40: What?
There is no such thing as a free lunch.
What is offered for free is dangerous – it usually involves either a trick or a hidden obligation. What has worth is worth paying for. By paying your own way you stay clear of gratitude, guilt, and deceit. It is also often wise to pay the full price – there is no cutting corners with excellence.
Basically not letting others control you through favors.
LAW 1: Never outshine the master
LAW 2: Never put too much trust in friends, learn how to use enemies
LAW 3: Conceal your intentions
LAW 4: Always say less than necessary
LAW 5: So much depends on reputation. Guard it with your life
LAW 6: Court attention at all cost
LAW 7: Get others to do the work for you, but always take the credit
LAW 8: Make other people come to you, use bait if necessary
LAW 9: Win through your actions, never through argument
LAW 10: Avoid the unhappy and unlucky
LAW 11: Learn to keep people dependent on you
LAW 12: Use selective honesty and generosity to disarm your victim
LAW 13: When asking for help, appeal to people's self-interest, never to their mercy or gratitude
LAW 14: Pose as a friend, work as a spy
LAW 15: Crush your enemy totally
LAW 16: Use absence to increase respect and honor
LAW 17: Keep others in suspended terror, cultivate an air of unpredictability
LAW 18: Do not build fortresses to protect yourself. Isolation is dangerous
LAW 19: Know who you are dealing with. Do not offend the wrong person
LAW 20: Do not commit to anyone
LAW 21: Play a sucker to catch a sucker. Seem dumber than your mark
LAW 22: Use the surrender tactic (transform weakness into power)
LAW 23: Concentrate your forces
LAW 24: Play the perfect courtier
LAW 25: Re-create your life
LAW 26: Keep your hands clean
LAW 27: Play on people's need to believe to create a cult-like following
LAW 28: Enter action with boldness
LAW 29: Plan all the way to the end
LAW 30: Make your accomplishments seem effortless
LAW 31: Control the options (get others to play with the cards you deal)
LAW 32: Play to people's fantasies
LAW 33: Discover each man's thumbscrew
LAW 34: Be royal in your own fashion (act like a king or queen to be treated like one)
LAW 35: Master the art of timing
LAW 36: Disdain things you cannot have, ignoring them is the best revenge
LAW 37: Create compelling spectacles
LAW 38: Think as you like but behave like others
LAW 39: Stir up waters to catch fish
LAW 40: Despise the free lunch
LAW 41: Avoid stepping into a great man's shoes
LAW 42: Strike the shepherd and the sheep will scatter
LAW 43: Work on the hearts and minds of others
LAW 44: Disarm and infuriate with the "mirror effect"
LAW 45: Preach the need for change, but never reform too much at once
LAW 46: Never appear too perfect (Only gods and the dead can seem perfect with impunity)
LAW 47: Do not go past the mark you aimed for. In victory, learn when to stop
LAW 48: Assume formlessness
Thoughts?