Shadowing Practice: Robert Greene: Why Nice People Lose Power & How To Fix It - Learn English Speaking with Video
Kies een oefenmodus
Elke modus opent een volledig scherm oefenruimte.
646 zinnen
Als zinnen te kort of te lang zijn, klik op Bewerken om ze aan te passen.
1
If you haven't heard of the book, The 48 Laws of Power, you might be living under a rock.
2
Today, I am privileged to talk to the man himself, the author of The 48
3
Laws of Power, Robert Green.
4
Robert, thank you so much for coming.
5
Thank you for having me, Jefferson.
6
I appreciate it.
7
This is a conversation I'm very much looking forward to
8
because your book is one that often when I make content or I'm speaking, there will typically be somebody who comes up and says,
9
oh, have you read
10
The 48 Laws of Power?
11
And I say, yes, I have.
12
And what I want to talk about and what the listeners are going to get,
13
what you're going to get in this episode is we're going to talk on,
14
can you use power and can you also maintain your own integrity?
15
Because a lot of the times people find those to be conflicting in some way.
16
They hear manipulation.
17
They don't hear anything that is descriptive, prescriptive, that can improve their life.
18
Robert, how would you define power?
19
What does power mean to you?
20
Well, power is a tool.
21
It's totally neutral.
22
Like a hammer, you can use it to build a house
23
or you could clobber someone over the head and kill them with it.
24
So power is simply a tool.
25
It's neutral.
26
It is neither good nor bad.
27
It can be used for evil.
28
It can be used for great good.
29
But power is the sense of having control over the immediate environment, over events that are occurring in your life.
30
So to use this to flip it around to the negative,
31
if you sense in your daily life that you have no ability to influence your children,
32
your spouse, your partner, the colleagues at work, your boss, the people in your company, it's a miserable, miserable feeling.
33
You have no power.
34
You have no control.
35
You have no influence.
36
You can't tell people to do something and they don't listen to you, right?
37
Or they do things to you that kind of block your path
38
and you have no way of getting them to stop this.
39
That feeling of powerlessness is something that human beings cannot endure very well.
40
And if you feel powerless for very long, something is going to warp inside of you psychologically psychologically.
41
You're going to turn inward.
42
You're going to become resentful.
43
You're going to become angry.
44
You're going to have pools of anger, you know, developing inside of you deeper and deeper and deeper.
45
And you're not going to have control over yourself.
46
So power is the sense first.
47
The first sense of control is over yourself, over your emotions, so that you're not always reacting and getting angry,
48
so that you have a little bit of detachment.
49
So when it comes to those situations where you need to move or influence people like your children, your spouse, your colleagues, your boss,
50
you're able to step back a half step, a full step, couple steps,
51
and think and go, what is it that will actually move that person in the direction that I want?
52
How can I actually influence them effectively so they don't hate me, so they don't resent me,
53
so that they actually do what is in my interest without maybe even realizing it
54
or that the interests align in some way.
55
So that is power for me, right?
56
It begins with yourself.
57
It begins with a sense of detachment from the events happening to you.
58
It's the ability to strategize and think in each situation in life.
59
This is a move that will gain me a little degree of control over events.
60
You can never, ever have complete control.
61
Life happens.
62
Things happen.
63
Pandemics happen.
64
Black swans happen.
65
You can't control everything, right? But
66
that little bit of margin of control is enough to kind of help you glide through life a little bit more smoothly.
67
When I think of power, I think what you said is a perfect definition of it the ability,
68
one's ability to control or influence another's behavior, maybe including even their own.
69
You have the personal power, you have relational power, like who in the dynamic might have more influence over the other between husband, wife, or partner.
70
And maybe there's political power, the ability to construct, influence others, the ability to write laws, implement laws socially.
71
And what I find, the people
72
that I get to talk to are always looking for power of themselves and how they're going to improve their life.
73
And where I teach is communication and the power of.
74
And this is why I really like,
75
there's a number of the laws that you have out that are specific to communication,
76
like using less words in particular.
77
How do you find that communication and power intersect?
78
They're obviously completely intertwined.
79
but communication has to be strategic and that's the problem
80
that a lot of people have in this world they think if they just talk, if they just say this is what I want,
81
this is what I need, please come and help me that that's communicating.
82
All you're communicating is your insecurity and your needs.
83
True communication is effective it's strategic.
84
Other people are naturally resistant to helping you or aligning themselves with your interest.
85
Everybody has their own problems in the world today.
86
We're all stressed.
87
We're all working too hard.
88
We never have enough time, right?
89
So you talk to me about what you want.
90
Okay, I'm kind of half listening, but you're kind of irritating me because you're just spewing things from your side, right?
91
True communication is what I was saying before.
92
You take that step back and you put yourself in the other person's shoes, right?
93
You get out of your own head because you're so self -involved
94
that you don't realize that your words are just landing nowhere.
95
You get out of your head and you go, I'm dealing with another person.
96
They are not me.
97
They have their own problems, their own wishes, their own issues right now in the present, right?
98
What is that?
99
What is it that is going on in their head in their world?
100
Sometimes you have to do some research.
101
Sometimes maybe you know them well and that maybe you don't know them at all, but you have to figure that out.
102
It's a puzzle.
103
Once you figure out their side, not your side, what they want,
104
what they need, now you have some power to craft what you say to actually influence them, to appeal to their self -interest,
105
which is one of the laws of power, one of the most powerful laws of all, right?
106
So if I say something and I'm trying to influence, I'm trying to move them like on a chessboard in my direction, right?
107
If I say something that appeals to their self -interest while it's also helping me, their eyes will light up.
108
All those defenses that they have will start to go down.
109
So communication is absolutely worthless unless it's strategic.
110
And always say less than necessary is important
111
because the natural tendency for a human being without self -control is just to spew words, you know, just like verbal diarrhea.
112
This is, you know, my problems, my life.
113
This is what's going on with me.
114
This is what I need, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
115
Right?
116
Just shut up.
117
Talk less and think more about what the other person needs and craft your communication strategically.
118
You know, I wrote a book recently and it's hard not to,
119
I can't imagine writing a book and not having pieces of yourself in it when you were writing this book,
120
what was coming up for you in your own life?
121
Are you just studying these elements of influence and control and power?
122
Is it something that you were writing to yourself or for other people?
123
Where did that come up for you?
124
Well, it came from two things.
125
First of all, a very deep desire to help people in this world.
126
I don't my books I think very very deeply this I'm working on my eighth book now
127
so power is in my only book
128
but I think very very deeply of my audience right it's a form of communication to get back to that right
129
and I want to help people
130
I want to help people deal with their problems in a real way not just to satisfy my own ego
131
so I have to think about how my words can actually be absorbed into your daily life.
132
So that's one side.
133
The other side is the book came from a lot of pain, right?
134
So I started into life, like most people, kind of naive, kind of innocent.
135
I wasn't a good player, naturally, necessarily in power, right?
136
I made mistakes.
137
I talked too much, probably.
138
I outshone the master, right?
139
On and on and on.
140
I could go through a laundry list of the things that I violated.
141
And I didn't realize that the world is political.
142
I thought when you enter the work world, what matters is having results, is getting things done, is doing things well.
143
But no, I had many, many, many painful experiences, particularly working in the film world.
144
But as I've said in many interviews, I've had 50 different jobs in my life, more than 50.
145
in all different aspects, in every little possible avenue of life I've had a job.
146
And I suffer deeply, and I suffer deeply from the sense of people are so political.
147
Their egos are involved in everything.
148
You can see their egos as they walk past you, right?
149
I would notice in the office that there was these hierarchies.
150
I worked, remember, I worked for a while at the magazine Rolling Stone.
151
And there were these hierarchies.
152
There was the boss and you could just see this massive ego walking back and forth.
153
Then there were all the smaller little people working right under him and their egos.
154
And there was a little me in the corner as a copy editor, a little tiny, tiny little ego.
155
But that's what mattered.
156
That's what made things run was how well you impressed him, how you talked to the boss, in this case, Jan Wenner.
157
And I thought this is silly, but this is the real world and you have to take the real world seriously.
158
You have to succeed in the real world.
159
So the book came from deep pools of pain from my own mistakes
160
and from a deep desire to help other people
161
because I feel it's the source of a lot of depression and misery in life.
162
You know, you say something or you do something thinking that you're on the right track, it's going to help you.
163
And the next thing you know, you're fired or you're depoted.
164
You don't know why.
165
I felt, you know, I see people around me having these problems.
166
So those are the two strands of the book, a deep desire to help people and a realization that the world is political,
167
full of egos, and that mistakes are very costly and painful, and I made plenty of them.
168
Yeah, well, you're not alone.
169
We've all made a lot of mistakes.
170
Looking back at it now and knowing the impact of the book, and I want to talk about the book specifically
171
that you're you're writing i'm going to be releasing soon is for those who haven't read it
172
or those who might go you know what now
173
that i've listened to this episode i want to pick
174
it up again maybe they have it on their shelf i haven't looked at it in a while how do you
175
find and especially being the one that wrote it
176
that this topic can also be very healing I get a lot of emails from people that, you know, it's helped them.
177
It's turned their life around or they started a business because of the book.
178
Of course, you know, it's anecdotal.
179
So I'm sure there's a lot of stories out there.
180
People who've been hurt, who've been on the other side of the manipulation.
181
I understand that.
182
But what's healing and liberating is to finally have
183
that little light turned on inside of your brain that this is how the world works.
184
I didn't realize that.
185
I thought what mattered was just being myself.
186
I thought that I could just do my job, say the things that I like, dress the way that I like to dress, just be myself.
187
And it was enough.
188
And no, I'm suffering from it.
189
And just seeing that little switch go on in your brain that no, the game is different.
190
It's played differently.
191
There are rules to this game.
192
You can't just come in and play poker and just do whatever you want.
193
There are rules for poker.
194
There are rules for chess.
195
You don't know the rules.
196
You're just playing terribly and you're suffering.
197
And just that little bit of switch inside going, maybe I'm entering this game, maybe I'm from the wrong angle.
198
Maybe I'm being too selfish, egotistical, I'm too self -absorbed,
199
and I'm not thinking enough about the players in this game.
200
That little switch of your perspective, how you look at it, can be deeply healing and enlightening because it's not natural to us.
201
As I said, it wasn't natural to me.
202
So, I think in that sense, that's what has helped a lot of people,
203
a lot of people who like myself enter the work world a little bit innocent
204
and a little bit on the naive side.
205
This episode was brought to you by Cozy Earth.
206
One of the reasons I love
207
Cozy Earth is because their products are just that dang good
208
when it comes to anything that I want to wear that is soft and comfortable.
209
I'm talking about hoodies, sweatshirts, sweatpants, which I am wearing a lot of right now.
210
Now that in Texas, It is less than 60 degrees, which means it's freezing here.
211
From our bed sheets to our bath towels to everything that is quality product, that's Cozy Earth.
212
And I love talking about them because I use their stuff all the time.
213
Go to CozyEarth .com slash Jefferson.
214
Use the code Jefferson and get 40 % off.
215
CozyEarth .com slash Jefferson.
216
Get the code Jefferson for up to 40 % off.
217
If you're looking for anything in the holidays, you need to go check out Cozy Earth.
218
You will not be disappointed you will find something that you go, oh.
219
I need this and I need to get it for somebody else, but I definitely need it for myself.
220
And now back to the episode.
221
How can you tell if somebody is trying to manipulate you?
222
Well, sometimes if people are clever, you're not going to realize it.
223
Like if people are really good at the manipulation game, if they know the 48 laws of power, If they know how to seduce you,
224
how to wrap their words and make you seem like they're just wonderful, that they're out for your best interest,
225
if they're really good at it, you won't realize it until it's too late.
226
And so in my book, I think my last book, The Laws of Human Nature,
227
what I tell people is you need to identify these people before they enter your life
228
or before you start listening to them.
229
You need to be able to identify the manipulative types before they start charming you, before they start enchanting you,
230
before they start wrapping you up in their dramas.
231
because if you don't, if you fall into that trap, it's going to probably be too late.
232
Most people aren't such good manipulators.
233
And you can sense it, right?
234
They're very passive aggressive.
235
They say things that they want to get from you, but there's a subtext involved, right?
236
And a lot of the bad manipulators, you can feel it.
237
You have an intuitive sense.
238
You can understand that something in their body language, something in how they speak, it doesn't seem sincere.
239
But the main thing is to be able to sense people's character, to be able to identify the types of people out there.
240
So, as I said, there's some people out there who are brilliant at the manipulation game for whatever reason.
241
Not because maybe necessarily they read my book, but because it's in their DNA.
242
They're just naturally good at it, right?
243
People who are very political, okay?
244
So your task is to be able to see through these people because the problem that a lot of people have,
245
you see, I have to kind of circle around here a little bit.
246
The thing that I try to say in the 48
247
Laws of Power is that it's a game of appearances.
248
Appearances matter so much in this power game, how you present yourself, how people see you.
249
You know, act like a king to be treated like a king, right?
250
Recreate yourself.
251
Your appearances is what people are judging you by, right?
252
So at the same time, you have to control your appearances so people see you as powerful.
253
But you have to see like a laser through other people's masks, through other people's games that they're playing, through the appearances they're trying to create.
254
So the great manipulators out there, right?
255
They have signs.
256
They're not perfect.
257
They give little clues, little crumbs that reveal that they're trying to play this kind of game on you.
258
And that's why I wrote
259
The Laws of Human Nature, where I give you tools for identifying the great narcissists out there.
260
Because most of the master manipulators are toxic narcissists.
261
And you have to be able to identify them before they enter your life.
262
How to identify people who are full of envy.
263
They are a very dangerous type.
264
They'll become your best friend in order to hurt you, to sabotage you, because they feel envious.
265
You have to identify them before they get into your life, on and on and on down the line.
266
So that's sort of my advice.
267
There's no simple answer how to identify a manipulator.
268
It's in their character.
269
It's in their body language.
270
It's the little signs that they give out.
271
And you have to be able to see through people's masks and not always take appearances for reality.
272
The people who would read this book and let's say they've read it,
273
they really understand it, they're putting it into practice, and they're somebody who wants to have, as we've defined, more power in their life,
274
whether it's for good or whether it's for bad.
275
And through that, they're going to be able to, as a verb, manipulate people for good or for bad to their purpose.
276
do you find that the people who read this book are doing it with ill intent or for good intent?
277
I know you've heard you have to have had a lot of feedback from this book over the last many years.
278
Yeah.
279
And I'm curious what you'd speak to that.
280
Well, let me clear up one thing, though, that not all of the laws are about manipulation, right?
281
Right.
282
I mean, I guess it's how you define manipulation.
283
But creating compelling spectacles, one of the laws, is creating something that draws a lot of attention.
284
Right.
285
Which is what a lot of life and social media involves.
286
You can say in some ways it's manipulation, but it's also just trying to please people, just trying to bring pleasure into the world,
287
just trying to create a spectacle that attracts attention.
288
I don't necessarily see every law in there about manipulation population.
289
But to get to your point, you know, I've said this before, the people who are really,
290
really nasty and evil at the game of power, and they're out there, out there,
291
I would say maybe three to 5 % of the population would be like that.
292
Maybe I'm overestimating the number.
293
You don't really need a book like the 48
294
Laws of Power, right?
295
They've been learning this from a very early age.
296
They probably had troubled childhoods.
297
I don't want to get too deep into the psychology of that, but they've been wounded in their childhood, right?
298
And they learn from the age of six or seven or eight.
299
This is how you get people.
300
This is how you string people along.
301
This is how you get attention.
302
This is how you be dramatic.
303
This is what you say.
304
This is how you get mommy and daddy to pay attention to me.
305
This is how, you know, you get the teacher to like me.
306
They've learned this step by step at an early age.
307
By the time they enter the work world in 22, they've been dealing, doing this in high school.
308
They've been doing that at college or wherever.
309
They're getting better and better at it.
310
Then this book comes along, The 48 Laws of Power.
311
Well, they don't need to read that if they read it, it's just going to confirm the things that they've kind of intuitively understood.
312
Now, I don't deny that there's going to be a percentage of people who read that book go,
313
wow, I can really be nasty in the world.
314
I can really use this now and get a lot of power.
315
And they are using it for bad purposes.
316
I understand that.
317
And I have to own up to that and not, I'm not completely naive about how the book is used.
318
But the vast percentage of people, and I know this from the emails I get,
319
I get hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of them in the last 20 -some years, probably hundreds of thousands in the end,
320
are people who are like myself, who are naive, who didn't understand how the game is played,
321
who entered the world with all kinds of illusions that were bred into them because your parents don't tell you,
322
your teachers, your parents in your schools, don't tell you that there are people out there who are manipulative, that the world can't be political,
323
that everyone out there has egos.
324
Nobody teaches you this.
325
All of the books are so sweet and sugary, telling you self -help books, you know, just cooperate.
326
This is how to be a good human being
327
and you enter the work world and nobody prepared you for the slap that you have from people being so nasty, political and ego ridden.
328
Nobody taught me this.
329
They glom onto the book like it's, you know, water in the desert.
330
Wow.
331
He's teaching me something real.
332
That's the majority of readers.
333
I believe I could be wrong.
334
There's no science behind it.
335
I don't have data.
336
anecdotal data, those is sort of how I believe it.
337
These are the readers that are attracted to them.
338
What I have found in my own life is so, so much of what I have seen and ran into with,
339
especially in, uh, when they would early childhood trauma,
340
like what you just talked about people who who have people who are proficient at lying
341
or manipulating or exercising as we can define power.
342
It's because at that point in time in their life, there was an actual utility to it.
343
They were able to get mom and dad to stop arguing.
344
They were able to keep the family together.
345
They were able to not get in trouble, to keep themselves from getting abused or whatever it is.
346
that so much of it, they have already learned.
347
And whereas some people might be like you said,
348
they think everything's roses and they just get hit with the tidal wave as soon as they enter the real world of,
349
wow, this is, it doesn't matter how nice I am.
350
They're going to be rude to me.
351
It doesn't matter how clean I play.
352
I'm never going to get anywhere if I don't do X, Y, and Z.
353
Nobody taught me the true rule, the hard knock rules.
354
Yeah.
355
Is that fair?
356
Yeah.
357
I mean, I wrote a book about warfare and one of the concepts called 33
358
Strategies of War.
359
And one of the concepts in there is what we call asymmetric warfare.
360
And that's what is also called dirty warfare.
361
Right.
362
People who like terrorism.
363
OK.
364
Like guerrilla warfare.
365
where the rules are thrown out, where you're willing to do anything.
366
Usually it comes from armies that are much smaller and weaker.
367
And that's certainly the origin of terrorism, right?
368
You're going to leverage your smallness, your small size, your small army,
369
but being as nasty and amoral and you'll do anything to get power to hurt the enemy, okay?
370
And what happens is oftentimes the enemy plays by rules, is good.
371
And so in asymmetric warfare, right, it's an ethical, there's also an ethical asymmetry.
372
So I think of things like poop in Russia, for instance.
373
Okay.
374
He's somebody who's willing to play, do anything for power.
375
As nasty and as dark, whatever works for him.
376
And his country is what he will do.
377
When you have these European countries with their democracies and their rules and their organization and their bureaucracies,
378
and they're continually at a disadvantage facing somebody who's willing to do anything much more than they're willing to do.
379
We find this as well in American politics.
380
Okay.
381
So in life, the same thing happens.
382
When there are people out there in your office who their ethics and their morals are thinner than yours,
383
they're willing to do things that you would never consider doing, you're at a continual disadvantage.
384
You're not willing to do the dirty things that they're doing, right?
385
How do you defend yourself in a world where some people are willing to do things
386
that you would never consider doing, right?
387
Well, you have to become strategic and you have to understand that you don't have to be evil.
388
You don't have to lower yourself to the level.
389
You don't have to play fire to hit fire with fire.
390
You can do different things to upset them, to be strategic, to deter them from hurting you,
391
etc. But the fact that there are asymmetries of it, there are people who are willing to do things that you're not willing to do,
392
is the source of a lot of problems and pain in your life and suffering.
393
And you're going to suffer throughout your life because of that.
394
You know, those toxic narcissists, their gamut of what they're willing to do is like this, and yours is like this.
395
And so, you know, you're constantly being hit by things, and you're not necessarily understanding because you're a good person.
396
You don't necessarily register all the dark things that they're doing until it's too late.
397
Before we keep going, I want to take a second to tell you about Monarch.
398
The holidays are great, but they come with a lot.
399
Travel, gifts, family gatherings.
400
It's one of those times where money moves fast, and it helps actually see where it's all going.
401
If you want to keep your finances under control this holiday season, you need to be using Monarch.
402
Rated by Wall Street Journal's best budgeting app of 2025, Monarch is the all -in -one personal finance tool
403
that brings your entire financial life together in one clean interface on your laptop or your phone, wherever you are.
404
And right now, just for my listeners, Monarch is offering 50 % off your first year.
405
That's 50 % off.
406
That's half.
407
That's awesome.
408
When you start using
409
Monarch, I promise you, you're going to be surprised at just how simple it is to tie everything together
410
and finally have a full picture.
411
Wouldn't that be nice to have, see all of your spending, all of your investments, where it's all coming in from, how it's all going out.
412
That's peace of mind.
413
So don't let financial opportunities slip through the cracks this holiday season.
414
Use code Jefferson at monarch .com in your browser for half off your first year.
415
That's 50 % off of your first year at monarch .com with the code Jefferson.
416
And now back to the episode.
417
I'd like to read a quote that hit home for me.
418
Understand, people will constantly attack you in life.
419
One of their main weapons will be to instill in you doubts about yourself, your worth, your abilities, your potential.
420
That's in transform self -love into empathy.
421
My question is, how do we build communication habits that handle these attacks on ourselves,
422
that instill doubts in us?
423
without internalizing them?
424
Or how do you handle people trying to instill doubts in you?
425
You talked about self -loves from my book, The Laws of Human Nature.
426
So to the degree that you are insecure,
427
to the degree that you don't really love yourself, So we have to.. clear up a misconception that people have.
428
There's a difference between narcissism and true self -love, right?
429
So if you learned at an early age, three or four or five years old, that you're actually a good person,
430
that you're worthy of love and affection from other people, you know, that you have skills and abilities as you get older that are actually worthwhile,
431
that will contribute, right?
432
Then you have an anchor in your life.
433
You have a degree of love of yourself, a confidence.
434
So every time later in life where you have blows, where people hit you with doubts, but they try and sabotage you,
435
they try and insinuate that maybe you're not so good, or they play these games that we're talking about, you're going to get this blow,
436
and it's going to depress you, and it's going to lower you down, and it's going to affect you.
437
We're all like that.
438
Nobody can can you can't suffer from that myself, including.
439
But what happens is if you have that level of self -love that you developed at an early age, you will rise back up.
440
You'll start going, no, it's not true that I'm this way.
441
It's not true what they're trying to tell me.
442
You know, I'm actually worthy and I know it because I've done things in my life.
443
I've accomplished this.
444
I've helped this other person.
445
It raises you back up.
446
It's like a thermostat that you have inside of yourself.
447
Okay.
448
So the degree that you have that, that love will bounce you back up
449
and you'll be able to tell yourself at first their doubts kind of hit you because we're,
450
we're all human, but then you go, no, it's crap.
451
They're playing a game.
452
I'm not going to fall for that.
453
But if you were wounded very early on and you never developed
454
that self love and you have a lot of doubts about yourself already
455
and you're insecure and you're riddled with like bullet holes and wounds inside of yourself where things can leak through
456
and people tell you those things, it's going to bring you down and you're going to not rise back up.
457
You rise back up a little bit, then another person will hit you.
458
You keep going down and down and then you get depressed and you'll find it very difficult to rise back up.
459
So the way you have to handle it in life, if you're in your 20s or 30s or 40s or even in your 50s,
460
well, I just saw a coyote walk right by.
461
You know, you have to develop it.
462
You have to go back and go, I'm beating up on myself.
463
I have all these insecurities.
464
They're effective.
465
These people are effectively manipulating them because I'm allowing them to manipulate me.
466
So when bad things happen to you in life, you have two choices you can do, right?
467
This is probably the most important thing I can tell everybody out there.
468
You have two ways you can go.
469
You can blame other people, you can say, oh, that evil person out there, he's manipulating, she's manipulating me, they're doing this, that, and the other,
470
oh, woe is me, I'm being the victim, blah, blah, blah, they're evil, they're bad.
471
Okay, you do that in life, you're never going to get anywhere, right?
472
You're going to always be looking for things to blame, looking at external things, you're never going to grow, you're never going to develop.
473
The other thing is every time something bad happens, you look inside of yourself and you go,
474
that person manipulated me, that narcissist got into my life and did all kinds of damage.
475
What is it about me that allowed them into my life?
476
What is it about me that was so innocent, that was so stupid, that believed the things that were saying?
477
Okay.
478
So if you're able to learn and grow from these events and look at yourself and go,
479
why was I allowing them to hit me and hurt me and instill these doubts?
480
Why didn't they affect me?
481
What's wrong with me?
482
Well, maybe I don't love myself enough.
483
Maybe I don't have enough confidence in myself.
484
How do I build that up?
485
Well, I have to go back to my childhood.
486
I have to think about the things that I've actually accomplished.
487
I have to build it up slowly, slowly, slowly and that's how you handle things.
488
But if you can't look inside of yourself and go, the bad thing happened and I have to learn from it
489
and I had to grow and maybe some of it's my own fault, you're sunk in life for the rest of your life.
490
You'll never ever develop.
491
I want to take a quick second to tell you about Momentus.
492
Momentus is a sponsor of this podcast.
493
I am so excited to be talking about because I use this stuff every single day.
494
When I tell you I ingest it and I feel like I am making myself a better person every time I do,
495
it's because that is the absolute truth.
496
Momentus, they make the science of better performance simple.
497
And you might be thinking, look, Jefferson, I am not huge on exercise.
498
I'm not some athlete.
499
I'm not running everywhere.
500
I get it.
501
I do.
502
I get it.
503
Momentus is giving me the nutrition that I know I'm not getting in my very busy day.
504
So here's how I think about it.
505
I know I want to show up my best.
506
That means I need to start with what I'm putting in my body.
507
That has to do with all of my nutrition.
508
So what am I taking?
509
I take a lot of Momentus stuff.
510
I do their whey protein, which is grass fed.
511
I use their creatine.
512
I use their magnesium L3O8.
513
They have a whole sleep stack that I take, which helps me sleep at night.
514
It's restful.
515
I take all their omega -3s and it's in my fridge.
516
I love this stuff.
517
And I used it before they were ever a sponsor.
518
So when I'm pressing record to talk to you or I'm stepping on a stage to speak to people,
519
it matters what I put in my body.
520
You can go to livemomentous .com, use the code Jefferson, and get up to 35 % off your first subscription.
521
That's livemomentous .com slash Jefferson.
522
Momentous.
523
When your moment matters, make it count.
524
And now, back to the episode.
525
I want to make sure and touch on the project you've been working on.
526
I believe it's called The Sublime?
527
The Law of the Sublime, yes.
528
Yeah, tell us about it.
529
Do you have a release date for it?
530
Well, I'm very finally happy to announce that, yes, it should be out in October of 2026.
531
That's fantastic.
532
Well, yeah, I mean, I've been working on it for five and a half years now, you know, and so every day,
533
constantly, it's been a roller coaster.
534
So to see the end is almost brings tears to my eyes.
535
I almost can't even, I can't even handle it.
536
This will be your ninth book?
537
It'll be my eighth book.
538
Eighth book.
539
Okay.
540
Eighth book.
541
Wow.
542
That's incredible.
543
Can you give us a little preview of the law of the sublime?
544
So it's a little bit influenced by the near -death experience I had eight years ago when I suffered,
545
or seven and a half years ago when I suffered a stroke.
546
And I came this close to dying myself.
547
And my wife basically saved my life.
548
I was driving my car here in Los Angeles.
549
she saw my face just falling apart something weird going on I was driving
550
I wasn't aware of any of it she got me
551
she forced me off the road she called 9 -1 -1 they came quickly
552
if any of those little things hadn't happened
553
if they'd been a minute later
554
or she hadn't recognized it I'd be I wouldn't be talking to you right now I'd either be dead
555
or I'd be in a vegetative state so life is this very thin thread, right?
556
Where things can, you know, you can definitely slip off the edge and you're not aware it can happen at any moment.
557
And the sublime is this understanding that to be alive, to simply be alive, to see the world,
558
to see things as they are, to see birds, to see nature,
559
to see human beings, to see that you and I are talking on this instrument right now,
560
which 50 years ago would seem like something from some science fiction story, is utterly mind -blowing.
561
But people don't realize that they walk through their lives with their phones stuck in their face.
562
They're thinking about, you know, reading about what people had for breakfast.
563
Their minds are getting smaller and smaller.
564
They're shrinking down.
565
They're not opening up to the infinite, to the vastness of this world,
566
to the amazing fact that we're on a planet with life in a cosmos.
567
There's probably very little, hardly maybe no life at all.
568
That it evolved to where we are today, that we're human beings, that we have what we have.
569
It's utterly unbelievable.
570
And I'm trying to open your eyes to each of the different aspects of what I call the sublime.
571
Then I talk about childhood and how our childhood was so intense.
572
All of our childhoods were so intense.
573
We're naturally sublime in what that means.
574
How the brain and consciousness itself is utterly weird and sublime.
575
How other animals and their consciousness and how we can kind of study and empathize with other species is utterly sublime.
576
Love, which is a chapter, is a sublime quality history in the past and our ancestors is an incredible thing.
577
I talk about ancient civilizations.
578
I described to you what the ancient city of Babylonia looked like.
579
The ancient world, the cities back there were unbelievably beautiful in a way we can't even imagine, right?
580
So I have 12 different chapters, each kind of going into some of those different aspects.
581
And it's been the journey because this hand here that I'm holding up
582
is kind of dead because this is my stroke I can't type so I've had to hand write everything
583
and then dig it into the computer wow
584
if you saw my process you go my god I can't believe
585
he even got one paragraph of this book out um
586
so uh well that is that is incredibly impressive and I look forward to everybody taking a,
587
making sure they can go take a look at it when it comes out there in October.
588
That's very, that's something to very much admire.
589
So I appreciate you sharing that with us.
590
You're very welcome.
591
Very welcome.
592
I wanted to wrap up with this question, one that you've probably gotten before.
593
Now that you've had 20 plus years to, you know, look backwards and you said, well, you know what?
594
I stopped at 48.
595
if there ever could be now looking at it, another law, maybe one or two, that you thought, well, I'd add this one.
596
Do you have one?
597
The 49th law is there is no 49th law, right?
598
You know, Jefferson, to be honest with you, when I finish a book, I kind of move on.
599
I'm on to the next project.
600
I'm on to seduction.
601
I'm on to war.
602
I'm on to mastery.
603
I'm working with 50 Cent.
604
I'm doing them all.
605
I'm so absorbed in them.
606
I don't really go back and think, what did I miss in that book over there?
607
I try to tell myself psychologically, you covered it all, move on, on to the next project, don't look back kind of thing.
608
That's sort of my guiding philosophy of life.
609
I think that's a pretty good philosophy, one I can certainly relate to.
610
Well, I appreciate, from me to you, I appreciate your dedication.
611
Oh, thank you to your art and to your projects and what you've chosen to share in the world.
612
And I know that, you know, as I've read them, anybody can, same with my content, you can always take them in the way
613
that you want to choose to receive them and how you accept them.
614
But they are what they are.
615
They, in many ways, power, like you've mentioned, is a neutral tool.
616
And so what I've learned in our conversation today is, number one, power is the ability to control or influence another to your desired outcome.
617
And those that don't have the power,
618
they're the ones that they feel powerless in many ways feel like they got left behind and didn't learn these tools.
619
These are the kind of lessons that you teach in
620
that book that you didn't just write off the top of your head.
621
You research it from globally, from different ages to all across the world.
622
And these are things that can help a lot of people.
623
If anything, give them a really genuine perspective of what the real world is like.
624
Two, when it comes to dealing with people that are attacking you
625
and trying to put you down and instill doubts in you,
626
their ability to do so is corresponding to the level of self -love that you have invested in yourself.
627
And those with higher self -love, they're going to be less affected by those trying to sow doubts into them.
628
And then three, I want to touch on the law of the sublime gave me just such a wonderful picture
629
as you were even listening here and you saw a coyote run by.
630
The appreciation for life and how precious it is is something that we should never forget.
631
Robert, thank you so much for taking the time to share with us and my audience.
632
I hope you're able to see me.
633
I see all this light coming in.
634
God, I should have moved over.
635
I just thought you were glowing.
636
Yeah, you know, I really, you're just glowing.
637
That's awesome.
638
Robert, thank you so much.
639
I appreciate it.
640
Thank you so much for having me, Jefferson.
641
I'm glad that we finally got to be able to do this.
642
Thank you.
643
Take care, man.
644
Me too.
645
Absolutely.
646
Yes, sir.
App downloaden
Alles wat je nodig hebt om vloeiend te spreken
AI UitspraakScoor elke zin
IPA OefeningBeheers elk geluid
WoordenschatBouw je woordenschat op
WoordenspelLeren terwijl je speelt
Zelfde Kanaal
B11
Use This Phrase on The Silent Treatment
Daily ConversationWorking Adults
B22
Hard conversations are NOT about you...
Daily ConversationWorking Adults
B21
How good leaders communicate
Daily ConversationWorking Adults
B21
What to Say When Texts Go Badly
Daily ConversationWorking Adults
B24
You’re Not Responsible for Their Emotions
American AccentBusiness EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B21
Erin McGoff: How to be Instantly More Confident at Work
American AccentBusiness EnglishInterview EnglishUniversity Students
B24
Never Struggle with Small Talk Again | Easy Tips for Better Conversations
American AccentBusiness EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B23
Finance Expert: How You Talk About Money Matters Ft. Vivian Tu
American AccentBusiness EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B21
You’re Losing Respect Every Time You Say This
American AccentBusiness EnglishDaily ConversationWorking Adults
B22
THIS is How To Be Direct Without Hurting People | Jefferson Fisher
American AccentBusiness EnglishInterview EnglishDaily Conversation
B2How to Be Direct Without Sounding Rude
American AccentBusiness EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B2How Strong Communicators Handle Difficult Talks
American AccentBusiness EnglishInterview EnglishDaily Conversation
B23 Communication Truths That Will Change Every Conversation
American AccentBusiness EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B1what to say instead of staying silent
American AccentBusiness EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B1Be more direct.
American AccentBusiness EnglishDaily ConversationWorking Adults
FOR YOU
Aanbevolen Video
C11
127 zinnen
A Powerful Technique To Seduce & Influence Anyone: Robert Greene
Daily ConversationUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
C14
198 zinnen
Command Your Life: The Neuroscience of Self-Worth & Power
Daily ConversationUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
C13
83 zinnen
3 Books That Will Change Your Life
Daily ConversationUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
C11
127 zinnen
Leadership Has To Be Learned | Simon Sinek
Daily ConversationUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
C13
308 zinnen
The Most Eye Opening 20 Minutes Of Your Life | Jordan Peterson Motivation
Daily ConversationUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
C12
44 zinnen
4 Key Lessons from Women Who Run With The Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estés
Daily ConversationUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
C11
43 zinnen
everyone must watch
Daily ConversationWorking Adults
C12
327 zinnen
How to Control Yourself, Read People & Build Discipline | Chase Hughes
Daily ConversationUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
C11
259 zinnen
Talk Back: Why Arguing With Yourself Can Help You Flourish
Daily ConversationUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
C12
82 zinnen
The 4 inner voices that we have that sabotage us. @Dr.ShadeZahrai
Daily ConversationUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
C11
140 zinnen
Stop Playing Small. Go All In.
Daily ConversationUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
C111
208 zinnen
The Psychology of Power, Silence, and Self-Control! | Robert Greene
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
Woordenschat en spreektips bij deze les
Deze spreekles is gebaseerd op de video “Robert Greene: Why Nice People Lose Power & How To Fix It”. Deze video bevat 646 zinnen en 7236 woorden om na te spreken. Het gesproken deel duurt 44:12. De spreker praat in een natuurlijk tempo van ongeveer 164 woorden per minuut, dicht bij een alledaags gesprek. 87% van de woorden hoort bij de 3.000 meest gebruikte Engelse woorden, dus de woordenschat is goed te volgen.
Belangrijke woorden in deze video
15 woorden uit de video die het leren waard zijn, met uitspraak en betekenis:
| Woord | Uitspraak | Betekenis |
|---|---|---|
| manipulation zelfstandig naamwoord | /məˌnɪp.juˈleɪ.ʃən/ | manipulatie, gebruik |
| manipulate werkwoord | /məˈnɪp.jʊ.leɪt/ | manipuleren |
| monarch zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈmɑnɚk/ | monarch |
| necessarily bijwoord | /ˌnɛs.əˈsɛɹ.ə.li/ | nodig, noodzakelijk |
| strategic bijvoeglijk naamwoord | /stɹəˈti.dʒɪk/ | strategisch |
| warfare zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈwɔɹfɛɹ/ | krijgsvoering, oorlogvoering |
| ego zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈiɡoʊ/ | ego |
| naturally bijwoord | /ˈnæt͡ʃ.(ə.)ɹə.li/ | natuurlijk |
| suffer werkwoord | /ˈsʌfɚ/ | lijden |
| eighth bijvoeglijk naamwoord | /eɪtθ/ | achtste |
| naive bijvoeglijk naamwoord | /naɪˈiv/ | naïef, tegen beter weten in |
| innocent bijvoeglijk naamwoord | /ˈɪnəsənt/ | onnozel, onschuldig |
| define werkwoord | /dɪˈfaɪn/ | bepalen, determineren |
| neutral bijvoeglijk naamwoord | /ˈnuː.tɹəl/ | neutraal |
| wound zelfstandig naamwoord | /ˈwund/ | wonde, verwonding |
Phrasal verbs die je zult horen
| Woord | Uitspraak | Betekenis |
|---|---|---|
| back up werkwoord | teruggaan | |
| go back werkwoord | teruggaan | |
| go down werkwoord | afdalen | |
| look forward to werkwoord | uitkijken naar, zich verheugen op | |
| see through werkwoord | doorheen zien | |
| check out werkwoord | onderzoeken | |
| come out werkwoord | /ˌkʌm ˈaʊt/ | uitkomen |
| fall apart werkwoord | uiteenvallen, uit elkaar vallen |
Zinnen om te herhalen
Korte, volledige zinnen uit de video die je in alledaagse gesprekken kunt gebruiken:
- Robert, how would you define power?
- What does power mean to you?
- How do you find that communication and power intersect?
- Where did that come up for you?
- Why didn't they affect me?
Grammatica in deze video
De structuren die de spreker het meest gebruikt, met de exacte woorden uit de video:
| Structuur | In de video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect continuous have/has been + -ing — iets dat eerder begon en nog bezig is | They've been learning · they've been dealing · They've been doing |
| Present perfect have/has + voltooid deelwoord — iets uit het verleden dat nu nog telt | haven't heard · I've said · I've had |
| Lijdende vorm be + voltooid deelwoord — het gaat om wat er gebeurt, niet om wie het doet | can be used · be absorbed · are involved |
| Betrekkelijke bijzinnen who / which + zin — extra informatie over een persoon of ding | somebody who comes · those who haven · those who might |
Uitspraak om op te letten
De spreker gebruikt 245 samentrekkingen en verkorte vormen, zoals you're, I'm, they're. Spreek ze kort uit, zoals je ze hoort.
- De “th”-klanken: eighth /eɪtθ/, worthy /ˈwɝ.ði/, ethical /ˈɛθɪkəl/, thin /ˈθɪn/, bath /bɑːθ/
- De klanken “sh” en “zh”: manipulation /məˌnɪp.juˈleɪ.ʃən/, consciousness /ˈkɑnʃəsnəs/, nutrition /njuːˈtɹɪʃ.ən/, accomplish /əˈkɑm.plɪʃ/, sabotage /ˈsæb.əˌtɑʒ/
- Lange woorden — let op de klemtoon: manipulation /məˌnɪp.juˈleɪ.ʃən/, manipulate /məˈnɪp.jʊ.leɪt/, necessarily /ˌnɛs.əˈsɛɹ.ə.li/, naturally /ˈnæt͡ʃ.(ə.)ɹə.li/, terrorism /ˈtɛɹəɹɪzəm/
Klanken die Nederlandstaligen lastig vinden:
- Stemhebbende eindmedeklinker — /b/, /d/, /g/, /z/, /v/ niet verscherpen: naive /naɪˈiv/, wound /ˈwund/, absorb /æbˈsɔɹb/, percentage /pə(ɹ)ˈsɛntɪd͡ʒ/, colleague /ˈkɒliːɡ/
- /æ/ — opener dan de Nederlandse “e”: nasty /ˈnæs.ti/, naturally /ˈnæt͡ʃ.(ə.)ɹə.li/, absorb /æbˈsɔɹb/, mask /mæsk/, craft /ˈkɹæft/
- /g/ — een harde plofklank, geen Nederlandse “g”: ego /ˈiɡoʊ/, colleague /ˈkɒliːɡ/, glow /ɡloʊ/, argue /ˈɑɹ.ɡju/, anger /ˈæŋɡə/
Zo oefen je met deze video
- Luister de hele video één keer zonder te spreken en noteer de woorden die je niet kent.
- Begin op 0,75× snelheid, spreek zin voor zin na en ga terug naar normale snelheid zodra het makkelijk gaat.
- Neem jezelf op en vergelijk met het origineel; let daarbij op woorden als manipulation, manipulate, monarch.
Wat is de Shadowing-techniek?
Shadowing is een wetenschappelijk onderbouwde taalleermethode die oorspronkelijk is ontwikkeld voor professionele tolkentraining en gepopulariseerd door polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. De methode is eenvoudig maar krachtig: je luistert naar native Engelse audio en herhaalt het onmiddellijk hardop — als een schaduw die de spreker volgt met slechts 1–2 seconden vertraging. In tegenstelling tot passief luisteren of grammaticadrills, dwingt shadowing je hersenen en mondspieren om echte spraakpatronen tegelijkertijd te verwerken en te reproduceren. Onderzoek toont aan dat het de uitspraaknauwkeurigheid, intonatie, ritme, verbonden spraak, luisterbegrip en spreekvaardigheid aanzienlijk verbetert — waardoor het een van de meest effectieve methoden is voor IELTS Speaking-voorbereiding en echte Engelse communicatie.