Immoral, deceitful, manipulative. @RobertGreene's 48 Laws of Power is one of the most practical, entertaining and widely misunderstood books of our time. It condenses millennia of knowledge about the nature of human relationships. To dismiss it is lazy, cowardly and unwise.
Robert's framing of the laws makes it easy to paint the book as evil. They are presented as methods of getting your way in a hostile world of conspiracy and resentment. The saucy approach makes the book deeply engaging and surely has helped move some paper. But it's one-sided.
The truth could be yet worse. The world's indifferent to you. But you don't have to be indifferent in return. Mastering the laws can make you the greatest blessing for everyone around you. Because they reflect deep insights about human psychology and how we relate to each other.
The lo-awarenes perspective is to see the 48 laws as cheap tactics to manipulate people. If you attempted to use them in this shallow way, you'd probably end up hurting yourself. Yet, condensed within the laws is ageless wisdom, which only fools would pass up.
If you ignore the laws, you choose to ignore a grand opportunity to improve your life and the lives of many others. There is nothing honorable in running away from little more than a bit of cognitive dissonance. The laws only bite, and savage, those who don't take them seriously.
People hurt each other every day out of mindless ignorance, not of conspiracy and deceit. This is a most essential theme in the book. And the laws empower you to remove much of that hurt by no longer acting like a self-absorbed infant. They don't obscure, they enlighten.
The 48 laws are tools. Application and judgement is up to you, and how you see yourself in the world. The laws are ever more relevant today, when you have to overcome the resistance of the dead culture and climb the rancid heaps of the lo-awarenes mass to get anywhere in life.
For those willing to do the work of understanding, there is much value to unpack from the deep human insights behind the 48 laws.
amazon.com/48-Laws-Power-…
amazon.com/48-Laws-Power-…
