Maybe this comes off as a long OYS but fuck it my ego is screaming and I have to get this off my chest.

21 months ago I hit bottom. That was my third bottom in life: the first was drugs at 15 (ego); the second was love at 23 (ego); the third was morals at 32 (ego). To be honest I can feel another bottom coming because I never really killed my ego. I sense it. So I'm putting it out here on the chopping block of MRP.

In the fall of 2016 I was creating an illusion of morality. Instead of being honest about who I was or how I felt, I was constantly trying to make people feel better about themselves by self-deprecating, omitting things or minimizing things. Ironically this was to control how others felt. So I was actually quite dishonest and manipulative. And although I thought I was doing it for the benefit of others, I really had no clue what was good for them. My 'morality' was an extension of my ego.

Back then my morality was me doing certain things to boost my opinion of myself. In the past year I purposely broke many of my previous values. I lied to clients, I cheated on my wife, I stole things. Or did I save face, increase pleasure, and acquire resources? Today I'm making myself valuable instead of holding onto values. After reading 48 Laws of Power and Art of Seduction, I realized people want to be fooled anyway. That humans crave illusion over reality. They would rather be thrilled with falseness than be bored with reality. This really fucks with my principle of honesty, but it appeals to my principle of being effective. If I can create an illusion around myself that actually accomplishes shit, then does that supersede the principle of honesty? Tough questions that still give my ego a headache.

I’ve learned that life is very much about power. As Oscar Wilde said, ‘Everything is about sex. Except sex. Sex is about power.’ So my take-away is ‘Everything is about power’. No one is spared the reality of living in a clash of powers. People have different types of power: some have wealth; beauty; leadership; status; charisma; sex appeal; intelligence; fame; charm. And they use these powers to push forward their maxim in life, their mission. Whether selfless or selfish they push their maxim with their powers. Mother Theresa was about power as much as Hitler. I still use power as much as I always did, but now in more effective ways.

I’ve learned that assuming a leadership position is not a moral or immoral thing, it's just powerful. My ego was saying 'I shouldn't have to ask, I shouldn't have to be influential'. I learned that charm, charisma and sex appeal creates influence in the eyes of women and men, and that influence serves my mission.

I also learned that by tripling my rates, people value my work more. My ego was keeping my rates low 'to be nice'. So now I ask for a lot more with less in return, and somehow clients are happier? And strangely it’s easier to ask for a gift than negotiate an investment. I learned that wealth is tightly held and investments are chosen with a lot of thought but gifts are given in a moment of emotion.

I’ve learned that popularity is crucial. I used to loathe fame but now I see that fame is perhaps the most powerful trait in human history. It penetrates every boundary. We look up to people who take great risks, who make great claims, who make great journeys, who risk death and embarrassment. When it comes to fame, illusion is straight up more important than reality. My ego was saying, "Tell people the truth and they will trust you." now experience tells me "Tell people what they want to believe and once in a while they can stomach the truth."

Today I don’t know what the ‘right thing’ to do is, so I figure why not maximize what I want? Why not trust fully in my desires? Trying to do 'moral behavior' in other's eyes is a crap shoot anyway, but I can trust 100% on my vision. And if I legit fuck up, well then most things grow back and apologies cost nothing. Congruence is worth more than self-deprecation for the sake of sparing someone’s feelings that I’ll never know anyway.