Quotes About Strategy

Robert Greene

Wage guerrilla war on your mind, allowing no static lines of defense, no exposed citadels—make everything fluid and mobile.

In fact it is often wise to choose the most innocent victim possible as a sacrificial goat.

The same is true of adults: it is through your battles with others that you learn what works, what doesn't, and how to protect yourself. Instead of shrinking from the idea of having enemies, then, embrace it. Conflict is therapeutic.

grasping at Option A as the single right answer, true strategy is positioning yourself to be able to do A, B, or C depending

Playing with appearances and mastering arts of deception are among the aesthetic pleasures of life. They are also key components in the acquisition of power.

Se existe um ideal a ser alcançado, deve ser o do guerreiro estratégico, o homem ou a mulher que administra situações difíceis e pessoas por meio de manobras hábeis e inteligentes.

Caesar set the ideal for all leaders and people of power. Like him, you must learn to enlarge your actions through dramatic techniques such as surprise

Your enemies, on the other hand, are an untapped gold mine that you must learn to exploit.

Verbal argument has one vital use in the realm of power: To distract and cover your tracks when you are practicing deception or are caught in a lie.

Remember: there are always people out there who are more aggressive, more devious, more ruthless than you are, and it is inevitable that some of them will cross your path.

la coqueta emite señales contradictorias que estimulan respuestas contradictorias, hundiendo a la víctima en la confusión.

Mao actually encouraged China's disagreements with the Soviet Union and the United States; without clear-cut enemies, he believed, his people would lose any sense of what Chinese Communism meant. A sharply defined enemy is a far stronger argument for your side than all the words you could possibly put together.

This law applies not only to war but to everyday situations. People are always trying to read the motives behind your actions and to use your predictability against you. Throw in a completely inexplicable move and you put them on the defensive. Because they do not understand you, they are unnerved, and in such a state you can easily intimidate them.

What gets us into trouble in the realm of power is often our own overreaction to the moves of our enemies and rivals. That overreaction creates problems we would have avoided had we been more reasonable.

By yielding, you in fact control the situation, because your surrender is part of a larger plan to lull them into believing they have defeated you. This is the essence of the surrender tactic: Inwardly you stay firm, but outwardly you bend. Deprived of a reason to get angry, your opponents will often be bewildered instead.

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.

Look wider and think further ahead" must be your motto.

It is easy to be overwhelmed by everything that faces you in battle, where so many people are asking or telling you what to do. So many vital matters press in on you that you can lose sight of your goals and plans; suddenly you can't see the forest for the trees.

Because humans are social creatures by nature, power depends on social interaction and circulation. To make yourself powerful you must place yourself at the center of things, as Louis XIV did at Versailles.

Once you step into a fight that is not of your own choosing, you lose all initiative. The combatants' interests become your interests; you become their tool. Learn to control yourself, to restrain your natural tendency to take sides and join the fight. Be friendly and charming to each of the combatants, then step back as they collide. With every battle they grow weaker, while you grow stronger with every battle you avoid.

To separate yourself from the mechanical and reactive types, you need to get rid of a common misconception: the essence of strategy is not to carry out a brilliant plan that proceeds in steps; it is to put yourself in situations where you have more options than the enemy does.

The Laws of Human Nature, 6: Elevate Your Perspective—The Law of Shortsightedness

Brecht, on the other hand, who had actually worked steadfastly for the Communist cause, played the opposite game: He answered questions with ambiguous generalities that defied easy interpretation. Call it the Campanella strategy. Brecht even wore a suit—a rare event for him-and made a point of smoking a cigar during the proceedings, knowing that a key committee member had a passion for cigars. In the end he charmed the committee members, who let him go scot-free.