Quotes from Robert Greene

As social animals we humans are very sensitive to our rank and position within any group. We can measure our status by the attention and respect we receive.

People have more freedom to bring more of their personal qualities into the role they play once they have established themselves and their competence is no longer in question. But this is always within limits.

Waste brings woe, and sorrow hates despair.

Emotions are continually affecting our thought processes and decisions, below the level of our awareness. And the most common emotion of them all is the desire for pleasure and the avoidance of pain.

Never waste valuable time, or mental peace of mind, on the affairs of others—that is too high a price to pay.

Mastery is not a function of genius or talent. It is a function of time and intense focus applied to a particular field of knowledge.

Ah Franion, treason is loved of many, but the Traitor hated of all: unjust offences may for a time escape without danger, but never without revenge.

The wrong way to look at your university life is to say it's like job training, unless you're going into something very specific.

Your college education is a key moment in life.

Understand: any phenomenon in the world is by nature complex. The people you deal with are equally complex. Any action sets off a limitless chain of reactions. It is never so simple as A leads to B. B will lead to C, D and beyond.

Ambition has become a dirty word, and I believe it is a great evolutionary force for the positive. If people fail or go astray in their ambition I can live with it but not with people lowering their expectations, wasting time, slacking off and glorifying failure and stupidity.

Power is a complicated word and can take many forms.

When you are trying to impress people with words, the more you say, the more common you appear, and the less in control. Even if you are saying something banal, it will seem original if you make it vague, open-ended, and sphinxlike.

Remind yourself that winning an argument or proving your point really gets you nowhere in the long run. Win through your actions, not your words.

A master performer like Bill Clinton never lost sight of the fact that as president he had to project confidence and power, but if he was speaking to a group of autoworkers he would adjust his accent and his words to fit the audience, and do the same for a group of executives.

With colleagues in the work environment, we fail to see the source of their envy or the reason for their manipulations; our attempts at influencing them are based on the assumptions that they want the same things as ourselves.

Be extra careful in the work environment with those who like to maintain their position through charm and being political, rather than getting things done. They are very prone to envying and hating those who work hard and get results. They will slander and sabotage you without any warning.

I don't want to throw mud at anyone - I really admire Gandhi as a brilliant strategist - but Gandhi was pretty manipulative, you know.

If you want to be a good strategist, you can never just go off a principle you read in a book. You need to adapt what you do to the situation; no rule of thumb is true all the time.

While still working for others, your goal at some point must be to carve out little areas that you can operate on your own, cultivating entrepreneurial skills.

The world is full of people with different characters and temperaments. We all have a dark side, a tendency to manipulate, and aggressive desires. The most dangerous types are those who repress their desires or deny the existence of them, often acting them out in the most underhanded ways.

When it comes to mastering a skill, time is the magic ingredient.

I'm afraid I'm just too intense to have soft ideas, you know, about what to read when you're trying to pass the time.

Hangs in the uncertain balance of proud time.