TRIGGERnometry - Trump Is the Greatest At One Law Of Power — And It Could Destroy Him - Robert Greene

00:00:01.000 We have a hunger for something larger.

00:00:04.000 The other motivating factor is every human being

00:00:07.000 needs a degree of validation.

00:00:09.000 The sense that you don't have any power in your life

00:00:12.000 is deeply, deeply miserable for the human animal.

00:00:15.000 Where one person doesn't feel like they have the power,

00:00:19.000 but they don't feel strong enough to directly attack

00:00:23.000 or deal with the person, they become indirect.

00:00:25.000 They become passive-aggressive.

00:00:27.000 aggressive. If you don't have power, you're going to find it somehow, some way, in some

00:00:31.700 manner. You're going to do whatever you can to change that dynamic. When you look at Trump,

00:00:37.260 do you think that he's a man who uses these laws of power effectively? I know that he has a very

00:00:44.000 powerful character flaw, and the character flaw is going to constantly get in his way.

00:00:53.120 Robert, welcome to Trigonometry. Thank you for having me.

00:00:56.140 We've been keen to get you on the show for a long time, as you know. You've written

00:01:00.000 a large number of books exploring human nature, what motivates people in their actions,

00:01:06.360 the nature of power. And that's a fascinating subject.

00:01:11.900 What are the key things that motivate people to do what they do?

00:01:17.580 Well, it's complicated, obviously. But people obviously want power.

00:01:25.560 that's why I wrote my first book. I mentioned, I speculate or believe that the sense that you

00:01:31.820 don't have any power in your life, any control over any influence, over your spouse, over your

00:01:38.000 children, over your friends, over your colleagues, over your boss, is deeply, deeply miserable for

00:01:43.820 the human animal. So we want to be able to have a sense, a feeling that we have some power over

00:01:50.420 our environment over the people around us now you can get power in various ways you can use

00:01:56.340 manipulation you can play a softer more seductive game but it is my opinion that a great majority

00:02:04.660 of people's behavior and actions are motivated by this desire to feel like there's a degree of

00:02:10.420 control over their environment okay and if you deny that need if you can't seem to get it if

00:02:16.660 if you don't have that power in your life,

00:02:18.760 if you feel powerless,

00:02:20.700 you can turn to some very negative forms of behavior.

00:02:24.400 So I try to say that to be able to understand the game of power,

00:02:28.440 to be able to feel like you can control people,

00:02:31.780 you can influence them, you can move them in your direction,

00:02:34.720 will save you a lot of energy in life,

00:02:36.840 save you a lot of drama,

00:02:38.240 save you a lot of self-loathing

00:02:40.500 and all kinds of bad patterns that you can fall into.

00:02:43.580 The other motivating factor is every human being

00:02:46.560 needs a degree of validation. We're a social animal. Our idea of existence as an individual

00:02:55.960 is kind of a myth, it's sort of an illusion. We are social animals. Everything we think

00:03:01.000 is reflected through the eyes of other people, right? And so if people are alone, if they're

00:03:07.700 isolated, their kind of sense of being a human being can dissolve, can fall apart.

00:03:13.160 So we can't get validation or attention or love from ourselves.

00:03:18.300 We need it from other people.

00:03:20.580 So the sense of getting recognition, people validating you for your experience,

00:03:25.660 for being who you are, is a deeply, deeply powerful motivating factor in human nature.

00:03:31.260 I mean, these are generalizations.

00:03:33.540 There are other things we can go into, but those, I would say, would be the two main things.

00:03:37.560 And I'm not an expert on this, obviously, but I imagine, would it be fair to say there's a 0.88

00:03:42.400 significant gender divide on how this manifests itself? Men operate in a slightly different way 0.83

00:03:47.900 to women on this, or no? You're shaking your head. Well, I believe the desire, obviously,

00:03:52.920 for validation and recognition and attention crosses all gender barriers. I do believe power

00:03:59.820 is the same. How men and women get power, how they feel towards it, is different. Of course,

00:04:06.640 that changes some men are more like women some women are more like men but women tend to have

00:04:13.440 a more sort of social approach to power right which often can make them better leaders in some 0.96

00:04:19.200 ways they're more sensitive to what other people are feeling what other people are thinking

00:04:24.800 which in some ways makes them a more powerful person in the power game the way it is 1.00

00:04:29.840 in 2026 but oftentimes and as once again we're generalizing women aren't so comfortable with 1.00

00:04:37.680 the hard game of power with the manipulating part with the deception part which is an elemental 1.00

00:04:43.840 part of it there's a hard part of power there's the hard game there's the soft game women are 0.93

00:04:49.520 excellent at the soft game and sometimes they're a little bit intimidated by the hard game now as 1.00

00:04:54.080 As I said, that can change from individual to individual.

00:04:58.180 But like my wife, for instance, she's a film director.

00:05:02.840 And it's a brutal, brutal business.

00:05:05.880 It is perhaps one of the most Machiavellian environments you can be in.

00:05:09.780 Comparable to the music industry, which is probably worse, right?

00:05:14.680 And she's a very sensitive person.

00:05:17.260 I'm a very sensitive person.

00:05:18.880 But she's very sensitive.

00:05:20.020 And it's very difficult for her handling some of the games that people are playing with her, right?

00:05:26.860 So of my books, her favorite, because we've been together throughout all of my books, is The War Book, oddly enough.

00:05:35.700 Because that has helped her a lot in dealing with the film business and dealing with all of the kind of weird things that people...

00:05:41.960 Because directing a film is like being a general in an army.

00:05:45.940 You know, you've got 40, 50 people, you've got a lead, right?

00:05:49.080 And it's incredibly complicated and difficult.

00:05:52.300 So she found the war book very helpful.

00:05:55.060 So I believe that the need for power, the desire for control,

00:06:00.900 the desire to be able to not be vulnerable to everything that people are doing to you,

00:06:07.260 to not feel weak, crosses all ethnic, all barriers.

00:06:11.880 How you get that, that could be different depending on individuals.

00:06:15.160 And Robert, social media must have changed that enormously because power now comes with having a large social media account. If you've got a large social media account, that means that you can influence, you can change the way people think, you can put your message out there, you can create things that were previously unimaginable, certain political movements, etc.

00:06:42.220 Do the laws of power change when it meets the social media age?

00:06:46.040 Well, you can also deceive and manipulate on a grand scale.

00:06:50.240 No, human nature is human nature.

00:06:52.080 Look, we evolved from our ancestors, you can go back millions of years,

00:06:57.580 but let's say Homo sapiens 100,000, 500,000, 50,000 years ago.

00:07:03.580 Our brains are wired a particular way.

00:07:06.760 I wrote a very thick book, I'm afraid to say 600 pages, on the laws of human nature.

00:07:12.420 These go back to our earliest ancestors.

00:07:15.040 We all feel envy, right?

00:07:17.300 We all have an irrational side.

00:07:19.340 We all tend to be self-absorbed.

00:07:21.880 All that social media does is it accentuates all of those qualities in human nature.

00:07:27.280 It makes them worse.

00:07:28.760 It makes them more extreme.

00:07:30.720 So if I know what everybody in the world is doing right now,

00:07:34.640 If all my friends are, I see all their photographs of their wonderful holidays they're taking,

00:07:40.400 their men, the beautiful women they're dating, all the fabulous things going on in their lives

00:07:44.980 because people curate their social media.

00:07:47.300 They don't let you know of all terrible, boring, banal things in their life.

00:07:51.420 Envy.

00:07:51.920 I feel envy.

00:07:53.400 Social media is this machine for creating vast amounts of envy, right?

00:07:58.200 Also for creating irrationality.

00:08:00.240 So the laws of power of human nature don't change.

00:08:04.640 It's just that the tools that they're giving us make it easier for us to manipulate, to deceive,

00:08:10.920 to create impressions and images. One of the laws of power is court attention at all costs,

00:08:17.300 right? Now, you know, you can court attention. I can think of some examples.

00:08:22.020 Yeah. You just have much more power to be able to do that. But I can't think of anything of a new

00:08:29.320 law that I would write based on social media. If you could tell me one, I'd be happy to

00:08:33.840 consider it. But, um, I think one of the things that social media has done, and look, this has

00:08:41.400 always been true, but we now see more and more people obsessed with appearing to be a good

00:08:49.700 person, to be moral, to be virtuous in the way that I didn't see as much in the nineties before

00:08:55.640 social media. I saw it because I was raised Catholic. So I saw the priests and the people

00:09:00.700 who worked in the church and saw some people on a Sunday wishing to appear holier than now.

00:09:06.020 But now it seems that's the game everyone's playing.

00:09:10.140 Yeah. Well, power is mostly about appearances, right? It's managing your appearances so you

00:09:19.240 seem powerful. Now, you can feel powerful, but it's more important to appear powerful.

00:09:24.380 This is a very Machiavellian concept, okay?

00:09:27.800 So always say less than necessary, law number four, right?

00:09:33.100 A powerful person, if they talk a lot, they appear kind of weak.

00:09:37.140 They don't feel, you don't look like you're in control of yourself, right? 1.00

00:09:41.160 You're talking too much, you're going to say something stupid. 0.99

00:09:44.180 So power is a game of managing the appearances because we're a social animal. 1.00

00:09:49.680 I don't judge you on, I can't see your character.

00:09:53.260 I can't see deep inside of you.

00:09:55.220 I can't read your thoughts.

00:09:57.360 I can see how you look, how you appear.

00:09:59.840 If I appear to be a certain thing, if I appear to be virtuous and good, you're going to judge

00:10:05.040 me as someone who's virtuous and good. 0.81

00:10:07.000 You don't know that deep down inside, I'm actually a really nasty, evil, Machiavellian 0.74

00:10:11.720 character.

00:10:12.600 This isn't, I'm not talking about myself personally here, right?

00:10:16.160 So social media gives you this tremendous power to curate your own appearance, how people

00:10:21.980 see you, how people judge you. And you're going to put out the things that are going to get

00:10:26.860 positive attention, right? Like you're virtuous, like you're in favor of all of the great causes.

00:10:32.200 Or nowadays that you're actually kind of so authentically angry and you're full of rage.

00:10:39.040 And, you know, you can be a bit nasty and people can even admire you for nastiness.

00:10:44.380 But it's an invisible realm. I can't see all of the people who are emailing me.

00:10:50.140 they present this certain facade about who they are or on my Instagram feed or whatever.

00:10:56.800 I can't really see who they are. And that gives them tremendous power to create these kinds of

00:11:01.960 impressions. It's a very, very dangerous world because it's not real. In flesh, when I see you

00:11:11.840 two, I can get a feel for who you are. I can see that you're nice people. I can see the humanity.

00:11:19.040 You can tell we've only just met.

00:11:21.040 Exactly.

00:11:22.040 I'm speculating.

00:11:23.040 I'm generalizing.

00:11:25.040 You know, I get a sense because we're animals, after all.

00:11:31.040 I mean, I know that we're animals.

00:11:33.040 I don't think there's a disagreement there.

00:11:35.040 We have a feel for what people are.

00:11:38.040 We can sense their energy.

00:11:39.040 We can sense their nonverbal cues.

00:11:42.040 We can sense if they are a tricky, deceptive person, we can see through it.

00:11:48.040 And so on the internet, you can't see any of that, right?

00:11:51.700 It's very deceptive, and it can be very troublesome.

00:11:54.980 And it's creating a lot of mental illness right now, I believe.

00:11:59.480 This thing that you and Francis have just been talking about is a thread that runs through a lot of your work,

00:12:04.300 which is the idea that what people present and what they are is different and necessarily so in some ways.

00:12:12.980 And I don't know if you've watched Game of Thrones,

00:12:16.940 But there's a scene in which this kind of conversation about power is shown very well in an interesting way,

00:12:23.900 where there's a character whose primary access to power is through knowledge and spying, Peter Baelish.

00:12:29.480 And he's arguing with Queen Cersei, and he says, knowledge is power.

00:12:33.380 And she gets her four armed guards to almost kill him, and she says, power is power.

00:12:39.960 So where is the balance between those two points of view?

00:12:43.140 but where's the truth rather is what i'm actually trying to ask where's the truth between those two

00:12:48.200 things because you mentioned appearing powerful is more important even than being powerful whereas

00:12:52.920 what she's saying is actually no being powerful ultimately at the end of the day is the thing

00:12:57.220 that determines how much power you have a quick word from our sponsor avocado green mattress

00:13:02.380 they make certified organic mattresses pillows and solid wood furniture no unnecessary chemicals

00:13:08.320 No cutting corners, just thoughtfully made products designed to support better sleep.

00:13:13.560 I'll be honest with you, I've never really thought that hard about what I sleep on.

00:13:17.380 It's one of those purchases you make once, convince yourself it's fine, and then just never revisit.

00:13:22.420 But the logic doesn't really hold up when you examine it.

00:13:25.320 You spend more time on your mattress than almost anything else you own.

00:13:29.500 The quality of what it's made from and how well it actually supports you has a direct effect on how you feel every day.

00:13:36.320 What I like about Avocado is that they've built something that's the opposite of that.

00:13:41.160 They focus on quality and craftsmanship over volume.

00:13:44.640 Certified organic materials, solid construction,

00:13:47.560 products that are made rather than just manufactured and assembled as fast as possible.

00:13:52.520 That distinction matters more than it sounds.

00:13:55.120 When something's made with certified organic materials,

00:13:58.800 it's not just a marketing claim.

00:14:00.460 It means better breathability, better support.

00:14:03.200 Fewer things in your home that probably shouldn't be there.

00:14:06.760 Avocado products are made, not manufactured.

00:14:09.880 Thoughtfully crafted with real materials to deliver lasting comfort and support.

00:14:14.240 Go to avocadogreenmattress.com slash trigger to check out their mattress and furniture sale.

00:14:20.020 That's avocadogreenmattress.com slash trigger.

00:14:24.360 avocadogreenmattress.com slash trigger.

00:14:28.260 Well, they both go together.

00:14:30.660 I mean, if you try to pretend that you're a godlike creature, that you have all this power,

00:14:37.200 but you have nothing behind you, you're going to be exposed, right?

00:14:41.120 So it depends on where you are in life and how people will view you.

00:14:48.680 But, you know, if I appear to be confident, so let's take confidence as a very important

00:14:58.140 component in the power game, right? So if I convince myself that I am powerful, that I am

00:15:07.280 confident, that I am worthy of attention and getting things that I want, it creates this kind

00:15:14.140 of self-fulfilling dynamic. People read off of you that you're confident, and they assume that

00:15:20.040 it comes from something real. And so you can get power just by creating this facade, right? And it

00:15:27.480 be very real i think of someone like elon musk okay who's you know we can just say whatever we

00:15:34.600 want about him but he's very brilliant at the marketing side of things right so here he is

00:15:40.680 he's got tesla motor company which has just started out and to start your own automobile company is

00:15:48.600 incredibly difficult it requires an awful lot of capital okay and you're starting a new kind you

00:15:54.600 you know, electric cars, etc. And so he creates this myth that he is this incredibly innovative,

00:16:03.660 forward-thinking person. I'm not saying it's completely unreal, but he creates this myth,

00:16:08.360 this aura around him. That aura now creates this dynamic where people want to fund his company.

00:16:16.780 He goes public and he gets massive amounts of capital from the aura, the appearance he creates

00:16:22.720 of somebody who is very future oriented that appearance translates into millions billions

00:16:29.760 of dollars coming into his company from his stock right which now allows him to build the company

00:16:36.800 to make it more powerful so the appearance of power can draw power to you now you know if somebody

00:16:44.240 has a gun and you're pretending to be something that you're not of them they can go ahead and 0.97

00:16:47.920 shoot you. Yeah, of course, they're the ones in control. It's very important. I talk to this a 0.78

00:16:55.020 lot about people. What is your leverage in a situation, right? If you have no leverage over

00:17:00.980 somebody, then you have no power. So in all negotiations and things like that, you have to

00:17:06.500 make this kind of calculation of, this is where I do have actual real power. It's not bullshit. 0.90

00:17:12.700 and these are things that I can leverage. So one thing that's very important in that kind of

00:17:18.060 situation is to be willing to walk away, to say that there's a limit, I'm only going to go this

00:17:25.380 far, and I'm going to blow the whole thing up. And if I walk away, fine, I don't care.

00:17:31.760 That gives you power, that gives you leverage. So leverage can be something that's very

00:17:35.380 psychological. But I don't know if I'm answering your question.

00:17:38.420 No, you absolutely are answering my question, and it's a fascinating answer.

00:17:41.560 Sorry, I've got a little convoluted there.

00:17:43.160 No, no, not at all.

00:17:44.280 I think smart people will be able to follow exactly what you said there,

00:17:47.660 which is that there are situations...

00:17:49.540 I don't know if I could follow what I just said.

00:17:51.260 Well, I certainly thought that I could.

00:17:55.060 I think the point you're making is there are certain situations

00:17:57.860 in which confidence and the presentation of power

00:18:02.400 attracts things that actually make you powerful,

00:18:04.820 but there's also other situations

00:18:06.180 where if you don't have the hard leverage that you need,

00:18:08.860 then you can't get any further because the other person has leveled a job.

00:18:12.440 It makes perfect sense to me.

00:18:14.140 Most people think they're informed.

00:18:16.420 In reality, they're selectively informed.

00:18:18.660 Modern media doesn't just tell stories.

00:18:20.820 It quietly decides which ones you never hear about at all.

00:18:24.180 That's why I use Ground News.

00:18:26.080 It's the only app that compares how the same story is covered across the political spectrum

00:18:30.600 and show you what whole audiences are not being told.

00:18:33.800 The Blindspot feed is one of my favorite features.

00:18:36.260 Every day, it flags upwards of 20 stories that are being ignored either by the left or the right.

00:18:41.360 Follow along at ground.news slash trigonometry.

00:18:43.920 Take this story.

00:18:44.800 A major U.S. poll found that Republican voters' confidence in Trump's economic leadership

00:18:49.060 has dropped sharply during his second term.

00:18:51.660 That is not a minor data point.

00:18:53.420 If you only read right-leaning publications, you would have missed this completely.

00:18:57.280 On the other hand, look at this.

00:18:58.900 The UAE drops UK from scholarship list over radicalization concerns on university campuses.

00:19:04.460 That's a significant story.

00:19:05.720 Yet, coverage from left-leaning outlets was almost non-existent.

00:19:09.160 Ground News puts all of this in one place.

00:19:11.360 Headlines, bias breakdowns, ownership, and context.

00:19:14.620 So you can actually understand what's going on, not just react to what you're told.

00:19:19.180 Go to ground.news slash trigonometry to get 40% off their unlimited vantage plan.

00:19:24.200 The same one we use.

00:19:25.560 And stop being managed by the media.

00:19:28.200 You always have some kind of leverage.

00:19:31.320 You know, there's always something you can do.

00:19:33.100 you can always take a little bit of the power that you have and you can use it in some way.

00:19:38.920 And we're talking in abstractions, but when people come to me with problems in a situation

00:19:44.220 like this, where they don't feel like they have power, I always try and step back and analyze.

00:19:49.920 You do have power. There is something you can do. You have leverage. It's small,

00:19:53.820 but you can use it. Can you give us an example of that?

00:19:56.440 Well, so they have, you know, the company or the people that are above you, they control it, they own what you're doing, right? Okay. But if you have the attitude, simply the attitude that I'm going to walk away from this whole project, right? It doesn't mean that much to me.

00:20:21.240 all right you're playing all of these games you're using all of this power on me

00:20:26.360 I feel kind of weak in comparison to you but I'm not going to show that I'm going to say look

00:20:32.280 I don't care anymore I'm walking away I'm finished I don't want to deal with this project anymore

00:20:37.800 they have invested a lot of time and energy in it as well right and they don't feel like you're

00:20:45.040 somebody who will do that but if you show them that at some point it doesn't matter to you

00:20:50.860 that you don't care about the money.

00:20:53.680 This is a negotiating play.

00:20:55.240 You do care about the money,

00:20:56.660 but you're presenting this,

00:20:58.240 I don't care about it.

00:21:00.000 It's worth it.

00:21:00.820 It's not worth it to me to do exactly what you want.

00:21:03.800 It's more important for me to feel like I have integrity.

00:21:07.240 I'm walking away.

00:21:08.360 I don't care.

00:21:08.960 Goodbye.

00:21:10.100 At that moment, even though you don't feel it,

00:21:13.500 you actually feel like, 0.98

00:21:14.620 Jesus, shit, I don't want to lose this project. 0.90

00:21:17.000 If you project that, 0.99

00:21:18.780 they're suddenly back on their heels.

00:21:20.080 they're going, hmm, I didn't see that in you. Well, we've invested a lot. All right. Well,

00:21:25.820 we don't want to blow this whole thing up. So maybe we'll give in on a couple of small points

00:21:30.960 and that's all that you're after. So in these situations, you have to be clear about who has

00:21:39.420 the power, what the dynamic is, what your leverage is, and what your goal is in the end.

00:21:44.840 So if they are imposing on you all of the control

00:21:49.340 and they're trying to mess with you

00:21:51.640 and trying to push you around,

00:21:53.820 you want to get them to back off a little bit, right?

00:21:56.680 That's all you want.

00:21:58.280 And by showing that you don't care

00:21:59.920 that you're willing to walk away from it,

00:22:02.120 that gives you power and control.

00:22:03.620 I watched this when I wrote a book with 50 Cent,

00:22:07.900 the rapper called The 50th Law, right?

00:22:10.480 And he told me this is his ploy all the time.

00:22:13.880 He appears completely uninterested in some deal somebody's going to make, even though he's very

00:22:19.460 interested, right? And the appearance of not really caring makes them, puts them on their

00:22:26.440 heels. They go, hmm, well, maybe we have to try harder to please 50. Maybe we have to give him

00:22:32.140 more of what he wants. That's all he's after, right? It's a negotiating ploy. So the sense that

00:22:37.620 You're signaling to the other side that you can walk away, that it's not so important to you.

00:22:47.280 It's a very powerful appearance to give.

00:22:49.800 It can give you power, even though you don't have any power.

00:22:53.900 That's the magical thing about playing the game according to what I wrote in that book.

00:22:59.380 You may not have any power at all in this world, but if you know how to use these small little things,

00:23:04.860 You can take what is your weakness and you can turn it into strength.

00:23:09.460 Very interesting.

00:23:10.260 And just coming back to the example you gave about people within working on a particular project

00:23:14.860 and have their different agendas, playing all these games.

00:23:17.740 Why do people do that?

00:23:18.920 Because, like, for example, Francis and I, we run this YouTube channel.

00:23:23.140 It's a small business.

00:23:23.980 We employ people, whatever.

00:23:25.560 What we found is the best game to play is a collaborative game

00:23:29.120 where the mission is more important than the people involved.

00:23:32.900 You seem skeptical now.

00:23:34.860 Well, I mean, I want to introduce you guys to the real world, okay?

00:23:38.540 Please do.

00:23:39.140 The real world doesn't operate according to your ideal little utopia,

00:23:42.760 which is a beautiful ideal, and I don't knock it at all.

00:23:46.180 People have egos.

00:23:47.960 They are political.

00:23:49.440 This is the human animal as it is.

00:23:51.720 It's not something I've just dreamed up.

00:23:54.300 Sure, of course.

00:23:55.080 Right?

00:23:55.600 So you'll be in a company.

00:23:57.440 I worked for a company years ago before I wrote books,

00:24:00.060 a television company, a terrible television show.

00:24:04.460 I wouldn't even tell you the name of it.

00:24:05.840 I was a researcher on it, right?

00:24:08.560 Okay.

00:24:09.660 The researcher, you were considered successful

00:24:13.060 by how many stories you actually found that got made.

00:24:17.380 I had the highest percentage of this team

00:24:19.720 of a dozen researchers by far, but then I got fired.

00:24:23.900 Why did I get fired?

00:24:25.660 Because I was too good at the job.

00:24:27.920 I wasn't playing the political game.

00:24:29.700 I wasn't brown-nosing, sorry, that expression,

00:24:31.840 with the boss, right? I had a bit of an attitude, but the results, who the fuck cares about 0.99

00:24:39.140 my attitude? I gave you results and yet I was fired because of people's stupid, stupid egos 1.00

00:24:46.120 and stupid political games that they play. They don't care about results. They care about how 1.00

00:24:51.700 they feel about themselves, about their ego, about how people think about them. That's more

00:24:56.420 important than results. And this crosses the line in business, in warfare. General Patton,

00:25:04.740 the great American general who had some of his own issues and problems,

00:25:08.640 he was kind of sidelined from the war effort in World War II because he was kind of abrasive

00:25:15.060 and difficult. He was going, but man, I marched through Sicily. I marched through Italy. I

00:25:19.920 defeated the Nazis here and there. What difference does it make? Well, no, even in warfare, he got 0.65

00:25:25.140 sideline because he wasn't playing the political game in entertainment, in law, in business,

00:25:30.740 in government, in sports. I can give you examples because I deal with a lot of athletes and managers

00:25:37.140 and coaches who come to me with their problems. This goes through sports. It goes through

00:25:41.280 everything. It's a theme through everything. So you two, I love the fact that you collaborate,

00:25:46.540 but I can guarantee if you bought a third person in that you were working with,

00:25:50.960 all of a sudden sort of egos and political games will start emerging.

00:25:55.300 Maybe not, but probably, because that is human nature.

00:26:00.360 And I think it's also maybe a question of scale.

00:26:02.600 I think I remember reading something.

00:26:03.920 I don't remember the name of this concept,

00:26:05.520 but once a business gets beyond a certain number of team members,

00:26:10.140 that's when people start caring more about their position

00:26:13.520 in the hierarchy than the mission,

00:26:15.720 which is why maybe it's good to keep things small

00:26:18.200 where that collaborative attitude is possible.

00:26:20.340 Yeah, definitely, definitely. I mean, obviously, the larger the group, the more the politics

00:26:26.380 arrive, the more egos that are involved. But even among two people, even in a couple,

00:26:33.420 a married couple, power games are being played.

00:26:36.700 Oh, yeah. Well, thank God we're not married.

00:26:40.480 You know, people feel like, well, you know, I'm having to do all the chores and you're not doing

00:26:45.900 so much. I don't feel like I have as much power in this relationship. So you put two people

00:26:52.020 together. It doesn't have to be a thousand. You're going to get these egos clashing because that's

00:26:58.580 who we are. And it's fascinating talking about power because I love Greek myths and I love

00:27:05.880 Shakespeare. And a lot of Shakespeare's plays are about the lust for power and how ultimately it

00:27:12.140 destroys you, think about Macbeth, for example. At what point does the desire for power ultimately

00:27:18.540 become self-sabotaging? Well, you know, a lot of the laws that I talked about in the book are about

00:27:27.880 knowing your limits. Like, so Law 47, I believe, is in victory, know when to stop, right? So you

00:27:35.480 can go too far. And when it becomes the fact, look, power is, we're a social animal. It's a

00:27:42.800 people's game, right? If you offend too many people, if you make so many enemies, it's going

00:27:49.240 to come back and hurt you in the end. You're not going to get very far, right? So if you have this

00:27:54.320 attitude where I'm going to screw everybody around me, I'm just going to manipulate them, I'm going

00:27:57.880 to control them, I'm going to push them around, you can get away with it for a while while you

00:28:02.420 have power. But the moment that power starts to diminish, we see this in history all of the time,

00:28:09.360 you know, suddenly people turn against you. You know, it caused the French Revolution,

00:28:13.340 for God's sake. You know, when people smell that a powerful person who's been evil and pushing

00:28:19.380 people around is now in a slightly weakened position, oh my God, they all turn into lines

00:28:24.420 and they pounce on you because they hate you, right? You can go too far. So power is a game

00:28:30.520 of getting people on your side

00:28:32.800 and they don't even realize why they're on your side, right?

00:28:35.920 That's the seduction part of the game.

00:28:38.360 But if you're pushing everyone around

00:28:40.780 and we're seeing this in American politics right now, right?

00:28:46.420 I mean, Donald Trump is screwing all of these other leaders.

00:28:50.000 Look what he's doing to European leaders and NATO. 0.95

00:28:52.640 He's humiliating them.

00:28:54.200 And now he's asking them to help him out

00:28:57.360 in this war with Iran and they're giving him the finger.

00:28:59.540 obviously in their own way because look you know you've offended us you've humiliated us

00:29:06.340 you want our help you're not going to get it and so power is a game of of using your allies of

00:29:12.640 creating as many allies as possible you can go just if you go so far where you alienate

00:29:18.020 everybody around you then the game will turn against you it's delicate it's a delicate game

00:29:24.640 It's a great point because you look at Trump and his greatest weapon, I think, is his sense of humor.

00:29:31.260 Sense of humor?

00:29:32.420 His sense of humor is that whenever he's in a position where it looks like he's on the back foot, he's very sharp with a quick comeback.

00:29:43.180 He makes people laugh.

00:29:44.540 Laughter resets the room.

00:29:46.040 People momentarily lose where they are.

00:29:48.560 And then he can pivot out of it.

00:29:51.220 And the humor is great.

00:29:53.640 The problem is with humor is that, invariably, there needs to be a victim.

00:29:57.960 So whilst it can appeal to your base, it can also antagonize the victim of your punchline.

00:30:03.620 Right, right.

00:30:04.500 And it's really interesting to see that dynamic.

00:30:07.800 What do you make of that, the use of humor, and particularly when it comes to power and being powerful?

00:30:13.960 well um what's important so a huge motivating factor among the human animal is envy our brains

00:30:25.400 operate through comparison that's how the human brain operates we take in information and we

00:30:30.840 compare it to other pieces of information and we go this is what this means it's a machine our

00:30:36.720 minds are machines for comparing things right and we do the same with other people we're constantly

00:30:43.500 comparing ourselves to others, right? Does that person have more power? Why is she making more

00:30:49.020 money than me? Why does he have more respect than me? Constantly, I have it, everybody has it,

00:30:54.720 it's natural, right? Okay, so when you're a powerful person, people envy you, they envy your

00:31:03.060 power. Having a sense of humor, a self-deprecating sense of humor is very powerful, because it kind

00:31:11.680 of can lessen that envy that people have. And I mentioned in my power book and other books

00:31:18.520 of figures like that who had that kind of self-deprecating humor. Abraham Lincoln was

00:31:24.000 sort of a master of it. It makes you human. You can make fun of yourself. The problem is Donald

00:31:30.220 Trump never makes fun of himself. His humor is at the expense of other people, right? And that can

00:31:36.360 wear on others. It can appeal to those who have that kind of slight cruel streak to them,

00:31:43.140 to those who hate all the wokeness. And I can understand that a bit as well.

00:31:49.100 But he never makes fun of himself. And that is a different kind of humor. It's always at the

00:31:57.360 expense of other people. And I think eventually that can wear very thin.

00:32:01.120 And when you look at Trump, do you think that he's a man who uses these laws of power effectively?

00:32:08.620 Or is somebody who is ultimately setting himself up for a fall?

00:32:14.340 Well, I don't have a crystal ball. I'm not Nostradamus. I don't know what's going to happen

00:32:20.380 in the next few years. But I know that he has a very powerful character flaw. And the character

00:32:27.060 of law is going to constantly get in his way. So he's absolutely brilliant at one law of power.

00:32:35.980 It's the source of all of his power. And I can't think of anybody in history who's ever been better

00:32:41.140 at it. Court attention at all costs. Law number six, right? I remember years ago, not years ago,

00:32:50.700 eight years ago or so, I was traveling. I think I was in Singapore. Everybody was talking about

00:32:56.560 Donald Trump. Everyone around the world is obsessed with him. I'm obsessed with him. He's in my head

00:33:01.940 all of the time, right? He courts attention at all costs. He's brilliant at that. He knows how to turn

00:33:09.140 everything that looks like a negative into some kind of marketing and publicity thing. He knows

00:33:14.620 he's very, very good at the attention game, not just at getting attention, but how to use that

00:33:21.080 attention to his advantage, okay? That has brought him a lot of power. But there is a limit to that

00:33:29.800 because that isn't enough, that isn't power by itself, right? And so one of the most important

00:33:38.160 things in the power game, as I say, it's a delicate game, is the ability to think ahead,

00:33:44.520 plan all the way to the end, which is law, sorry, 28 or something like that. Plan all the way to

00:33:50.300 the head and think not just this move, this immediate move, but two, three, four, five moves

00:33:57.020 in advance like you do in chess. If you're a good chess player, you're 10 moves ahead further than

00:34:02.600 your opponent is, right? Okay. It's an extremely important part of power because it means you see

00:34:09.440 the longer vision. And when things start interrupting your vision, when all kinds of

00:34:13.800 circumstances arise that you hadn't expected, you know how to deal with it because, oh, this is my

00:34:20.480 end game. And if this occurs, well, I go, I tack a little bit in this direction, but eventually

00:34:26.080 I have to head here. It gives you strength. It gives you this kind of anchor in life, right?

00:34:32.660 This is a man, because of his character, because of his ego, because of his extreme narcissism,

00:34:39.000 I'm not trying to be political here because I think everybody sees his incredible narcissism,

00:34:45.020 right? He can't get out of the moment. He can't get out of how people are reacting against him.

00:34:51.520 He can't get out of his rage, his resentment, his anger, his bitterness, and see the bigger

00:34:57.240 picture. If he came into power in 2025 and he moderated some of the things that he ended up

00:35:04.120 doing, right? If he was more attentive to the larger picture, that his power base, he brought

00:35:12.340 in Latinos, Black people, people who weren't part of the Republican base ever before. If he moderated,

00:35:19.460 if he was smart, if he could think ahead, he would be doing really well right now. He'd be very

00:35:24.060 popular. Unfortunately, he would be, right? But he can't think that far ahead. He can only think

00:35:30.960 in immediate terms. This person insulted me. Well, I have to humiliate him. I have to try and

00:35:36.460 sue him and get him put in prison, right? He can't see the larger picture. And that is a very,

00:35:43.460 very limiting factor in power. I don't know. He's like a cat with nine lives. He keeps escaping

00:35:50.000 things and you think he's done. He's finished. He pops out of another bag and he's fine.

00:35:55.920 I think that eventually it's going to catch up with him. But as I said, I don't know.

00:36:01.920 We get asked this all the time. Which VPN do you use at Trigonometry?

00:36:07.200 The answer is simply CyberGhost VPN. CyberGhost isn't some fringe tool.

00:36:12.800 It has 38 million users and over 20,000 five-star reviews on Trustpilot,

00:36:19.440 which frankly is rare for any tech product, let alone a VPN.

00:36:23.840 CyberGhost encrypts your internet traffic, which means your provider, your employer,

00:36:28.160 your school or anyone else on public Wi-Fi cannot see what you're doing online. It routes your

00:36:34.260 connection through secure servers in 100 countries, hides your IP address, and keeps no logs at all

00:36:40.100 so your activity isn't being tracked or stored. On top of that, it unlocks regional content from

00:36:45.800 40 streaming platforms like Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Disney Plus. And it works on up to seven

00:36:51.720 devices at once. Phones, laptops, tablets, even your smart TV. You can share it with your family

00:36:58.120 if you want. We rely on it when we're traveling for the show because it's simple, fast, and it

00:37:02.640 just works. Right now, you can get CyberGhost for about two bucks a month with four months free,

00:37:09.240 a 45-day money-back guarantee, and 24-7 support. That's protection for your browsing data and

00:37:16.820 access to blocked content online for two bucks a month, totally risk-free. To grab the offer,

00:37:22.880 go to cyber ghost vpn.com slash trigonometry or click the link in the description of this episode

00:37:28.700 it's completely risk-free so check it out today i want to come back to something you said at the

00:37:34.900 beginning because i think it ties potentially with politics as well which is you mentioned

00:37:39.300 that when people feel like they have no power there is a whole swath of negative behaviors that

00:37:45.400 they can exhibit um and we see on both sides i would argue the political spectrum people who

00:37:51.680 feel like they have no power, burning things down, you know, burning things down, metaphorically

00:37:58.340 speaking, wanting to tear down the certain things about the society they live in. What happens when

00:38:04.520 people feel at the individual level, but also the collective level, that they don't have the power

00:38:09.860 that they want or should? Well, you can't deal with that feeling, right? It's unbearable. So

00:38:19.180 you're going to try and get power some way that you can. On the individual level, you'll find

00:38:25.880 people play, and I talked about this in the book, negative power games. They'll become passive

00:38:32.160 aggressive. That happens a lot in individual, in relationships, where one person doesn't feel like

00:38:40.880 they have the power, but they don't feel strong enough to directly attack or deal with the person.

00:38:46.780 they become indirect, they become passive aggressive.

00:38:49.980 We're British, you don't have to explain that to us.

00:38:52.160 Okay.

00:38:53.340 National passive.

00:38:54.560 Yeah, sorry.

00:38:55.800 Well, Americans can be very passive.

00:38:57.360 Yeah, you're true, you're right.

00:38:59.140 Okay, so when you feel like you have no power,

00:39:02.960 you'll turn, won't be aggressive,

00:39:04.820 you'll be passive aggressive, right?

00:39:07.700 On a collective level,

00:39:10.660 I mean, we can see countries around the world

00:39:14.520 that have felt disrespected and screwed

00:39:18.140 and feel like they've been humiliated on the world stage.

00:39:22.800 And it creates a kind of a similar dynamic

00:39:25.820 to the passive aggressiveness.

00:39:27.760 Well, we're gonna get back at you some way.

00:39:30.260 You can't control this completely.

00:39:33.120 And even to some degree,

00:39:36.500 I mean, this is maybe a horrible way to put it, 0.99

00:39:39.120 but like with Iran right now,

00:39:40.820 You know, they obviously don't have the power that the United States military has, but they can certainly be very passive-aggressive.

00:39:51.060 I mean, it's not really passive, but they can be very indirect.

00:39:54.360 They can very, when you're weak, this is the whole origin of guerrilla warfare and terrorism, right?

00:40:02.400 And guerrilla warfare is one of the most powerful strategies ever invented in military history.

00:40:09.120 It's one side that has no power, but they use their lack of power to torment and torture the

00:40:16.660 other side. And they don't, as the phrase goes, the weaker side doesn't have to win,

00:40:23.380 they just have to survive. And so, you know, they'll play games like that. But if you don't

00:40:28.800 have power, you're going to find it somehow, some way, in some manner. You're going to do

00:40:32.900 whatever you can to change that dynamic. Well, it's interesting you mention the

00:40:38.800 geopolitical side of it, because I would argue from direct experience in Russia and also from

00:40:46.920 history that I know, that whipping up or at least addressing, and those both can be true,

00:40:53.300 the sense of loss or resentment or grievance or envy that people have and channeling that

00:40:59.440 It's a very powerful tool. I mean, in Russia right now, the narrative is, you know, the evil Americans took advantage of us in the 90s and we have to, you know, secure our board, take control of our neighborhood, etc.

00:41:13.960 Hitler likewise whipped that up. It's a very powerful tool for political leaders to achieve their objectives, isn't it? 0.64

00:41:24.840 Yeah, yeah, very much so. I mean, it's definitely what Putin is doing with Russia right now.

00:41:32.760 And, you know, but in the end, you know, I don't know how successful that is because

00:41:42.360 you can it's kind of like you're riding a tiger. You're creating so much anger and resentment.

00:41:48.280 Can you control it? You know, where is it? Are you in control of or is it leading you around?

00:41:54.840 You know, appealing to people's basest emotions is a very, very powerful political weapon, right?

00:42:04.940 But it can hurt you and it can bite back and hurt you in the end because you can't really control it, you know?

00:42:12.040 So, but I see what you're saying and it is, and the sense of a country feeling that kind of grievance is an incredibly powerful, motivating factor.

00:42:22.000 And I see that around the world right now, you know, we're living through a very chaotic moment

00:42:29.800 in history. I read a lot of history. I don't know a lot of things about this world, but I do read a

00:42:35.260 lot of history. And it's a very strange moment. It's one of those transitional moments where the

00:42:41.800 world, the paradigms are shifting. What we used to believe in doesn't seem to work anymore, right?

00:42:48.700 and it makes people go crazy.

00:42:52.480 I feel like sometimes I was on a bike ride the other day

00:42:55.500 and I was thinking,

00:42:57.020 sometimes I feel like I'm living in an insane asylum.

00:43:00.900 Like people are literally going mad

00:43:02.660 and I include myself in that.

00:43:04.160 I don't separate myself in that.

00:43:07.560 And so when people feel like they have no control,

00:43:11.420 mostly over their pocketbook,

00:43:13.380 which is happening a lot now,

00:43:15.320 but also a sense of the future, my values, what matters,

00:43:18.700 they go a little bit crazy and it creates incredible space for demagogues to use that

00:43:28.020 kind of confusion, to use that sense of like powerlessness to whip people up into a frenzy,

00:43:39.840 to get control of them. And it's a very dangerous times because you're seeing a steering towards

00:43:46.700 authoritarianism all around the globe. And what's going on here? Why is this happening now? It

00:43:52.880 happened in the 1920s and the 30s. It seems to be happening now. And I think there's this overall

00:43:59.320 sense that people feel like we're losing control over their own lives, over the future of their

00:44:05.480 country, their children. It's a very strange, dark moment, I think. And to your point, this is

00:44:12.520 something you see across Europe, across the political spectrum, by the way. You see populist

00:44:17.160 left parties rising very quickly and populist right parties. Where are the populist left parties?

00:44:21.880 Well, the party with the biggest momentum in the UK right now is the Green Party.

00:44:26.040 That's right. Yeah. And also, it's not just about political parties. It's also now increasingly

00:44:31.740 about influences. If you start a YouTube channel in Britain now talking about how you've been

00:44:37.740 screwed by the rich and the billionaires and tax the rich and all of this, you're going to do

00:44:42.500 extremely well, because there is ample ground for that sentiment, which is rising very quickly.

00:44:50.600 And likewise, on the right, you know, and by the way, both of these can be somewhat true.

00:44:56.380 Inequality is a problem. On the right, of course, mass immigration, the way that we've had in Britain, 0.91

00:45:02.400 bothers a hell of a lot of people, as I think it does probably in your country, although it's

00:45:06.520 different here. And those are things that are creating these, on both sides, a rising populist

00:45:12.520 tide, I think. And that speaks very much to what you're saying. Yeah, yeah, I agree.

00:45:19.360 I mean, you know, if you feel like, like, you know, I was, I was in France, I have a kind of

00:45:29.560 a long love affair with France. I'm sorry to say that. Yeah. I love England. Now we're disappointed.

00:45:34.260 I lived there and I studied the language and all that.

00:45:42.840 But I remember I was there about 12 years ago and I was going through Paris.

00:45:50.620 And I'm actually somebody who's very open to immigrants and to their plight.

00:45:54.820 But I was thinking, France is in trouble because they're losing a sense of their identity.

00:46:01.720 and a country like that has a very, very powerful sense of identity

00:46:07.420 because it's a country that's actually a feudalism

00:46:10.560 that's kind of disguised as a nation.

00:46:13.400 And people like de Gaulle had to struggle

00:46:15.800 to create this kind of national unity around Joan of Arc

00:46:19.880 and around these various myths and Louis XIV

00:46:22.280 and on and on Napoleon, et cetera.

00:46:26.100 Very powerful myths of identity of this is who the French are. 0.84

00:46:31.340 And I could sense that there was something very dangerous going on 1.00

00:46:34.720 because they were going to lose that sense of who they were 1.00

00:46:39.020 with all of the immigrants that were pouring in at this time. 0.99

00:46:42.940 And I can empathize with that to a point where,

00:46:47.920 you know, you have this sense of what your country is

00:46:51.320 and you're losing that, right?

00:46:54.180 So it creates an opening for some ugly kind of politics, I'm afraid.

00:47:01.280 It's the family and friends event at Shoppers Drug Mart.

00:47:04.620 Get 20% off almost all regular priced merchandise.

00:47:07.900 Two days only.

00:47:09.140 Tuesday, April 28th and Wednesday, April 29th.

00:47:12.300 Open your PC Optimum app to get your coupon.

00:47:18.560 And when we're talking about people who live in these countries where things aren't as good as they used to be,

00:47:26.180 things feel under the decline socially, economically,

00:47:30.700 What we're talking about, and what I feel in the UK, is demoralization.

00:47:35.080 And when people are demoralized, that's a very, very dangerous space for a populist to be in.

00:47:41.600 Yeah.

00:47:43.240 Yeah, I mean, what are you referring to in particular?

00:47:46.220 Particularly, for instance, in the UK, where people feel that things are getting worse and they're not going to get any better,

00:47:52.200 and we're on a current downward trajectory.

00:47:54.420 And if you look at the economics of the situation, that would bear it out.

00:47:57.240 if you look at it culturally societally it would bear it out again i think once you hit that that's

00:48:03.700 when people become incredibly vulnerable yeah well it speaks to your point doesn't that about

00:48:09.480 when people don't feel that they have the power and particularly in the uk um a lot of people feel

00:48:16.280 that voting a certain way and even electing parties that say they will deal with certain

00:48:22.940 problems, doesn't actually produce the results. And I imagine based on your analysis, that would

00:48:27.080 be, like Francis says, quite a dangerous place to be, right? Yeah, I mean, you know, politicians

00:48:33.640 don't really control as much as they think they control. And as much as Donald Trump rails against

00:48:41.640 globalism and wants to go back, it is an interconnected planet. And you don't have

00:48:47.180 control over forces. You know, you see in the war going on right now, how this is rippling across,

00:48:54.620 particularly across Asia. And who knows, in a few months or years, the kind of dynamic,

00:49:02.040 the kind of problems that is going to set off in countries where the populace feels so,

00:49:08.140 so diminished in their power, that all kinds of rebellions. History is weird, because what's

00:49:15.060 happening in the moment, you don't know, you don't see the seeds of the kind of ugliness or bad

00:49:20.560 things that could be happening in a year or two years from now. And a simple thing like cutting

00:49:25.760 off oil and making the price of oil go up has a rippling effect that can create a revolution in

00:49:32.280 some Eastern Asian country that then triggers, you know, a world war or something. I mean, I'm 0.63

00:49:37.660 being apocalyptic here, but you don't know these little effects. And political leaders,

00:49:44.740 as I said, it was kind of like riding a tiger. They feel like I can get to power using all of

00:49:50.780 this resentment and grievance and anger and bitterness, but I can't control it because I

00:49:57.640 can't really deliver what I'm promising I'm going to deliver, you know? So yeah, it's a very

00:50:03.680 dangerous game. Do you think that, for instance, if a politician came out and actually said,

00:50:10.680 look, there are things that I can control or that we can control. There are things that we

00:50:14.980 simply cannot control. As a result of that, this is the path that we're going to plot.

00:50:21.360 Would that be more appealing to people? Or do people, what people actually desire deep down

00:50:28.120 is a strong man to come in and go, I'm going to sort it out. This is what's going to happen.

00:50:33.680 Yeah, I mean, we've talked earlier about social media, and part of the problem that's going on is people think in very simplistic terms.

00:50:45.900 Right.

00:50:46.540 Things are delivered in a way like there's no nuance anymore.

00:50:51.120 It's just this way or it's that way kind of thing.

00:50:55.540 So if a political leader came about now who was very realistic and very honest,

00:51:02.020 you know, Biden was a little bit like that.

00:51:04.280 And he got chewed apart.

00:51:05.460 He got decimated.

00:51:06.600 He wasn't very effective.

00:51:08.340 But he was trying to be honest and say, this is what I can do.

00:51:11.480 This is what I can't do.

00:51:13.020 I don't think people want to hear that right now.

00:51:15.140 They want to hear easy, simple solutions.

00:51:18.400 I mean, if you look at the global stage right now, it's startling.

00:51:23.140 It's really startling because 70 years ago, you would see leaders and parties that would stay in power for decades, sometimes through corruption, I don't deny.

00:51:35.240 But there was a consistency, right?

00:51:38.660 And now, it's like it's turning over by the month, practically.

00:51:44.040 You said the Green Party.

00:51:45.320 Well, three months ago, it was Farage and I forgot the name of his party.

00:51:50.940 The Reform Party.

00:51:52.440 And in three months, it's going to be some other party.

00:51:55.520 The volatility is out of this roof.

00:51:58.280 And that's why I said there's a kind of madness going on in the world,

00:52:02.520 a kind of madness where people's opinions are shifting so quickly like that.

00:52:07.060 There's no anchor.

00:52:08.120 There's no sort of, there's nothing kind of holding it all together

00:52:11.420 where this politician, I believe, can solve my problems.

00:52:16.020 I'm willing to wait.

00:52:17.780 I'm willing to be patient with him or her

00:52:20.340 and give him or her three years, four years to figure out,

00:52:24.280 oh, that can't happen, you know?

00:52:26.560 I was, I don't know if this is how relevant this is,

00:52:29.860 but I was on the board of directors

00:52:32.900 of a publicly traded company, American Apparel, right?

00:52:36.760 Which no longer exists.

00:52:38.700 And I saw up front how the business world operates

00:52:43.480 and it was startling to me.

00:52:45.240 so this is a company that was probably expanding way too fast right and of course it went public

00:52:55.260 and that's when I was brought on to the board of directors okay and um I was seeing I was

00:53:03.200 foreseeing long-term problems he had created the Dove Charney he created this brand that was all

00:53:08.420 about sexiness for young women based on the 80s, kind of the 80s aesthetic, you know, the kind of

00:53:15.420 short workout, you know, short sort of thing. And I was thinking there's a shift going on in

00:53:24.180 people's taste. This is 2009 or so. I feel like in a couple of years, it's not going to be the

00:53:30.440 aesthetic. It's not going to be the ethos anymore of young women because that's who the company was 1.00

00:53:35.300 appealing to. And I was trying to tell the director there, I was thinking, we've got to make 1.00

00:53:41.780 a shift in the brand. You've got to be more forward thinking. But the pressures of Wall

00:53:47.280 Street and the quarterly report were so powerful that you could not think long term. You could not

00:53:53.860 project six months in advance because you had to make a quarterly report that showed Wall Street

00:53:59.480 that you were making that you were growing right that was the growth right new markets

00:54:05.180 we're getting market share and if you did that then you'd get more money coming in

00:54:09.840 but you couldn't raise your head this much above the moment to think in advance

00:54:15.240 that's the business world that we live now in the united states and it's very

00:54:18.860 i think it's creating a lot of problems

00:54:20.980 если хочешь по-настоящему понять язык нужно слушать как говорят живые люди

00:54:26.200 If you understood that, good, but I'm going to repeat myself.

00:54:30.060 If you didn't, here's what I said.

00:54:31.800 If you want to actually understand the language, you need to hear how people speak it,

00:54:35.440 not work through textbooks.

00:54:36.860 I grew up speaking Russian, and what makes a language stick isn't grammar drills,

00:54:40.640 it's immersion, the rhythm of how people actually talk, the slang,

00:54:43.880 the way a sentence lands in a real conversation rather than on a printed page.

00:54:48.100 That's the whole logic behind Lingopi.

00:54:50.040 It's a language learning platform built around watching real TV shows and films

00:54:53.640 in your target language.

00:54:54.940 The subtitles are interactive.

00:54:56.920 Click any word for an instant translation.

00:54:59.080 Your vocabulary saves automatically and you review it later with flashcards,

00:55:02.780 quizzes and pronunciation tools.

00:55:04.560 You can replay lines and slow dialogue down until it clicks.

00:55:07.940 LingoPy turns watching into learning without feeling like either.

00:55:11.320 It has over 3,000 shows and films across 14 languages on your phone, laptop or TV.

00:55:16.540 Consistency is key when it comes to language learning

00:55:18.780 and this makes that significantly easier.

00:55:21.180 For 55% off the annual plan, click the link in the description or go to learn.lingopi.com

00:55:27.880 slash trigonometry.

00:55:29.220 That's learn.lingopi.com slash trigonometry.

00:55:33.380 It's interesting you say that because there's people who've offered to invest in our show

00:55:39.980 and like help.

00:55:41.560 And it's not really ever appealed to us because we know that if that happens, we no longer

00:55:46.500 can have the conversations we want.

00:55:48.320 We have to have the conversations that are going to get views.

00:55:50.820 yeah and then that would ruin the whole thing that we do because it works because we it's

00:55:57.160 authentic yeah and if you try and create something fake then you make more you get more clicks but

00:56:01.900 then the people who actually watch the show in the beginning don't want to watch it anymore

00:56:04.940 and we'd hate our job as well but i can see how that would affect a business yeah to the point

00:56:11.420 where it's no longer actually fulfilling its mission it's now just trying to make money yeah

00:56:15.960 and making bad decisions and then goes out of business yeah is your point yeah yeah if i would

00:56:21.500 advise you guys i would say stay small you know when he started this business i'm talking about

00:56:27.100 american apparel he had one store here in los angeles when i first met him right and and then

00:56:34.460 it got like 10 stores and 20 stores but it was solid it had a it had you know i could see the

00:56:40.700 point of it, right? By the time he expanded to 300 stores around the world, it lost its meaning,

00:56:48.900 it lost its brand, it lost what it was. And then forget it, you're never going to get it back,

00:56:54.300 you know? It's interesting as well, something you mentioned, I just remember Desmond Morris,

00:56:59.560 who is a writer, who's, I've read a lot, Naked Ape, Human Zoo, and a bunch of others. But one

00:57:04.420 of the things he talked about is the length of women's skirts goes up, so the skirts get longer,

00:57:10.700 when economic times are bad. So 2009 would have been exactly the right time to pivot to longer

00:57:16.620 rather than shorter. Yeah, it was right after the financial crisis.

00:57:21.100 Yeah. Does it help in a society where power is shared? So for instance,

00:57:27.420 is part of the problem with our society is that it's become ever more secular. So there's a lot

00:57:34.060 of us who are not religious. There's a lot of us who don't believe in God. And as a result of that,

00:57:39.260 we instead of looking maybe to the church or to the mosque or whatever it may be we now look only

00:57:46.360 to our political leaders that's a very good point um well you're a catholic right i was raised

00:57:53.060 catholic it never leaves you the guilt is always there i'm jewish so i know this

00:57:57.600 um yeah i mean uh i'm i'm my new book that i i'm i've finished the last chapter a month ago and i'm

00:58:07.220 almost finished with the introduction, so I'm almost there to be out in November,

00:58:11.560 is kind of dealing with that because we humans have a spiritual side to us. We have a hunger

00:58:20.900 for something larger that aren't just our egos, than just making money, than just surviving.

00:58:26.260 We need to feel connected to something larger. It's part of our nature. And in my book, I explain

00:58:31.640 where that comes from um and that never goes away i don't care how sophisticated we are i don't care

00:58:39.800 if it's 3 000 years in advance and we're all like borgs we're part cyborgs etc it's still a part of

00:58:46.440 human nature it isn't going away and so organized religion was the sort of the main source of that

00:58:54.440 first for centuries right and it kind of become became dead in a way it wasn't really connected

00:59:01.320 to people's authentic experience anymore,

00:59:03.780 particularly as we became technologically so sophisticated.

00:59:07.920 It seemed like something kind of superstitious,

00:59:10.100 something from the past.

00:59:11.400 And also, it wasn't appealing to our lived experience.

00:59:14.940 I remember as a child going to the synagogue, right?

00:59:20.160 And it's just like,

00:59:21.980 what does this have to do with my life here in Los Angeles?

00:59:24.540 It's in the 60s.

00:59:26.300 And people are going nuts in the streets

00:59:28.540 and the Vietnam War and, you know, sex and everything.

00:59:31.320 And here there's like these prayers.

00:59:33.660 Like it had no connection to my life as a child and to my world.

00:59:37.800 So I couldn't understand organized religion, okay?

00:59:42.440 But people still have this need.

00:59:44.680 They still have this hunger.

00:59:45.720 They still are looking for some kind of a meaning.

00:59:47.380 They want to connect to something bigger than just their egos, right?

00:59:51.780 And there's nothing out there that's supplying that, I think.

00:59:56.000 And you find, because of that, a lot of people are going into these sort of niche spiritual worlds that at least feel a little more direct and part of their everyday life, but aren't connected to anything larger, any kind of movement.

01:00:10.880 And so it shifts. Now it's, I'm interested in this little form of Buddhism, then in six months it'll be, you know, I'll be getting drug therapy, and then in six months it'll be something else, right?

01:00:25.120 So there's nothing kind of solid,

01:00:27.400 and it's an emptiness that people feel.

01:00:31.380 And so the book that I wrote was trying to deal

01:00:35.960 with that kind of emptiness and how you as an individual

01:00:39.820 or we as a collective can find our way back

01:00:42.960 to finding this kind of higher meaning in our life.

01:00:46.620 But, yeah.

01:00:47.200 So carry on.

01:00:48.200 No, no, no.

01:00:48.780 I was saying, but it also speaks to a kind of...

01:00:51.100 We were having a conversation, Constantine and the rest of the team, last night, literally

01:00:55.880 about this topic.

01:00:57.120 It speaks to a kind of arrogance, doesn't it?

01:00:59.620 Particularly in the West, that somehow we superseded religion.

01:01:03.480 We don't need it anymore because we're so smart.

01:01:05.780 We have this amazing technology. 1.00

01:01:07.860 It's stupidity. 0.99

01:01:08.640 I mean, I'm reading quotes from Albert Einstein, you know, probably the most brilliant scientist 1.00

01:01:16.780 of our era.

01:01:17.560 and he believed in what he called cosmic religion.

01:01:21.740 And he said, mysticism is as much a part of the arts

01:01:24.820 as it is of the sciences.

01:01:26.700 And if you can't feel awe in front of this universe

01:01:29.700 that we have, then you might as well be dead, right?

01:01:33.540 So you can mix science, technology,

01:01:37.900 and sophisticated thinking and 21st century thinking

01:01:41.840 with something spiritual.

01:01:44.100 You can, it can be done.

01:01:46.020 But the idea that everything has to be rational, everything has to be data, algorithms, you know, program, etc., is just creating deadness in people.

01:01:58.700 It's making them insane because that's not how the human animal is.

01:02:02.040 We need something else. 0.79

01:02:03.600 So, yes, it is very arrogant to believe they can just get rid of religion. 0.84

01:02:08.980 Sorry to say, but Nazism was a religion.

01:02:12.860 Chinese communism and what Mao had was a religion. 0.63

01:02:15.480 Stalin is a religion without religion, but it was still based on that kind of form.

01:02:21.800 That's what happens when you get rid completely of things that meant so much to people.

01:02:27.580 Absolutely, because we respect science, we respect data, we respect all of those things.

01:02:33.220 Those things are highly important.

01:02:34.960 But let's be very real about it.

01:02:36.920 If you've had a diagnosis, a terrible diagnosis, let's say you've staged four cancer,

01:02:42.680 data and science are not going to keep you warm at night.

01:02:45.480 There's going to be something else that we're going to reach towards.

01:02:48.860 And that transcends intelligence around everything.

01:02:52.680 We need something else.

01:02:54.980 And, you know, I had a stroke about eight years ago.

01:02:59.020 That's why my hand is like this and why I can't walk very well.

01:03:02.560 I came this close to dying, right?

01:03:05.400 And I didn't have a near-death experience, but it was close to something like that.

01:03:09.780 And it shook me up.

01:03:10.840 It changed me.

01:03:11.540 And so in my book that I'm writing, the last chapter is about death and people who had near-death experiences.

01:03:20.560 And there was this theme of, I was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer, as you mentioned.

01:03:26.520 I have only three months to live.

01:03:29.540 I have never felt more alive than in these three months.

01:03:32.760 I don't have to think about social media.

01:03:35.860 I don't have to think about my admission.

01:03:37.520 I don't have to think about all these other little problems.

01:03:40.340 suddenly the world opens up to me and I'm thinking about what really matters, about what really

01:03:45.320 life is about, right? Because no amount of technology is going to keep me alive. And even

01:03:50.700 if it does, I'm still going to have, the cancer will come back. And so you're forced to think

01:03:55.820 about what really matters to you. And that's what death can do for you, you know? And so,

01:04:01.040 So, you know, we're taking away things that really matter to human beings and we're paying

01:04:12.520 a price for it. And so we have to find a way back to some of these things that our ancestors

01:04:18.960 understood about the human animal and how we need an anchor in our lives.

01:04:24.660 What's interesting is you see both in this country and in many other countries now,

01:04:30.060 actually religious attendance of church, at least, is actually, or other religions, is on the rise

01:04:35.300 slowly, particularly among young people. So it may be happening voluntarily, which is how you'd

01:04:41.800 hope it happens, really, I guess. Rob, it's been an absolute pleasure. Thank you for coming. And

01:04:45.560 what is your book called? And you mentioned it comes out in November. When will people be able

01:04:49.100 to pre-order it? I don't know when they'll be able to pre-order, probably fairly soon, like within a

01:04:54.120 month or two. I think it's been announced. It'll be out in November.

01:04:59.520 And the title?

01:05:00.320 It's called The Law of the Sublime. The book is about the sublime. And the idea is,

01:05:08.520 as a human animal, as a social creature, we live with certain conventions and limits and codes that

01:05:15.120 tell us, this is how we're supposed to think, this is how we're supposed to live, this is how we're

01:05:18.880 supposed to behave. And the sublime are experiences that lie outside that circle.

01:05:24.120 that kind of expand our consciousness.

01:05:27.080 And I say that there's a lot of things going on in science

01:05:30.680 that should naturally do this,

01:05:32.740 like the nature of human consciousness,

01:05:36.640 like the origin of the universe and the origin of life,

01:05:40.900 and all these amazing discoveries going on

01:05:43.400 that should be expanding our minds outside this circle.

01:05:46.760 And as the mind expands,

01:05:49.200 you naturally feel this kind of awe,

01:05:52.000 this kind of cosmic sense

01:05:53.500 that was once a part of religion.

01:05:56.740 But at the same time that science is expanding this

01:05:59.980 and we should be going, whoa, whoa,

01:06:02.540 social media is doing this to us.

01:06:05.340 The mind is getting narrower, narrower, narrower.

01:06:07.440 What is she having for breakfast?

01:06:09.520 You know, all these sort of trivial, banal things

01:06:12.640 that we're worried about, right?

01:06:14.720 And so I'm trying to explode all of that

01:06:17.380 and get you back into thinking

01:06:18.800 about what lies outside that circle.

01:06:21.560 And that's what I call the sublime.

01:06:23.500 We'll put the link in the description if it's available when this episode comes out.

01:06:27.360 Before we ask you questions from our supporters, the final question we ask all our guests

01:06:31.320 is what's the one thing we're not talking about that we should be?

01:06:34.760 Before Robert answers a final question at the end of the interview,

01:06:38.040 make sure to head over to our substack.

01:06:40.260 The link is in the description where you'll be able to see this.

01:06:43.940 If you had to add new or amend existing laws from the 48, what changes would you make?

01:06:49.620 Critiques of your book have suggested you're teaching people to be coldly manipulative.

01:06:53.500 What do you say?

01:06:55.040 What's the one thing we're not talking about that we should be?

01:06:59.480 Well, about my book, I guess.

01:07:01.660 We just did.

01:07:03.260 You know, because I hate to say it, but because of my stroke, I had to, I can't type, so I

01:07:15.520 had to hand write this entire book.

01:07:18.460 Wow.

01:07:19.480 And that means handwriting it, then doing it in another

01:07:24.160 notebook and editing it in another notebook,

01:07:26.320 then editing it in another, then editing and editing,

01:07:28.600 and then finally dictating it right into the computer,

01:07:31.720 and then trying to edit it with one hand.

01:07:34.700 And then I couldn't take a walk if I needed to clear my mind,

01:07:39.940 right?

01:07:40.840 I'm sort of trapped in my office.

01:07:43.900 And I'm somebody who loves exercise, loves hiking, being out in the world.

01:07:48.200 And whenever my other books, I felt blocked, I would go on an amazing hike.

01:07:52.620 All these ideas would come to me.

01:07:54.120 I was trapped in this world and I couldn't, I had to handwrite everything.

01:07:58.960 And yet the book is about the sublime.

01:08:01.200 I had to feel it.

01:08:02.200 How am I going to feel it when I'm like a bird in a cage?

01:08:05.900 I had to overcome all of these things in my head and in my body.

01:08:12.580 And so it took me seven years to write this book,

01:08:16.740 almost seven years.

01:08:18.340 I don't care if it doesn't sell a single copy.

01:08:21.280 I've never felt more pride in myself

01:08:24.580 that I overcame all of this.

01:08:26.820 And there were difficult moments where I was like crying,

01:08:29.480 like I can't do it.

01:08:30.840 It's not working, but I did it.

01:08:34.140 And it's a sense of achievement that I've never had before.

01:08:37.580 So I don't know,

01:08:38.680 maybe that's something I just wanted to share.

01:08:40.540 That's awesome, man.

01:08:41.200 Yeah. That's really special. Well, thank you for coming here and talking to us about it.

01:08:46.660 Head on over to triggerpod.co.uk where we ask Robert your questions.

01:08:51.180 Don't forget to click the link in the description of this episode to grab the special CyberGhost VPN discount.

01:08:58.220 It's completely risk-free, so check it out today.

01:09:03.520 Do you see parallels with historical movements such as communism in using constructed claims of victimhood

01:09:10.180 and moral arguments to gain legitimacy and consolidate power.

TRIGGERnometry - April 22, 2026

Trump Is the Greatest At One Law Of Power — And It Could Destroy Him - Robert Greene

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript