80 Top Robert Greene Quotes On Strategy, Leadership & Success

Updated: July 27th, 2021

Robert Greene is an American Author.

He is known for his award-winning books on strategy, power, and seduction.

He has written six international bestsellers: The 48 Laws of Power, The Art of Seduction, The 33 Strategies of War, The 50th Law, Mastery, and The Laws of Human Nature.

We've put together an incredible collection of Robert Greene quotes to read.

Here they are:

80 Top Robert Greene Quotes On Strategy, Leadership & Success

List of Inspiring Robert Greene Quotes

When you are trying to impress people with words, the more you say, the more common you appear, and the less in control. - Robert Greene


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


The more you say, the more likely you are to say something foolish. - Robert Greene


Be Royal in your Own Fashion: Act like a King to be treated. - Robert Greene


It is smart to occasionally display defects, and admit to harmless vices, in order to deflect envy and appear more human and approachable. - Robert Greene


Never assume that the person you are dealing with is weaker or less important than you are. - Robert Greene


Do not accept the roles that society foists on you. - Robert Greene


Grand strategy is the art of looking beyond the present battle and calculating ahead. Focus on your ultimate goal and plot to reach it. - Robert Greene


Do not wait for a coronation; the greatest emperors crown themselves. - Robert Greene


Never take your position for granted and never let any favors you receive go to your head. - Robert Greene


Be the master of your own image rather than letting others define if for you. - Robert Greene


If you want to turn people down, it is best to do so politely and respectfully, even if you feel their request is impudent or their offer ridiculous. - Robert Greene


Powerful people impress and intimidate by saying less. - Robert Greene


To succeed in the game of power, you have to master your emotions. - Robert Greene


Your fears are a kind of prison that confines you within a limited range of action. The less you fear, the more power you will have and the more fully you will live. - Robert Greene


Repeated failure will toughen your spirit and show you with absolute clarity how things must be done. - Robert Greene


Strike the shepherd and the sheep will scatter. - Robert Greene


You must be the mirror, training your mind to try to see yourself as others see you. - Robert Greene


Fools say that they learn by experience. I prefer to profit by others’ experience. - Robert Greene


You must engrave deeply in your mind and never forget: your emotional commitment to what you are doing will be translated into your work. - Robert Greene


The mind must not wander from goal to goal, or be distracted by success from its sense of purpose and proportion. - Robert Greene


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


Re-create yourself by forging a new identity, one that commands attention and never bores the audience. - Robert Greene


The human tongue is a beast that few can master. It strains constantly to break out of its cage, and if it is not tamed, it will tun wild and cause you grief. - Robert Greene


If you are unsure of a course of action, do not attempt it. Your doubts and hesitations will infect your execution. - Robert Greene


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


Everyone admires the bold; no one honors the timid. - Robert Greene


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


An emotional response to a situation is the single greatest barrier to power, a mistake that will cost you a lot more than any temporary satisfaction you might gain by expressing your feelings. - Robert Greene


If you make a show of going against the times, flaunting your unconventional ideas and unorthodox ways, people will think that you only want attention and that you look down upon them. - Robert Greene


Appearing better than others is always dangerous, but most dangerous of all is to appear to have no faults or weaknesses. - Robert Greene


Incorporate dramatic devices into your public gestures and actions – your power will be enhanced and your character will seem larger than life. - Robert Greene


What you do not react to cannot drag you down in a futile engagement. Your pride is not involved. The best lesson you can teach an irritating gnat is to consign it to oblivion by ignoring it. - Robert Greene


When you show yourself to the world and display your talents, you naturally stir all kinds of resentment, envy, and other manifestations of insecurity. you cannot spend your life worrying about the petty feelings of others. - Robert Greene


Never be distracted by people’s glamorous portraits of themselves and their lives; search and dig for what really imprisons them. - Robert Greene


It is your own bad strategies, not the unfair opponent, that are to blame for your failures. You are responsible for the good and bad in your life. - Robert Greene


Life has more meaning in the face of Death. - Robert Greene


Events in life mean nothing if you do not reflect on them in a deep way, and ideas from books are pointless if they have no application to life as you live it. - Robert Greene


You are miserly by nature, you will never go beyond a certain limit; only generous souls attain greatness. - Robert Greene


The real poetry and beauty in life comes from an intense relationship with reality in all its aspects. Realism is in fact the ideal we must aspire to, the highest point of human rationality. - Robert Greene


Your Life’s Task does not always appear to you through some grand or promising inclination. - Robert Greene


When our emotions are engaged, we often have trouble seeing things as they are. - Robert Greene


Sweet are the thoughts that savour of content, The quiet mind is richer than a crown. - Robert Greene


Timidity is dangerous: Better to enter with boldness. - Robert Greene


Too much respect for other people's wisdom will make you depreciate your own.- Robert Greene


Never whine, never complain, never try to justify yourself. - Robert Greene


Keep friends for friendship, but work with the skilled and competent. - Robert Greene


Many a serious thinker has been produced in prisons, where we have nothing to do but think. - Robert Greene


Everyone admires the bold; no one honors the timid. - Robert Greene


Sometimes any emotion is better than the boredom of security. - Robert Greene


There is nothing more intoxicating than victory, and nothing more dangerous. - Robert Greene


Always Say Less Than Necessary. - Robert Greene


For the future, the motto is, "No days unalert.” - Robert Greene


Creative Endeavors are by their nature uncertain. - Robert Greene


Envy creates silent enemies. - Robert Greene


Think As You Like But Behave Like Others. - Robert Greene


Chance favors only the prepared mind. - Robert Greene


Avoid the unhappy and unlucky. - Robert Greene


He who poses as a fool is not a fool. - Robert Greene


Inter action with boldness. - Robert Greene


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


The passive ironic attitude is not cool or romantic, but pathetic and destructive. - Robert Greene


The time that leads to mastery is dependent on the intensity of our focus. - Robert Greene


People around you, constantly under the pull of their emotions, change their ideas by the day or by the hour, depending on their mood. - Robert Greene


If we can make it look like we are not really responsible for our fate, for what happens to us in life, then our apparent powerlessness is more palatable. - Robert Greene


No one is really going to help you or give you direction. In fact, the odds are against you. - Robert Greene


You must love the subject and feel a profound connection to it. Your interest must transcend the field itself and border on the religious. - Robert Greene


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


Become who you are by learning who you are. - Robert Greene


There is too little mystery in the world; too many people say exactly what they feel or want. - Robert Greene


All of us have access to a higher form of intelligence, one that can allow us to see more of the world, to anticipate trends, to respond with speed and accuracy to any circumstance. - Robert Greene


Everything that happens to you is a form of instruction if you pay attention. - Robert Greene


Our natural tendency is to project onto other people our own belief and value systems, in ways in which we are not even aware. - Robert Greene


Think of it this way: There are two kinds of failure. The first comes from never trying out your ideas because you are afraid, or because you are waiting for the perfect time. This kind of failure you can never learn from and such timidity will destroy you. The second kind comes from a bold and venturesome spirit. If you fail in this way, the hit that you take to your reputation is greatly outweighed by what you learn. - Robert Greene


Psychology of love, translated by Joan Riviere. - Robert Greene


Love never dies of starvation,” she wrote, “but often of indigestion.” - Robert Greene


You cannot repress anger or love, or avoid feeling them, and you should not try. - Robert Greene


Friendship and love blind every man to their interests. - Robert Greene


Love is a lock that linketh noble minds. - Robert Greene


Love taught me that your honour did but jest. - Robert Greene

Pat Walls,  Founder of Starter Story
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