past, with all those pesky morals and traditions. We can’t have morals or traditions in the future.If you heed the advice, you may yet be saved. If you don’t, then your soul will slowly be consumed. Until you too are no different than the demons you should rightfully fear. Even if you were not a religious person, it would be obvious to see how unethical this book is. You will become a spawn of evil. And no amount of prayer and church-going will ever be enough. Because you have been done the unforgiveable knowingly.If you wish to learn how to use power for good, then I would recommend Aquinas’s De Regno, Vincent of Beauvais’s The Education of Noble Children, Cicero’s De Officiis, Seneca’s De Clementia, and the King’s Mirror by anonymous. There are many more on the observation of power and its use in business, but these work. And you don’t need to be underhanded in order to do so. The best businessman is the one who can keep his soul intact, and thinks of the good of others. Not himself.
I have lost my innocence from reading this book and realised that there really are people who are out to get you (paranoia aside). People exist like the people described in this book who will manipulate the situation and use you for their own ends. While this book outright advocates that you do this (because other people are bound to be doing it so why don’t you join them and get them before they get you, which is a highly flawed argument), this is clearly not always the best course of action.However, this book has helped me in ways that I did not expect. I am more aware of what other people are doing, I am actually more concerned with the welfare of others, and I realised that it is important to at least have power over your own life so I am now a much more in control person who is more disciplined. I am also more excited about life somewhat, knowing that you can have fun improving yourself and your position in life and in the world.I am not sure that I will follow each and every rule of the book, but it’s an interesting read and some of the laws are fairly neutral such as being careful about what you say to people, not always showing all of your cards and never appearing or being smarter than those above you, especially in a professional work situation. Laws such as these are good for self-preservation, if nothing else.But if you take everything in this book as gospel, then you may lose your humanity (as other reviewers have said) and/or you may realise that the heights of power are not what you wanted after all. Ultimately, take this book with a barrel of salt and maybe go for the more morally neutral laws, lest you be completely corrupted by the dark side of the world.
I just bought this book and in the opening pages your told to basically obey your master” referring to work bosses in a modern term. I disagree completely in the context it’s written, you want to dumb down your shine so your master can outshine you. Is one lesson this book includes, if you really are submitting to someone else’s opinion, you lose fullstop, in doing so you give up the one thing you own in this world, that’s yourself. Staying authentic and shining should be the key to life and your “master” should want to see you shine more than them.
I don’t recommend this book to everyone…in my opinion this books is very good for people that were used and kind hearted people…Not everyone will be able to understand the value of this book people might say it’s a immoral book, however it’s very helpful if you are a very altruistic person it will help balance your extremely kind personality…
This is a fine book that I thought, at first, I wouldn’t enjoy but did. It is full of wonderful quotations from history and the text is written beautifully by Greene. It is not stuffy and academic, which I thought it might have been. Nor is it one of those briefer, ‘snappy-type’ books, always ending in a joke with little elaboration.Here the 48 Laws are thoroughly discussed, with lots of interesting stories making the book a real page turner.Of course, it is not difficult to find criticisms of each Law; I found and disagreed with some myself. But I think Greene, on the whole, recognises this and even puts in a ‘Reversal’ section for each of the 48 Laws to show that this can be the case. Besides, you don’t have to take each Law seriously. I certainly didn’t. I thought they were just fun to read, though they did make me think about how self-interested the human race actually is.Even so, I haven’t read a book as good as this since reading Benjamin Hoff’s The Tao of Pooh & the Te of Piglet some years ago, and I shall certainly be looking out for more works by Robert Greene in the future.I hope you find my review helpful.
After reading parts of this book, it appears the author has several sociopathic tendencies. These aren’t ‘laws of power’ but more so ways to manipulate, use others and abuse your position of trust/power where possible. If that’s what you’re after then sure, it’s a great read but I couldn’t enjoy such an unethical book.
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