“Keep your friends for friendship, but work with the skilled and competent”

Understand: A person of power instills a kind of fear by deliberately unsettling those around him to keep the initative on his side.

Nothing is stable in the realm of power, and even closest of friends can be transformed into the worst of enemies.

Fear creates its own self-fulfilling dynamic- as people give into it, they lose energy and momentum. Their lack of confidence translates into inaction that lowers confidence levels even further, on and on.

You must always be prepared to place a bet on yourself, on your future, by heading in a direction that others seem to fear.

Actually, your past successes are your biggest obstacle: every battle, every war, is different, and you cannot assume that what worked before will work today.

It is in fact the height of selfishness to merely consume what others create and to retreat into a shell of limited goals and immediate pleasures.

No moment is wasted if you pay attention and learn the lessons contained in every experience.

The worst thing is to sit and whine and complain and obsess about money as if that were the only sign of your worth as a human.

If you are worried about what others might think and about how your position in the group might be jeopardized, then you will never really create anything.

The truth is that creative activity is one that involves the entire self – our emotions, our levels of energy, our characters, and our minds.

Remember: The best deceivers do everything they can to cloak their roguish qualities. They cultivate an air of honesty in one area to disguise their dishonesty in others. Honesty is merely another decoy in their arsenal of weapons.

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

If you’re just letting the time pass at your job, it’s just dead time and you’ll never get it back. If at that job you’re learning and you’re observing and you’re seeing about people and connections, it’s suddenly alive time.

Do not leave your reputation to chance or gossip; it is your life’s artwork, and you must craft it, hone it, and display it with the care of an artist.

The future belongs to those who learn more skills and combine them in creative ways.

Mastery is not a question of genetics of luck, but of following your natural inclinations and the deep desires that stirs you from within.