Become Articulate. Because that’s the most dangerous thing you can possibly be.
It’s better to be a warrior in a garden, than a gardener in a war.
If you're a monster, and you don't act monstruosly, then you're virtuous.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fesSvXKxYd0
https://youtube.com/watch?v=QQ5oqgJWJyw
You don’t want a factual description of every muscle twitch. You want to distill experiences down into the gist, which is the significance of the experience, what you can derive from listening to the experience that will change the way that you look at the world and act in the world, so it’s valuable information. Terrible stories can be valuable because they can tell you how not to look at the world and act.
You might say that someone who is incapable of cruelty is a higher moral being than someone who is capable of cruelty. That’s dangerously incorrect. If you’re not capable of cruelty, you’re absolutely a victim to anyone who is.
It’s impossible to achieve strength of character and respect yourself until you grow teeth. If you grow teeth and realise that you’re somewhat seriously dangerous, then you might be more willing to demand that you treat yourself with respect and other people do the same thing.
Being able to be cruel and then not being cruel is better than not being able to be cruel. In the first case you’re weak and naive. In the second case you’re dangerous but you have it under control.
If it was all a matter of following your bliss and doing what made you happy, then everyone in the world would be a paragon of wisdom, but it’s not that at all. It’s a matter of facing the thing you least want to face. The gateway to wisdom and to the development of personality is precisely through the portal that you do not want to climb through.
There’s a bunch of things about you that are underdeveloped because they’re thing you’ve avoided looking at because you don’t want to look at them, and there’s parts of you you’ve avoided developing because it’s hard for you to develop those parts. It’s by virtual necessity that what you need is exactly where you don’t want to look.
The plot of your life is the overcoming of those limitations. If there were no limitations, then there would be no plot, and maybe there would be no life. You have to accept the fact that you’re flawed and insufficient and live with it and consider it a precondition for being.
It helps to read. It really helps to write. Not only you should read but you should write down what you think, and if you can do it a little bit every day, say 15 minutes, for 10 years, you really straighten out your thinking.
If you’re going to speak effectively, you have to know way more than you’re talking about. If you’re giving a lecture, you want to know 10 times as much as what you’re saying in the lecture.
If you’re speaking in front of a group, you’re not delivering a talk to a group. There isn’t a group. There’s only a bunch of individuals. So just look at one person at a time, say something, and you can tell if they’re engaged. Do they look confused? Do they look interested? Angry? Bored? They give you feedback about how you’re doing. Even if they’re not talking, they’re nodding, shifting position, and you can use that to govern the level at which you’re addressing the entire audience.
La celebrità non è una gioia perché i rapporti veri, quelli giusti, quelli intensi, quelli significativi, sono quelli duali. Quelli plurali, è rumore. — Galimberti
Communication skills are pivotal for success in any field; mastering them boosts negotiation and collaboration outcomes.