Vet your associations more stringently for people of good character in all manners and regards.

Whilst you may on occasion team up with a villain to achieve a mutual end, the body of people around you MUST be solid, decent and strong.

Most people aren't actually worth knowing. https://twitter.com/Stoicismrobot/status/1265534133415161867

This is one of the most important skills in life

"Ethics are for idiots" is all well & good when you're cutting corners to get ahead & feeling smug

But it comes to bite u in the ass later on when you get betrayed due to it. That's what you get for befriending the dishonourable.

The noble don't want to be friends with the dishonourable, but the dishonourable want to be friends with the noble.

The attraction is one way.

Everything comes down to trust, at the end of the day.

If you are weak, you cannot be trusted.

If you are predatory, same again.

Weaklings and predators you cannot trust, only game.

Weaklings lack character and the self-discipline to do the hard things, so will always rat you out, take the easy path etc.

Predators see the world as zero sum and will profit off your misery if given ample opportunity.

So yes get good at vetting

Not just women

But everyone, people in general

Put people through their paces

I am generally speaking IQ supremacist, but if it came down to it I'd pick an average dude with solid character over a smart dude of questionable honour any and every day.

All a man has got is his word and there's a lot of clowns in this world who don't even try to keep it. In fact, they actively abuse it.

Make your word worth something, and only deal with those who do the same.

Save yourself a lot of hassle, pain and drama.

It is perfectly reasonable to be both honourable and cunning with no dissonance. In fact, all the best men are. Both traits are necessary to be a solid patriarch.

But no, I will not explain.

Time is at a premium.

If this seems counterintuitive, think it through. Important.

Sometimes you have to give someone a chance to see who they are.

You have to give them trust they haven't earned to get the ball rolling.

Call it a leap of faith.

But make that leap small.

Confine the level of risk to acceptable loss.

Scale risk as trust is earned over time.

Most people won't go to the effort of winning your trust over a long time scale by being consistently honourable, with the active and initial intention of eventually breaking that trust once enough has been amassed unless you're a very juicy target & even then, it's hard for them

It's hard for them because being repeatedly honourable to someone is a form of bonding. You will come to like the person you initially had bad intentions for, and you won't actually want to lose the trust you've built up. How they see you will matter to you. You're invested now.

Which is why you don't even need to be paranoid about people playing a long game if you know human nature.

Because most people won't go to those kind of lengths.

And the dishonourable people who would will end up liking you anyway, thus exempting you from their general fuckery.

Every villain has a secret wish to be the good guy for one reason

They can't trust anybody

And everybody wants to trust, because everyone wants friends

People they can rely on who like them for their character, not what they can do

People they don't have to play games with

So if you want to be liked for your character.

Then it stands to reason you must first forge a character that is actually worth a fuck.

You owe that much to yourself, if you wish to surround yourself with good people.

Invest in yourself so you can be selective with others.

Doesn't mean you'll be perfect, won't mess up, will always 100% deliver etc.

After all, you're human, error runs through your veins - but it does mean this: you will right all your wrongs, and be wise enough to abstain from the greatest mistakes.

Nobility is worth the hassle.

Ascend.