on 29-Jan-2017 (Sun)

Learning the game of power requires a certain way of looking at the world, a shifting of perspective. It takes effort and years of practice, for much of the game may not come naturally. Certain basic skills are required, and once you master these skills you will be able to apply the laws of power more easily.

It is a game. Both of you behave as gentlemen. observing the rules of the game and taking nothing personally.

Galileo depended on the generosity of rulers to support his research so he would sometimes make gifts of his inventions to the leading patrons of the time but his patrons usually paid him with gifts, not cash. This made for a life of constant insecurity and dependence.

He hit on a new strategy, when he discovered the moons of Jupiter. Instead of dividing the discovery among his patrons, as he had done in the past, he decided to focus exclusively on the Medicis.

He chose the Medicis because they had made Jupiter, the mightiest of the gods, the Medici symbol—a symbol of a power that went beyond politics and banking.

Galileo announced that "the moons of Jupiter offered themselves in the heavens” to his telescope at the same time as Cosimo II’s enthronement. He said that the four moons harmonized with the number of the Medicis.

After he dedicated the discovery to the Medicis, Galileo commissioned an emblem representing Jupiter sitting on a cloud with the four stars circling about him, and presented this to Cosimo II as a symbol of his link to the stars.

Cosimo II made Galileo his official court philosopher and mathematician, with a full salary.

For a scientist this was the shit. The days of begging for patronage were over.

Never take your position for granted and never let any favors you receive go to your head.

Commit harmless mistakes that will not hurt you in the long run but will give you the chance to ask for his help. Masters adore such requests.

Avoid outshining the master. This is a lesson that the stars in the sky teach us—they may be related to the sun, and just as brilliant, but they never appear in her company.

If your master is very weak and ready to fall, let nature take its course. Do not risk outshining a feeble superior—it might appear cruel or spiteful.

Ones are motivated by the need to live their life the right way, including improving themselves and the world around them.

Ones at their BEST are
ethical
reliable
productive
wise
idealistic
fair
honest
self-disciplined


Ones at their WORST are
judgmental
inflexible
dogmatic
obsessive-compulsive
critical of others
overly serious
controlling orderly
anxious
jealous

Small words can have a big effect when used with care and understanding. And because they are small, they often go undetected, which makes them subtle tools for change and persuasion.

Ace (perfection)

we also live in an incredible age, where the study of human psychology has researched, worked out, proven and explained many concrete ways in which humans are powerfully influenced.

Influence and control really boils down to making someone else make a decision in the direction you wish them to.

The first principle to understand is that human beings are emotional creatures. Our day to day lives are filled with hundreds of micro-decisions, which we mostly make unconsciously, and these decisions are largely based on our emotional responses to things.

Because nobody likes to admit that our decisions are based mainly on how we feel in that moment, we almost always explain out decision to ourselves based on logic.

it is very effective to influence someone using a strong emotional technique, and then help them along by giving them a logical reason to explain to themselves or others by saying ‘because…’ and giving any logical reason.

It’s important to remember that people make decisions emotionally, because then you start to realize that people will follow their emotions. Yet they do not necessarily know where their emotions are coming from. You can lead their emotions, in many man ways.

Certain basic skills are required, and once you master these skills you will be able to apply the laws of power more easily.

With those above you, however, you must take a different approach: When it comes to power, outshining the master is perhaps the worst mistake of all.

Masters always want to feel secure in their positions, and superior to those around them in intelligence, wit, and charm.

Do not fool yourself into thinking that life has changed much since the days of Louis XIV and the Medicis

Public flattery can be effective but has its limits; it is too direct and obvious, and looks bad to other courtiers.

A master who cannot bestow on you the gifts of his experience may direct rancor and ill will at you instead.

If you have to entertaining your master, display limited means to win his sympathy.

Any attempt to impress your master with your grace and generosity can prove fatal: Learn from Fouquet or pay the price.

All superiority is odious, but the superiority of a subject over his prince is not only stupid, it is fatal.

being perfectly honest will inevitably hurt and insult a great many people, some of whom will choose to injure you in return.

Masters care about their name and glory.

intellectual powers can make the master feel insecure

LAW 2 NEVER PUT TOO MUCH TRUST IN FRIENDS, LEARN HOW TO USE ENEMIES

JUDGMENT

Be wary of friends—they will betray you more quickly, for they are easily aroused to envy. They also become spoiled and tyrannical. But hire a former enemy and he will be more loyal than a friend, because he has more to prove. In fact, you have more to fear from friends than from enemies. If you have no enemies, find a way to make them.

Once a young man named Michael III assumed the throne of the Byzantine Empire. His mother, the Empress Theodora, had been banished to a nunnery, and her lover, Theoctistus, had been murdered. The head of the conspiracy to remove Theodora and enthrone Michael had been Michael’s uncle, Bardas.

Michael was now a young and inexperienced so he needed someone he could trust as his councillor, and his thoughts turned to Basilius, his best friend. Basilius had no experience but he had proven his love and gratitude.

To have a good enemy, choose a friend: He knows where to strike.
DIANF DE POITIERS, 1499-1566, MISTRESS OF HENRI II OF FRANCE

They had met a few years before, when Basilius had saved Michael’s life. The groom’s strength and courage had impressed Michael, who immediately turned Basilius from being a horse trainer to the position of head of the stables and they became inseparable. Basilius was sent to the finest school in Byzantium became a cultured and sophisticated courtier.

Every time I bestow a vacant office I make a hundred discontented persons and one ingrate.
Louis XIV, 1638-1715

Now Michael was emperor, and trusted a friend who owed him everything.

Ignoring the advice of those who recommended the much more qualified Bardas, Michael chose his friend.

Thus for my own part I have more than once been deceived by the person I loved most and of whose love, above everyone else’s, I have been most confident. So that I believe that it may be right to love and serve one person above all others, according to merit and worth, but never to trust so much in this tempting trap of friendship as to have cause to repent of it later on.
BALDASSARE CASTIGLIONE, 1478-1529

Basilius was soon advising the emperor on all matters of state. The only problem seemed to be money—Basiiius never had enough. He became avaricious for the perks of power. Michael doubled, then tripled his salary, ennobled him, and married him off to his own mistress, Eudoxiaingerina. Keeping such a trusted friend and adviser satisfied was worth any price.

Bardas was now head of the army, and Basilius convinced Michael that the man was ambitious. Under the illusion that he could control his nephew, Bardas had conspired to put him on the throne, and he could conspire again, this time to get rid of Michael and assume the crown himself. Basilius poured poison into Michael’s ear until the emperor agreed to have his uncle murdered. Basilius killed him. Soon after, Basilius asked that he replace Bardas as head of the army, where he could keep control of the realm and quell rebellion. This was granted.

Now Basilius’s power and wealth only grew, and a few years later Michael, in financial straits from his own extravagance, asked him to pay back some of the money he had borrowed over the years. To Michael’s shock and astonishment, Basilius refused, with a look of such impudence that the emperor suddenly realized his predicament: The former stable boy had more money, more allies in the army and senate, and in the end more power than the emperor himself. A few weeks later, after a night of heavy drinking, Michael awoke to find himself surrounded by soldiers. Basilius watched as they stabbed the emperor to death. Then, after proclaiming himself emperor, he rode his horse through the streets of Byzantium, brandishing the head of his former benefactor and best friend at the end of a long pike.

THE SNAKE, THE FARMER, AND THE HERON

A snake chased by hunters asked a farmer to save its life. To hide it from its pursuers, the farmer squatted and let the snake crawl into his belly. But when the danger had passed and the farmer asked the snake to come out, the snake refused. It was warm and safe inside. On his way home, the man saw a heron and went up to him and whispered what had happened. The heron told him to squat and strain to eject the snake. When the snake snuck its head out, the heron caught it, pulled it out, and killed it. The farmer was worried that the snake’s poison might still be inside him, and the heron told him that the cure for snake poison was to cook and eat six white fowl. “You’re a white fowl,” said the farmer. “You’ll do for a start.” He grabbed the heron, put it in a bag, and carried it home, where he hung it up while he told his wife what had happened. “I’m surprised at you, ” said the wife. “The bird does you a kindness, rids you of the evil in your belly, saves your life in fact, yet you catch it and talk of killing it. She immediately released the heron, and it flew away. But on its way, it gouged out her eyes.

Moral: When you see water flowing uphill, it means that someone is repaying a kindness. AFRICAN FOLK TALE

When you see water flowing uphill, it means that someone is repaying a kindness.

Michael III staked his future on the sense of gratitude he thought Basilius must feel for him. Surely Basilius would serve him best; he owed the emperor his wealth, his education, and his position. Then, once Basilius was in power, anything he needed it was best to give to him, strengthening the bonds between the two men. It was only on the fateful day when the emperor saw that impudent smile on Basilius’s face that he realized his deadly mistake.

He had created a monster. He had allowed a man to see power up close—a man who then wanted more, who asked for anything and got it, who felt encumbered by the charity he had received and simply did what many people do in such a situation: They forget the favors they have received and imagine they have earned their success by their own merits.

At Michael’s moment of realization, he could still have saved his own life, but friendship and love blind every man to their interests. Nobody believes a friend can betray. And Michael went on disbelieving until the day his head ended up on a pike. Lord, protect me from my friends; I can take care of my enemies. Voltaire, 1694-1778

Michael III staked his future on the sense of gratitude he thought Basilius must feel for him. Surely Basilius would serve him best; he owed the emperor his wealth, his education, and his position. Then, once Basilius was in power, anything he needed it was best to give to him, strengthening the bonds between the two men. It was only on the fateful day when the emperor saw that impudent smile on Basilius’s face that he realized his deadly mistake.

He had created a monster. He had allowed a man to see power up close—a man who then wanted more, who asked for anything and got it, who felt encumbered by the charity he had received and simply did what many people do in such a situation: They forget the favors they have received and imagine they have earned their success by their own merits.

friendship and love blind every man to their interests. Nobody believes a friend can betray.

Lord, protect me from my friends; I can take care of my enemies.

Voltaire, 1694-1778

For centuries in China army men would plot to kill a weak emperor, then would replace him with a strong general. The general, to ensure his own survival he would kill off his fellow generals. After some years, new generals would rise up and assassinate him.

To be emperor of China was to be alone, surrounded by a pack of enemies.

General Chao K’uang-yin became Emperor. He knew the probability that soon he would be murdered.

To break the pattern, he ordered a banquet to celebrate his triumph, and invited the most powerful commanders in the army. After drinking a lot, he talked alone to them, who thought they were going to get murdered.

Instead of killing them, he ask them if someone wanted to dethrone him. Drunk and fearing for their lives, the generals proclaimed their innocence and their loyalty.


But Sung offered them: "give up your commands, and I will give you houses, riches and bitches."

The next day, all of the generals tendered their resignations, and they retired as nobles to the estates.

In one stroke, Sung turned a pack of “friendly” wolves, who would likely have betrayed him, into a group of docile lambs, far from all power.

Over the next few years Sung continued his campaign to secure his rule.

In A.D. 971, King Liu of the Southern Han finally surrendered to him after years of rebellion. To Liu’s astonishment, Sung gave him a rank in the imperial court. Liu thought he was going to get poisoned. He said he didnt deserved death, then, Emperor Sung swallowed it himself. There was no poison. From then on Liu became his most trusted and loyal friend.

When Ch‘ien Shu, the king of one of little kingdom, was defeated, Sung’s ministers advised the emperor to lock him up. They presented documents proving that he was still conspiring to kill Sung. When Ch’ien Shu came to visit the emperor, however, instead of locking him up, Sung honored him. He also gave him a package, which he told the former king to open when he was halfway home. Ch’ien Shu opened the bundle on his return journey and saw that it contained all the papers documenting his conspiracy. He realized that Sung knew of his murderous plans, yet had spared him nonetheless. This generosity won him over, and he too became one of Sung’s most loyal vassals.

There are many who think therefore that a wise prince ought, when he has the chance, to foment astutely some enmity, so that by suppressing it he will augment his greatness. Princes, and especially new ones, have found more faith and more usefulness in those men, whom at the beginning of their power they regarded with suspicion, than in those they at first confided in.

Pandolfo Petrucci, prince of Siena, governed his state more by those whom he suspected than by others.

NICCOLÒ MACHIAVELLI, 1469-1527

In one stroke, Sung turned a pack of “friendly” wolves, who would likely have betrayed him, into a group of docile lambs, far from all power.

A brahman, a great expert in Veda who has become a great archer as well, offers his services to his good friend, who is now the king. The brahman cries out when he sees the king, “Recognize me, your friend!” The king answers him with contempt and then explains: “Yes, we were friends before, but our friendship was based on what power we had.... I was friends with you, good brahman, because it served my purpose. No pauper is friend to the rich, no fool to the wise, no coward to the brave. An old friend—who needs him? It is two men of equal wealth and equal birth who contract friendship and marriage, not a rich man and a pauper.... An old friend—who needs him?

THE MAHABHARATA, C. THIRD CENTURY B.C.

A Chinese proverb compares friends to the jaws and teeth of a dangerous animal: If you are not careful, you will find them chewing you up. Emperor Sung knew the jaws he was passing between when he assumed the throne: His “friends” in the army would chew him up like meat, and if he somehow survived, his “friends” in the government would have him for supper. Emperor Sung would have no truck with “friends”—he bribed his fellow generals with splendid estates and kept them far away. This was a much better way to emasculate them than killing them, which would only have led other generals to seek vengeance. And Sung would have nothing to do with “friendly” ministers. More often than not, they would end up drinking his famous cup of poisoned wine.

Instead of relying on friends, Sung used his enemies, one after the other, transforming them into far more reliable subjects. While a friend expects more and more favors, and seethes with jealousy, these former enemies expected nothing and got everything. A man suddenly spared the guillotine is a grateful man indeed, and will go to the ends of the earth for the man who has pardoned him. In time, these former enemies became Sung’s most trusted friends. Pick up a bee from kindness, and learn the limitations of kindness. SUFI PROVERB And Sung was finally able to break the pattern of coups, violence, and civil war—the Sung Dynasty ruled China for more than three hundred years.

In a speech Abraham Lincoln delivered at the height of the Civil War, he referred to the Southerners as fellow human beings who were in error. An elderly lady chastised him for not calling them irreconcilable enemies who must be destroyed. “Why, madam,” Lincoln replied, “do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?”

A Chinese proverb compares friends to the jaws and teeth of a dangerous animal: If you are not careful, you will find them chewing you up

Emperor Sung knew the jaws he was passing between when he assumed the throne: His “friends” in the army would chew him up like meat, and if he somehow survived, his “friends” in the government would have him for supper.

Emperor Sung would have no truck with “friends”—he bribed his fellow generals with splendid estates and kept them far away. This was a much better way to emasculate them than killing them, which would only have led other generals to seek vengeance.

nstead of relying on friends, Sung used his enemies, one after the other, transforming them into far more reliable subjects

While a friend expects more and more favors, former enemies expect nothing.