There is no revenge like oblivion, for it is the entombment of the unworthy in the dust of their own nothingness.
—Baltasar Gracián
It is tempting to want to fix our mistakes, but it is sometimes more politic to leave them alone. In 1971, when The New York Times published the Pentagon Papers, a group of government documents about the history of U.S.
involvement in Indochina, Henry Kissinger erupted into a volcanic rage.
Furious about the Nixon administration’s vulnerability to this kind of damaging leak, he made recommendations that eventually led to the formation of a group called the Plumbers to plug the leaks. This was the unit that later broke into Democratic Party offices in the Watergate Hotel, setting off the chain of events that led to Nixon’s downfall. In reality the publication of the Pentagon Papers was not a serious threat to the administration, but Kissinger’s reaction made it a big deal. In trying to fix one problem, he created another: a paranoia for security that in the end was much more destructive to the government. Had he ignored the Pentagon Papers, the scandal they had created would eventually have blown over. Instead of inadvertently focusing attention on a problem, making it seem worse by publicizing how much concern and anxiety it is causing you, it is often far wiser to play the contemptuous aristocrat, not deigning to acknowledge the problem’s existence.
Daily Law: The harder we try to fix our mistakes, the worse we often make them.
The 48 Laws of Power, Law 36: Disdain Things You Cannot Have—Ignoring Them Is the Best Revenge
The game of power is a game of constant duplicity most resembling the power dynamic that existed in the scheming world of the old aristocratic court. Throughout history, a court has always formed itself around the person in power—king, queen, emperor, leader. The courtiers who filled this court were in an especially delicate position: They had to serve their masters, but if they seemed to fawn, if they curried favor too obviously, the other courtiers around them would notice and would act against them. Meanwhile, the court was supposed to represent the height of civilization and refinement. This was the courtier’s dilemma: While appearing the very paragon of elegance, they had to outwit and thwart their own opponents in the subtlest of ways. Life in the court was a never-ending game that required constant vigilance and tactical thinking. It was civilized war. Today we face a peculiarly similar paradox to that of the courtier: Everything must appear civilized, decent, democratic, and fair. But if we play by those rules too strictly, if we take them too literally, we are crushed by those around us who are not so foolish.
As the great Renaissance diplomat and courtier Niccolò Machiavelli wrote, “Any man who tries to be good all the time is bound to come to ruin among the great number who are not good.” The court imagined itself the pinnacle of refinement, but underneath its glittering surface a cauldron of dark emotions—greed, envy, lust, hatred—boiled and simmered. Our world today similarly imagines itself the pinnacle of fairness, yet the same ugly emotions still stir within us, as they have forever. The game is the same. The month of April will teach you how to play the game of power as the perfect courtier.
When you enter the real world, you are suddenly blindsided by this whole realm that exists. It is like our dirty little secret. People will talk about their sex lives. But nobody talks about all the power games that are constantly going on in the world. So, I want to interject my own personal story from when I got out of college and was suddenly confronted with this real world.
I had graduated with a background in Classics, ancient Greek and Latin. I was immersed in studying philosophy and literature and languages. And so, when I started working, essentially in magazines, with my first job at Esquire, I had no idea of how things operated in the real world, and I was very much shocked by all the egos, the insecurities, the game playing, and the political stuff. It really kind of disturbed and upset me. I can remember, when I was about twenty-six or twenty-seven years old, one particular job that affected me deeply.
I am not going to tell you which job this was. I don’t want you googling it and figuring out who I’m talking about. But, basically, the job was that I had to find stories that would then be put into a documentary series, and I was judged on how many good stories I found. I am a very competitive person, and I was doing better than anybody else there at the job. I was finding more stories that ended up getting produced, and I told myself, “Isn’t that the whole point?” We are trying to produce a show. We are trying to get work done, and I was more than holding up my fair share.
Suddenly I found that my superior made it very clear that she wasn’t happy with me. I was doing something wrong, she was displeased, and yet I couldn’t figure out what it was.
I tried to put myself in her shoes. And I’m thinking, “What is it that I’m doing that might be displeasing her? I am clearly producing in my work.”
And I figured out, well, maybe it is because I’m not involving her in what I’m doing, in my ideas. Maybe I need to run them by her. I need to involve her more so she feels like she is a part of the research that I am doing.
I would then go into her office and I would tell her where my ideas were coming from. I was trying to engage with her, assuming that was the problem. Well, that didn’t seem to work. She was still clearly unhappy with me. Maybe she simply didn’t like me. So, I thought, going further, “Well, maybe I’m not being friendly enough with her. Maybe I need to be nice to her. Maybe I need to go in and not talk about work, but just talk, and be nice.”
Okay. So that was strategy number two. I started doing that. She still seemed really cold. I figured, all right, she hates me. That’s just life. Not everybody can love you. That must be it. I’ll just continue doing my job.
Then one day we are having a meeting in which we are discussing our ideas, and my mind was elsewhere, and she suddenly interrupts and says, “Robert, you have an attitude problem.”
“What?”
“You’re not listening to people here.”
“I’m listening.” I got a little defensive. I produce. I work hard, I said. You are going to judge me about how wide my eyes are open and how I’m listening to people? She goes, “No. You have a problem here.”
“I’m sorry. I don’t think I do.”
Anyway, over the course of the next few weeks she just started torturing me about my supposed attitude. And, of course, naturally, I developed an attitude. I started resenting her. A couple weeks later I quit, because I just hated it. I probably quit a week before they were going to fire me anyway. I went home, and over the course of several weeks I thought really deeply about it. What happened here? What did I do wrong? I mean, she just didn’t like me? I think I’m a likable person.
Finally, after much analysis, I came to the conclusion that I had violated a law of power ten years before I ever wrote the book. Law 1: Never Outshine the Master. I had gone into this environment thinking that what mattered was doing a great job and showing how talented I was. But, in doing that, I had made this woman, my superior, insecure that maybe I was after her job or that I was better than she was. And I would make her look bad because the great ideas were coming from me and not from her. It wasn’t really her fault.
I had violated Law 1. And when you violate Law 1, you are going to suffer for it, because you are touching on a person’s ego and their insecurities. That is the worst thing you can do, and that is what had happened.
In reflecting on this, it became a turning point in my life. I said, “I’m never going to let this happen again. And I’m never going to take things personally and get emotional.” Because that is what happened. I basically reacted emotionally to her coldness and antagonism and developed an attitude. Never again. I’m a writer. I’m going to look at these jobs that I get with some distance. I am going to become a master observer of the game of power. I am going to watch these people as if they were mice in a laboratory, and I’m the scientist.
This suddenly allowed me to not only observe the power games going on in the many different kinds of jobs I’ve had, but also, in having this distance and looking at the world like this, suddenly I had power. I wasn’t emotionally entangled, and I could deal with things much more easily. Out of such a perspective, I developed The 48 Laws of Power. What I decided in The 48 Laws is that this is the reality we must all deal with—we are social creatures, we live in environments where there are all kinds of complicated networks, and we are, in a way, defined by how we handle these environments, this reality.