Law of Power 1- Never outshine the master.
Make everyone, who is above you, feel superior. Showing them that you are better than them will make them feel uncomfortable. Making them uncomfortable can be harmful to you. If you succeed in making them feel better than what they actually are, then you will achieve more power.
Law of Power 2- Never put too much trust in friends, learn to use enemies
Your friends can easily envy you and therefore they are more likely to betray you. You have more to be wary of your friends. Your enemy, on the other hand, is safer for you. If you show trust in your enemy then he is less likely to betray you as he has more to prove.
Law of Power 3- Conceal your intentions.
If people will not know what your true intentions are, they will never be able to stop you from what you are trying to achieve. If you will keep them in dark then you can easily take them to the wrong path. By the time they will come to know about your true intentions, it will be too late for them to do anything about it.
Law of Power 4- Always say less than necessary.
Speaking less will make your talks vague and open-ended, as a result, it will sound more original. Saying less helps you to impress and intimidate others easily. The more you speak, the more you look common and prone to speak something foolish.
Law of Power 5- So much depends on reputation, guard it with your life.
Your reputation helps in exercising power over others. Once your reputation is gone, you are off-guard and no one is afraid of attacking you. Therefore destroy the potential dangers to your reputation even before they attack you. To destroy your enemy, just open holes in his reputation and the public opinion will do the rest.
Law of Power 6- Court attention at all cost.
Whatever remains unseen is counted as nothing. So never let yourself fade away into the crowd. Stand out and grab as much attention as possible. Try to appear larger than life and shine brighter than those around you. Create mysteries and conspiracies to grab that attention.
Law of Power 7- Get others to do the work for you, but always take the credit.
Never do what others can do for you. Make others do the necessary legwork required to achieve a goal and take the credit in the end. Those who did the work will be forgotten and you will be remembered. It will give you the reputation of someone who is extremely efficient. It happens in the corporate world every day. Not every employee get the credits.
Law of Power 8- Make other people come to you, use bait if necessary.
When other people come to you, you hold a strong position. In such a situation, what you say is listened and done rather than what the other person says.
Law of Power 9- Win through your actions, never through argument.
Winning through arguments is a victory at a high cost. You cause resentment within the person who lost the argument. Instead of arguing, demonstrate your point with your actions and get others to agree with you.
Law of Power 10- Avoid the unhappy and unlucky.
Happiness and luck are infectious. Therefore avoid the unhappy and unlucky to stay happy and lucky.
Law of Power 11- Learn to keep people dependent on you.
The more the people are dependent on you, the more independent you are. Never teach someone so much that he can live happily and freely without you.
Law of Power 12- Use selective honesty and generosity to disarm your victim.
Gain trust with selective honesty. Use this trust to deceive your victim.
Law of Power 13- When asking for help, appeal to people’s self-interest, never to their mercy or gratitude.
Gratitude or mercy will not give anything in return to a person. But if helping you fulfils his self-interest then he will enthusiastically help you as he has something to gain. This is also one of the law from ‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’
Law of Power 14- Pose as a friend, work as a spy.
Pose as a friend to your rival. Ask open-ended questions to know about him. He will unknowingly tell his secrets as he will consider you as her friend. Use the information to compete with him.
Law of Power 15- Crush your enemy totally.
Don’t give your enemy another chance to rise again and take revenge. Crush him completely.
Law of Power 16- Use absence to increase honour and respect.
Things which are easily available often have less value. Similarly, if you are often available to people, you will also have a small value. Therefore be absent sometimes to be talked about and admired by people.
Law of Power 17- Keep others in suspended terror: Cultivate an air of unpredictability.
If you behave in a consistent manner, then people will feel to be more in control. But your consistency in being unpredictable will keep them off balance. Practising this strategy to an extreme level will make it impossible for others to predict your next moves resulting in intimidation and terror among people.
Law of Power 18- Do not build fortresses to protect yourself. Isolation is dangerous.
Isolation cuts you off from valuable information. Being in the crowd and making allies will help you shield yourself from the attacks of your enemies.
Law of Power 19- Know who you are dealing with. Do not offend the wrong person.
Deceiving and offending the wrong people will bring you a lot of unnecessary enemies. Therefore chose your victims carefully and attack only on your target. Try to have fewer enemies.
Law of Power 20- Do not commit to anyone.
If you are independent then people will pursue you to bring to their side. But if you are already possessed by someone, you have lost attention. Therefore do not commit and be desirable.
Law of Power 21- Play a sucker to catch a sucker: Play dumber than your mark.
Make your victim feel smarter than you by playing dumb in front of him. If he believes that you are stupid, then he would never suspect that you may have ulterior motives.
Law of Power 22- Use the surrender tactic: transform weakness into power.
When you see a defeat coming, it is wise to surrender instead of fighting foolishly for your honour. Surrender will give you a chance to live and gather the power to fight with your enemy again.
Law of Power 23- Concentrate your forces.
Find The One Thing which can give you the most power and then concentrate all your energy on that single thing. Don’t spread yourself thin. Intensity always wins over extensity.
Law of Power 24- Play the perfect courtier.
Learn the art of perfect courtier-ship. Apply them in your life to rise in the court.
- Be modest and talk less about yourself.
- Don’t let others see that you are working very hard. Make your results be seen as something that you did effortlessly.
- Make your superior look better but avoid too much flattery.
- Create your style and image such that you get noticed.
- Have a different style of talking to deal with different kinds of people.
- Don’t be the person who always brings a bad news.
48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene Summary
Law of Power 25- Re-create yourself.
Don’t let others decide who you are. Create your own image in front of others. Chose an identity which makes you look larger than life so that your power is enhanced.
Law of Power 26- Keep your hands clean.
Do not let your image taint. Use scapegoats if necessary but always avoid to be seen as someone who has committed mistakes or as someone who has done evil deeds.
Law of Power 27- Play on people’s need to believe to create a cult-like following.
When people do not have a cause to follow in life, they become vulnerable. This is because people have strong needs to believe in something. They cannot stand long periods of doubtfulness and emptiness. In such a situation, if you can provide a strong value system to people, then you can create a cult-like following around you.
- Promise something great and transformative, but maintain vagueness around what you say. In this way, your believers will create their own fantasies out of what you said.
- Emphasize the Visual and the Sensual over the intellectual.
- Borrow the forms of organised religion to structure your group. Act like a sage.
- Disguise your source of income.
- Set up an Us-Versus-Them Dynamic. Make your followers believe that they are the part of an exclusive group. To strengthen the bond among them, make them believe that there are people who are the enemies of your group.
Law of Power 28- Enter actions with boldness.
Perform every action with boldness. Do not attempt to do anything about which you are doubtful. But in no case, you should look timid. Boldness is admired, timidity is not.
Law of Power 29- Plan all the way to end.
By planning till the end, you will be aware of all the kind of obstacles you can find during your course of action. You will not be overwhelmed by the circumstances when they will arrive in your way.
Law of Power 30- Make your accomplishments seem effortless.
Do not reveal how hard you worked to achieve something, as it will only raise questions about you. Never reveal your tricks, otherwise, they will be used against you.
Law of Power 31- Control the Options: Get others to play with the cards you deal.
Give your victims the options to chose. It will make them feel they are in control. But make sure that whichever option they choose, the decision is always in your favour. In this way, they will never know that they were deceived.
Law of Power 32- Play to people’s Fantasies.
Truth and realities make people uncomfortable. If you will bring the harsh realities in front of people again and again, then you have to face their anger. But if you can create romantic fantasies and make people feel good, then everyone is going to flock around you.
Law of Power 33- Discover each man’s thumbscrew.
Every person has some weakness in one or the other form. Be it an insecurity, an uncontrollable emotion or need, or a small secret pleasure. Once it is found, it can always be used to your advantage.
Law of Power 34- Be royal in your own fashion: Act like a king, to be treated like one.
Others treat you the way you carry yourself. So if you want to be treated respectfully then first learn to respect yourself. Never let anyone disrespect you.
Law of Power 35- Learn the art of timing.
Learn to recognize the best time to act. Do not look restless and don’t be desperate. Learn to be patient until the right time comes and learn to strike hard when the time has come.
Law of Power 36- Disdain things you cannot have: Ignoring them is the best revenge.
If you pay more attention to a small problem, it will start appearing big to you. Similarly, if you will pay attention to your trivial enemy, he will also become bigger for you. Therefore learn to ignore small enemies to prevent them from gaining strength.
Law of Power 37- Create Compelling Spectacles
Derive a visual trademark from something powerful in the past. Associate this trademark with yourself. Make people believe that you are a living incarnation of this powerful symbol. The visual can be anything, the sun, the moon, some ancient God, a weapon, anything powerful. Use this symbol as something which belongs to you. Once people start seeing your personality and the symbol as one single entity, you will have the power of that symbol.
Law of Power 38- Think as you like but behave like others.
Do not challenge the conventions openly. The people who do so are often punished in the society. Be blended with other by behaving like them and keep your unconventional thoughts for your trusted friends and like-minded people.
Law of Power 39- Stir up waters to catch fish.
If you master the art of making your enemies angry and emotional while you being calm and controlled, you can easily control your enemy.
Law of Power 40- Despise the free lunch
Free things can be dangerous and deceitful. They can even bring you guilt. Always avoid anything free. But giving away something for free will show your generosity and influence others.
Law of Power 41- Avoid stepping into a great man’s shoes.
Ideas and people who succeed first are always seen as originals. Whatever follows them are not given as much importance. If you had a successful father or predecessor, then you have to be two times more successful to outshine him. Therefore don’t go in the direction of your predecessor, create your own identity by changing your course.
Law of Power 42- Strike the shepherd and the sheep will scatter.
Sometimes you will see that most of the trouble is being caused by a single person. Others may be just following the troublemaker. In such situations, strike the troublemaker and scatter all those who are following him to end your trouble in a single attempt.
Law of Power 43- Work on the hearts and minds of others.
Forcing your will on others never works. Find the emotional attachments of people and then use this information in seducing them emotionally to do what you want them to do.
Law of Power 44- Disarm and Infuriate with the mirror effect.
The mirror effect can be used in 4 ways.
- Neutralising Effect- Mimic every act of your enemy and he will get irritated. In his irritation, he can lose control. The moment he loses control is the moment when you take control of the situation and neutralize your enemy. Remember how we get frustrated when someone mimics everything we say? This is also the same situation.
- The Shadow Effect- In shadow effect you practice each and every movement of your opponent without letting him know about it. By following his every movement you gain insights into his habits and routines.
- The Narcissus Effect- It is like first understanding the kind of man a woman fantasize about and then acting just like the man of her fantasies.
- The Moral Effect- Doing exactly what the other person has done to you in order to make him realize how unfair he was to us.
- The Hallucinatory Effect- This is a tool of con artists. It creates a copy of the real world, the con artist camouflages in this copy and deceives the victim.
Law of Power 45- Preach the need for change, but never reform too much at once.
When you are in a position of power and you find a need to bring change. In such a situation do not bring changes drastically as it can make people revolt against you. Bring subtle changes and respect the old way of doing things.
Law of Power 46- Never appear too perfect
If you are too perfect then people will envy you. It is good to sometimes display your harmless defects to abstain making silent enemies.
Law of Power 47- Do not go past the mark you aimed for; In victory, learn when to stop
Do not let victory to get in your head. It can lead to arrogant actions and you can cross the lines. This can bring you, uncalled enemies.
Law of Power 48- Assume Formlessness
Be flexible in your way of doing things. A straight way of doing things will make you predictable. Be unpredictable.
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