Law #10 is "Infection: avoid the unhappy and unlucky."

[LoZoccolo]

You can die from someone else’s misery – emotional states are as infectious as disease.  You may feel you are helping the drowning man but you are only precipitating your own disaster.  The unfortunate sometimes draw misfortune on themselves; they will also draw it on you. Associate with the happy and fortunate instead.

This is an excerpt from The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene.

[NutmegYankee]

1. I always wondered where our new economic policies came from.

:banghead: :puke:

[Zywiec]

2. Unhappy and Unlucky - The majority of the posts here. n/t

[NYC_SKP]

3. Sage advice, and advice that I try very hard to follow.

As I've gotten older, I've committed to avoiding negative people, even moderately sad or pessimistic folks.

Except for kids who might be having a bad day, where it's part of my job description to be supportive, I simply don't have time for shenanigans and negativitah!



:hi:

[Bluenorthwest]

9. Here are 'rules 11 and 12' I wonder what you think of them?

Law 11 Learn to keep people dependent on you.
Law 12 Use selective honesty and generosity to disarm your victim.
How about this one?
Law 17 Keep others in suspended terror: cultivate an air of unpredictability.

Sage?

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

11. Sage? I'd say evil and dishonest. Effective, perhaps, but nasty.

[Bluenorthwest]

12. It is just 'The Prince' rehashed for the hard of reading crowd

With stark, Randian modernity.

[XanaDUer]

30. +1

nt.

[NYC_SKP]

13. To 11, 12, &17: No, no, and no...

I was addressing only this one:

"Infection: avoid the unhappy and unlucky."

You can die from someone else’s misery – emotional states are as infectious as disease. You may feel you are helping the drowning man but you are only precipitating your own disaster. The unfortunate sometimes draw misfortune on themselves; they will also draw it on you. Associate with the happy and fortunate instead.

Not that I would ignore a drowning man, we just have to take care not to be taken down with them. More to the "unhappy" than the "unlucky", I've met far too many who choose and bask in their unhappiness and, interestingly, often surround themselves with other discontented sad people. And there's a fine line between truly unlucky and self-destructive. An alcoholic who keeps getting DUIs isn't unlucky. People who gamble and lose the mortgage aren't even unlucky, they're in trouble by choice.

As to 11, 12, and 17, since you ask, my friends and family will tell you I'm fiercely independent and, while helpful to a fault, I prefer guiding people to become independent. My career is actually all about promoting independence. So, no, that's not me.

Number 12 is something that applies to victimizers, so I'm not relating to that one.

Number 17 I just don't get and cannot relate to. Life's too short.

:patriot:

[Bluenorthwest]

17. Ah, so perhaps the sage is just a stooge?

That's what I'd say. I don't really believe in luck, although that is probably because I am so fortunate and it feels better to credit myself rather than kismet or the angels or whatever. I find this 'law' to be a simplistic come on for the rest of the philosophy. Rand's work has similar devices, which is why right wing Christians wind up raving about the wisdom of a writer that hated religion. They hang on to a couple of aphorisms and declare them to be pearls of wisdom from a sage. This is a set of 'Laws' and 17 is equal to the others, they are intended to be an outline for living. Number 17 is Cheney's Law, if that helps. Also the Law of the Abusive Spouse.
In honor of the President's devout Christian faith, I will say 'Do to others as you want them to do to you, even when they are drowning'. I would want someone to try to help me if I was drowning, but not to harm themselves in the process, so that is what I would do. To say 'do not help' is a crafty antithesis of that rule called Golden. It says not to do what you'd want done for yourself, but always demand for yourself all you wish to demand. Not what I call sage at all.

[NYC_SKP]

20. .

I don't subscribe to any of this "book" or "list" or whatever is the original source.

My reply was pretty clear, I think. I don't hang out with pessimistic complaining sad people, they don't help leave the world a better place.

And negativity, I avoid that. I think feeding it is not a good use of energy.

That's all, nothing more.

Take care, please enjoy the rest of the weekend!

:hi:

[Bluenorthwest]

23. Certainly.

I am glad that you,unlike the OP, clarified. Most people avoid dismal company, because it is dismal. Not exactly one for the great minds to ponder. I see the anti equality divisive dogma that some politicians speak to be negativity on a huge scale. Bad use of energy to go on about how your neighbors are not equal to you. It seems like they are always complaining that the world is not uniform and conforming, that they simply can not stand to see happiness in others. So it is easy to claim to 'avoid negativity' but not so easy to actually do so. Dogmatic belief systems are negative, fear and prejudice are also negative.
Enjoy your weekend as well. And if either of us see a drowning man, let's at least call 911!

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

4. This guy makes Machiavelli look like St. Francis of Assisi.

http://www2.tech.purdue.edu/cg/courses/cgt411/covey/48_laws_of_power.htm

[RaleighNCDUer]

21. That's some sick shit. nt

[Enrique]

5. what is your opinion of this, LoZoccolo?

i think it's bad advice.

[Electric Monk]

27. (crickets)

[RandomKoolzip]

6. Yeah, and sometimes people are unhappy because bad things have happened to them.

But fuck them, right? That's the Democratic Party, all right! WINNERS!

[Gemini Cat]

7. Sounds like a bunch of rubbish.

:eyes:

[Bluenorthwest]

8. Is this your personal guidebook?

I find Machiavelli to be even less interesting through the Randian filter of Green and Elfers.

[Electric Monk]

28. That would explain it

[Dept of Beer]

10. He's right.

The last time somebody tried to help mankind he was nailed to a cross for his troubles. Furthermore his name is now invoked in the name of winning a war or in a politician's sex scandal.

[HereSince1628]

14. yessiree bob, just kick people with depression to the side

don't hire them. If you work with one, rat it out to your supervisor and suggest that the company not keep them employed, because they'll just bring down you and your entire organization!

Depressed people should crawl under a rock. Those Debbie Downers never contribute to society.

Looking back over history if that had been applied... I wonder whose face would be on that currency rather than portraits of US Grant and Abraham Lincoln. For that matter I wonder about what a map of the North American continent would look like without them.

[Bluenorthwest]

15. Interesting that you and the posters who like this refuse to

discuss it. It is a contradiction to offer a subject for discussion and then not discuss it.Is that an expresson of Law 14 'Pose as a friend, work as a spy', or of Law 6 'Court attention at all costs'?
Attention at all costs. The Reality TV theory of life.

[Electric Monk]

18. Yes, quite. Speaks volumes, actually.

[RaleighNCDUer]

22. lol

I skimmed through them, but didn't see the one that advocates "snipe from the shadows, then run away".

[snagglepuss]

25. bingo nt

[RaleighNCDUer]

16. Translates to:

Ignore the unfortunate. They're just bummers who will bring you down.

Everything's good.

Is the subtitle "How To Be A Republican"?

[XanaDUer]

31. Funnily enough, I find most, or the few, conservatives I come

into (forcible) contact with to be downers. Nervous, neurotic, and not doing too well, financially, and worried as hell. I will gladly avoid them! :)

[mmonk]

19. Close your eyes in other words?

[Demoiselle]

24. So I looked up Robert Greene.

My source is Wikipedia...
Mr. Green was born in LA, went to school in Wisconsin, got a degree in classical studies. He failed as a Hollywood scriptwriter. He has succeeded in writing best-selling "How To" books.
But aside from his skill at putting together the books and selling them, he doesn't seem to have acquired a lot of personal power. Meh. If a writer is going to give me power lessons, I'd prefer Elmor Leonard.
Or Carl Hiassen.

[Bluebear]

26. Avoid the unhappy and unlucky....sounds like a very Republican law.

[WhiteTara]

29. All of them made me feel dirty. n/t