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Mastery

Robert Greene (Goodreads Author)

4.28 · Rating details · 27,989 ratings · 1,870 reviews

In this book, Robert Greene demonstrates that the ultimate form of power is mastery itself. By analyzing the lives of such past masters as Charles Darwin, Benjamin Franklin, Albert Einstein, and Leonard da Vinci, as well as by interviewing nine contemporary masters, including tech guru Paul Graham and animal rights advocate Temple Grandin, Greene debunks our culture’s many ...more

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Hardcover, 318 pages

Published November 13th 2012 by Viking (first published November 1st 2012)

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Nov 10, 2012 Tom rated it it was amazing

Robert Greene’s The 48 Laws of Power is his most notorious work, so blatantly amoral that many of its adherents are rumored to hide in the closet. But since its publication, his work has gradually taken a moral turn. In his follow-up, The Art of Seduction, Greene mentions having compassion for one’s “victim”—he or she being seduced. The 33 Strategies of War instructs readers that there is no moral value in ignoring certain tenets. In Mastery, which concerns the pursuit of virtuosity in one’s fie Robert Greene’s The 48 Laws of Power is his most notorious work, so blatantly amoral that many of its adherents are rumored to hide in the closet. But since its publication, his work has gradually taken a moral turn. In his follow-up, The Art of Seduction, Greene mentions having compassion for one’s “victim”—he or she being seduced. The 33 Strategies of War instructs readers that there is no moral value in ignoring certain tenets. In Mastery, which concerns the pursuit of virtuosity in one’s field (and, according to Greene, ends the journey that began with 48 Laws), Greene finally mentions the value of a “great contribution to society.” Elevating this brand of altruism over self-aggrandizement, the book becomes his most essential work.

Greene’s format hasn’t changed much. He details six steps to Mastery, typically beginning chapters with an anecdote from history about a Master—the first here being Leonardo Da Vinci (who, with his diverse career, was a wise choice). Then he moves through gorgeous passages on figures such as the Wright Brothers or Albert Einstein, concluding with Goethe’s life story. What separates Mastery from the rest of his oeuvre is that Greene’s emphasis on his subject’s importance in the 21st century forces readers to play close attention.

Consider The Art of Seduction. After finishing, a reader will watch a flirtatious couple and think to herself, “They’re doing it all wrong.” Thus her worldview has been changed forever. Still, the book is targeted at those who can tolerate seeing life as a stage, and most people would prefer their own version of reality. In Mastery’s case, Greene clearly believes it crucial that we all become Masters of our skills for our planet’s future. Thus after we read the stories, we are locked in to his deconstructions. Here Greene actually makes the same case for the seductive lifestyle, but this time it is gravely serious instead of guiltily pleasing.

Few will find the book inaccessible—Greene covers virtually every possible field and often includes the connections between them, such as Yoky Mastuoka’s work on robotics and tennis. Some might raise eyebrows when told that in childhood their career field was clear to them, but Greene compensates with a “reversal” addressed to those who lacked such direction, or, later, to those without the capacity for social intelligence. Rarely is Greene blunt about the specific issues facing our age, but parsing his implications can be its own adventure—is he speaking of hipsters in describing the ironic attitude? Does he believe, like Goethe foretold, that our information overload is leading to cultural decay?

The flaws in Greene’s prose haven’t changed. He overuses “Understand” and “Think of it this way:.” The problem with such repetitive phrasing is that just having read it in the last chapter, our brains are inclined to think we’ve read what follows this before, and so we skim. Furthermore, the length can be trying, and one wonders about the necessity of eight or nine stories for one of Greene’s steps—the constant shifting of setting and characters can render some sections hard to focus on, and even harder to recall.

Yet, as with his previous work, there is a method here, and it works in the book’s favor. Greene is not David Foster Wallace, nor does he wish to be—he includes just enough SAT words to read as authoritative but layman-friendly. And the aim of the over-length is to upload his ideas into the reader’s mind so that we ruminate sufficiently. In our attention-deficit culture, concision can be frivolous. Hence Greene’s loquacity might be precisely what will have Masters mentioning his book as an influence 10 to 20 years from now, and this time out of the closet.

Rating: A- ...more

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Nov 30, 2012 Filip rated it it was amazing

I spent almost as much time getting myself to write a review for this book as I have reading it. Is it a five star book? Is the repetition of featured stories (you know what I'm talking about if you've read it) such a big deal? Am I just getting fooled by Greene and riding an emotional high of "anything is possible to master if you set your mind to it"?

I've slept on it for long enough to conclude that this book indeed IS brilliant.

It completely shatters the myth of iconic people being destined ...more

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Nov 13, 2012 Courtney Rene rated it it was amazing

We all are searching for power of some type. We may not say it out loud, but deep inside we all know that this is a true statement. Whether it’s power through success or power through knowledge or whatever, we are all searching. On this quest for power we usually find that we have personal obstacles that get in our way, that we struggle to overcome, and block us at every turn. This book, Mastery by Robert Green wants to teach you how to overcome one of the biggest obstacles we face. The obstacle ...more

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Dec 18, 2012 Dave Bolton rated it it was ok

Unfortunately a mess of ideas and misconceptions (did you know that Albert Einstein discovered relativity due to spending a badly estimated 10,000 hours thinking about it over 10 years?) that did little to illuminate mastery. Lord, even the table of contents is confusing.

Some of the profiles are interesting, but they are also repetitive. Each time a profile is incrementally built on, one has to read all the parts that were earlier presented, which is a ridiculous way to treat a studious reader.

I ...more

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Sep 03, 2020 Krishna Chaitanya rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: productivity, self-help, 2020, nonfiction

"How to master a skill?" If this question is nagging you and keeping you awake at night, then you should pick this one. If you want to master the skill all by yourself not taking any help then you would lose decades of time, so, learn from the masters. Mastering a skill is frighteningly difficult task, but you could attain by learning from the masters who have patiently yet fiercely spent decades of time for their discoveries and inventions.

1) The apprenticeship phase: Follow your inclinations. ...more

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Mar 09, 2013 Paul rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: self-help, how-to, psychology

Drawing lessons from the lives of accomplished people, this book offers practical, organized advice for how to realize your own Life's Task.

If a friend had not recommended this book to me, I doubt I would ever have given it a look. I bought Greene's The 48 Laws of Power a few years ago but quickly found it to be repugnant. It struck me as being a manual for psychopaths: handsome, well laid out, well thought out--and chilling. I wondered what sort of a person Robert Greene must be.

I probably stil ...more

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Mar 25, 2013 Mark Bao rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites

4.5/5, rounding up. Best book I've read in a while, mainly because it's one of the few books I've found on long-term skill and personal development for excellence. The main thing I got from this book is: Mastery is the process of gaining knowledge in the right ways, in a field that you feel closely connected to, while in the process arranging support structures that increases your propensity of gaining that knowledge (especially mentors), then applying what you've learned to certain projects, wi ...more

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Aug 17, 2013 Rrrrrron rated it did not like it

Shelves: unfinished, post-tun

For a book that received mostly 4-5 stars on amazon and audible, this was particularly bad. So many other books on what drives success are so much better. For instance, Talent is Over-rated. Or Outliers. Or Drive. And the message is work hard and find something you are passionate about so that you work hard. Two main reasons why the book is so terrible.

First, it was meandering and long-winded trying to tie stories about evolution and human history to 'mastery'. And that was mostly nonsense and ...more

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Jun 09, 2013 Brian rated it it was ok

Shelves: own, first-reads, biography, nonfiction, social-science

I won this book as part of Goodreads' First Reads program in exchange for my honest review.

This book is really 2 distinct parts. The first is a series of biographies on modern and classic 'masters' in their respective fields. The second part is examining what lessons can be learned from these masters and how they can be applied in our everyday lives to become masters in our own rights.

I really enjoyed the biographies, they were a series of short, concise examinations of great people that was enj I won this book as part of Goodreads' First Reads program in exchange for my honest review.

This book is really 2 distinct parts. The first is a series of biographies on modern and classic 'masters' in their respective fields. The second part is examining what lessons can be learned from these masters and how they can be applied in our everyday lives to become masters in our own rights.

I really enjoyed the biographies, they were a series of short, concise examinations of great people that was enjoyable to read. However, I feel the application sections really didn't do justice to their subjects. The tone was so superior that it almost came off as condescending in my view. The author's book is based on 2 premises, that mastery is some lost art and that everyone should strive for mastery. The author takes a very simplistic view on the everyday world and essentially tells the reader to sacrifice everything else at the expense of becoming a master. He fails to realize that people have families that need to be supported, that not everyone will have the opportunities that those in the biographies had, that many fields are ultra competitive in this job market, and that being happy doesn't always mean being a master in your field.

Because of the authors view of mastery over everything else, I found a lot of the advice to very off-putting and ineffective. There are numerous instances where the pursuit of money is belittled, almost to the point that the author almost seems to say that earning money outside of your field to be mastered is ill-advised. There is a section on getting the most out of one's mentors, then ditching them, even with advice on how to get away from them. Even parents are ever so subtly denigrated at point. I literally laughed out loud when the author tells us that people who are friendly when you first meet them at work are secretly plotting to take you down.

The road to the author's mastery is to be a colossal jerk it seems. I would much rather take the path to accomplished and be nice.

I gave this book 2 stars; the wonderful biographies are outweighed by the higher-than-thou advice that really became a chore to read by the end. ...more

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Jul 19, 2015 Amir Tesla rated it it was amazing

Shelves: productivity, favorites

You want to be a genius? Here's the recipe. ...more

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Jan 02, 2017 Olly rated it did not like it

Shelves: self-help, worst-of-best-sellers, american-baloney, reviewed

We are all geniuses in the making, short of hard work and the right luck, so believes the populist Robert Greene.
For a book treating 'masters' as a scarcity in our population, now made all the rarer by ironic attitudes towards skill in a technological age, Greene introduces his book with the guarantee that every reader can find their inside talents and master them.

Stories of past 'Masters' are woven into threads of highly speculative narrative fallacies. What did Da Vinci think on his death bed? ...more

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Nov 05, 2012 Andrienne rated it it was amazing

I read this with lots of reservation. After all, I've read so many self-help and enlightenment sort of books before, so what could be new in this one right?
Well, there were plenty. It offers plenty of examples so it's more like a show than tell sort of approach, which I appreciated. There are a lot of nuggets in it that will allow the reader to reflect on the unifying theme of what Mastery is about. In my case, it was relevant because I have mastered (no pun intended) the jack-of-all trades conc ...more

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May 10, 2013 Frank Calberg rated it it was amazing

Takeaways from reading the book:

The book contains useful advice as well as several good examples of what masters such as Albert Einstein and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart did when they lived. Reading the book, I learned that a deep inclination toward a particular subject / field lies at the core of mastery. This inclination is a reflection of a person’s uniqueness. To find your path to mastery, you need to listen to who you are, listen to what dominates your thoughts, and connect with this inner force ...more

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Nov 19, 2012 Ben Lever rated it it was amazing

Shelves: psych, occupy, philosophy, politics, modern

Definitely one of the greatest books I've ever read.

Greene brings together the stories of various masters over the centuries - from scientists to pilots to boxers to writers - to show how one truly masters a field. Combating the pernicious myth of the naturally-talented genius who comes out of nowhere with the world-changing idea, he shows how an intense apprenticeship is necessary for the deep insights these masters produce - even though this apprenticeship does not often take the route of a co Definitely one of the greatest books I've ever read.

Greene brings together the stories of various masters over the centuries - from scientists to pilots to boxers to writers - to show how one truly masters a field. Combating the pernicious myth of the naturally-talented genius who comes out of nowhere with the world-changing idea, he shows how an intense apprenticeship is necessary for the deep insights these masters produce - even though this apprenticeship does not often take the route of a conventional education.

I feel like the pieces of this have been dancing around the edges for a long time. You see hints of it in Greene's first book, The 48 Laws of Power, and a strong feel of it is in his recent collaboration with 50 Cent, The 50th Law. But more than that, in blogs posts and things like Kirby Ferguson's video series Everything Is A Remix - our culture has some powerfully wrongheaded ideas about the natures of intelligence, creativity, power, and many other forces, and our traditional educational institutions are ill-equipped to prepare us for reality.

Although I don't like saying too much about it because I haven't actually accomplished anything yet, my life's current trajectory is already based on the kinds of things he's talking about, so this book will be immensely useful in fine-tuning what I'm doing. I've certainly missed some key aspects, and I will be re-reading this and his other works very soon.

I do have some minor nitpicks with some of the "rational vs intuitive" parts, and Greene does have a slight tendency to mythologise certain aspects of the world - he often talks about things being "impossible to explain" (as opposed to just "difficult to explain" or "beyond the scope of this book") and he commits the naturalistic fallacy a lot - but I suspect most of this is not really a problem with the ideas, just a problem with simplifying them for a mass audience.

To quote Greene's protege, Ryan Holiday, this book is "a master studying mastery in what turns out to be a masterpiece". I cannot recommend it highly enough. ...more

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Jan 14, 2014 Andy rated it it was amazing

"Mastery" is unlike Greene's previous books, which were "The Prince" for modern times. This one seems almost to have been written by a different person. Instead of instructing the reader on how to achieve fleeting victory over other evil jackasses, now the author is trying to help you to do something meaningful for the world in the long-term. The quirky perspective yields content that is not in any of the standard books on management, leadership, psychology or wisdom.

The audience here is the cr ...more

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May 09, 2014 Enrico Bertini rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

This is one of the most important books I read in my entire life. Mastery goes very well beyond any simplistic formula found in self-help books and describes what it takes to achieve mastery by analyzing the life of hundreds of masters from the past and today.

The book is organized in stages of maturity towards achieving mastery.

One of the main messages of the book that will stick with me forever is this: it does not matter how much talent you have, you will always need to spend and enormous amou ...more

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Jul 04, 2020 Ujjawal Sureka rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: paperback, 5-star, re-read-list

Genre: life mastery, career, passion
Publication Date: November 2012

One of the best books I have read recently. This book breaks down the reasons why the top performers like Da Vinci, Einstein, Goethe, Mozart, and many more have achieved so much their brief lifetimes in this planet.
It goes on to say how anyone can achieve their dreams, if they are willing to give their best and sacrifice immediate gratification. It holds some painful truths, and a lot of empowering information about how we have e ...more

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Jul 04, 2019 ScienceOfSuccess rated it it was ok

Shelves: waiting

Probably the best of Robert's books.

The main problem I had with this "masterpiece" is that his writing style is repetitive.
He starts a story, doesn't end it, then starts again and add something, and he does it with few stories over and over again.

Honestly, if he would take his pills, he probably could sum up the whole book in 20 pages.

This time I won't argue with research, assuming it was better, but he also took some ancient or unknown people and made them god's kind of.

Cool read if u want to ...more

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Dec 08, 2012 Ryan DeLuca rated it it was amazing

One of the best books I've ever read. Should be required reading for every teenager that wants success in life. ...more

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Feb 23, 2014 Olga rated it did not like it

Shelves: self-growth, neterminate, biography

supt din deget!
Survivorship bias. Hindsight bias. Narrative fallacy. Cherry picking famous biographies to fit the story. Overall - motivational gibberish for suckers!

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Oct 24, 2012 David Bradley added it

Robert Greene's Mastery explores the lives of many historical Masters (Mozart, Da Vinci, Proust, etc.) and explains how their Mastery is attainable for everyone. By ignoring societal constraints and complications, following our own interests, serving time in an apprenticeship phase, and staying committed to our craft, Greene believes that everyone can become a Master and make lasting contributions to society.

While I like Greene's message and find his writing to be absorbing, I have some serious Robert Greene's Mastery explores the lives of many historical Masters (Mozart, Da Vinci, Proust, etc.) and explains how their Mastery is attainable for everyone. By ignoring societal constraints and complications, following our own interests, serving time in an apprenticeship phase, and staying committed to our craft, Greene believes that everyone can become a Master and make lasting contributions to society.

While I like Greene's message and find his writing to be absorbing, I have some serious concerns about this book. First is the fact that Greene's conclusions stem from extremely shaky "evidence". There are practically no scientific studies cited in this book, and very rarely do Greene's interpretations involve any proof at all. Every piece of evidence that Greene presents to support his theory is anecdotal. Greene is not a scientist himself, and really gives no reason why we should believe his arguments. Throughout this book, I could not help but think that anybody could have come to Greene's conclusions and presented them as facts. So, why should we believe in what Greene has to say? Unfortunately, this book never provides an adequate answer. We are left to assume that what Greene tells us is true, because Robert Greene says so.

Another issue in this book is it's extremely repetitive nature. Every single section tells an anecdote about someone considered a Master in his or her field, and then Greene goes on to explain that this person is a Master only through hard work, something that everyone can achieve. This cycle occurs over and over and over and over and over and over, for 300+ crammed pages and is truly exhausting. Even more disconcerting is how Greene will, within his repetitive structure, duplicate anecdotal sections. There are three sections throughout the book that discuss famed boxing trainer Freddie Roach, and each section tells the same exact anecdote. A fact may be added or the story might be expanded at the end, but the reality is that I ended up reading the same story three times (never has Roach been given such exposure in a book that has absolutely nothing to do with boxing). The effect is nearly maddening and forced me to skim over various sections, searching for new information.

While I found a number of flaws with this book, I don't want to take anything away from Greene's prose. The book is well written, provides interesting mini-biographies about famous figures, and can be quite captivating in the areas that till new ground. But, for me, it is hard to take a book seriously when it relies so much on anecdotes and ignores the need for any scientific evidence. In a book about Mastery, it's clear that Greene is no Master of science, no Master of proof, and no Master of Mastery, but is, instead, simply a Master of selling books.

Thanks to Viking Books and First Reads for sending me the ARC of this book. ...more

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Dec 29, 2012 Richard Gazala rated it really liked it

Each of us has a passion. For a variety of reasons within and outside our control, very few of us pursue our respective passions to the point of achieving mastery over them. Author Robert Greene's great new book, "Mastery," can't help us defeat objective limitations truly beyond our control that prevent us from mastering those passions. Barring such limitations, however, "Mastery" is brilliant. It's nothing short of a concise, elegantly written, well-researched and deeply inspirational guide to ...more

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Dec 15, 2012 Arjun Ravichandran rated it liked it

'Mastery' is not of the same ilk as the supremely concise and concentrated '48 Laws' ; neither is it the deep psychological excavation of fear that was 'The 50th Law' ; It is an altogether different beast.
Fans of Greene's previous work who were expecting a manifesto (that is to say, a clear and sharp work) will be disappointed. The book is more diffuse, more abstract, and altogether, more difficult to get a good hold of.
That's not to say the book isn't without value. It's just different from Gr ...more

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Jul 27, 2013 Sully (thysaltymar) added it

“To the extent that we believe we can skip steps, avoid the process, magically gain power through political connections or easy formulas, or depend on our natural talents, we move against this grain and reverse our natural powers. We become slaves to time – as it passes, we grow weaker, less capable, trapped in some dead end career. We become captive to the opinions and fears of others.” (9) “This intense connection and desires allows them to withstand the pain of the process – the self-doubts, ...more

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Nov 27, 2012 Aaron Goldfarb rated it it was amazing

If you're a Greene fan, you're going to like this one. But it's also a good starting point if you've never read any of his works before. Personally, I still think 33 STRATEGIES OF WAR is his all-encompassing masterwork, but MASTERY is still highly valuable. ...more

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Nov 27, 2012 Aaron Wolfson rated it it was amazing

Your Life's Task is to discover your uniqueness, and express it in your work, the work only you can do. And the way to do that is to submit to the process of Mastery.

The Life's Task is a concept I've always believed in, but I've never been able to articulate it as well as Greene, who himself is a Master storyteller and synthesizer of how humans operate.

But since this is my review, I'll give it a go anyway, with a nod to Greene, as I couch my formulations in his and bask in his reflected luminesc ...more

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May 19, 2016 Willian Molinari rated it it was amazing

Shelves: audio, non-fiction

One of the best books I ever read.

This book goes through the life of various masters of our history. Some of them I did not know and decided to look after their life, which was a great experience as well.

If you want to be a master of something, be prepared to use a huge amount of time dealing with it and practicing. Masters don't become what they are by just working 9-5 and watching television in their spare time. They are passionate about what they do and most of the time they don't care about ...more

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Feb 14, 2015 Jeffrey rated it it was amazing

Shelves: career, rbt, learning

I like the way Robert Greene writes his books by filling his examples with historical figures. It makes you feel literate and a little smarter for reading them. He develops his models of how the world works by examining the biographies of great people and looking for the patterns. He sees the process of mastery of falling into a handful of discreet steps from apprenticeship (learning), to finding excellent mentors (or using books as mentors), how to optimize creative synthesis, until you reach " ...more

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Nov 13, 2012 Shaina rated it it was amazing

Shelves: first-reads-read

*Disclaimer: I received a free copy from the Goodreads First Reads Program.*

I have never read anything similar to "Mastery" before and approached Greene's book with an open mind. The lessons in these pages are invaluable. Greene uses examples of household names to convey the idea that mastering something is so much more than an innate talent or uncanny ability. The book is well organized. The one thing I wasn't a fan of was the font size. Being that this reads almost like an academic text, the t ...more

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Nov 13, 2012 Doug Lautzenheiser rated it really liked it

Shelves: business

On my bookshelf are four books by Robert Greene covering Power, War, Seduction, and Mastery. Greene has an amazing ability to research and summarize the great people and topics of the world.

In this particular book Greene explores Mastery, providing insight into the lives of amazing people of whom we have all heard: Albert Einstein, Henry Ford, Benjamin Franklin, and Leonardo da Vinci. But Greene also includes some modern day geniuses and heroes of lesser renown, such as: John Coltrane, Freddie ...more

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More examples of Mastery	14	109	Sep 22, 2019 05:46AM
Goodreads Librari...: Incorrect grammar	2	61	Jan 28, 2014 02:48PM
Must I "adore" my Life's Task?	2	66	Apr 23, 2013 03:51AM

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About Robert Greene

Robert Greene

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Best-selling author and public speaker, Robert Greene was born in Los Angeles. He attended U.C. California at Berkeley and the University of Wisconsin at Madison, where he received a degree in classical studies. He has worked in New York as an editor and writer at several magazines, including Esquire; and in Hollywood as a story developer and ...more

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Quotes from Mastery

“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. Repeated failure will toughen your spirit and show you with absolute clarity how things must be done.” — 305 likes

“The future belongs to those who learn more skills and combine them in creative ways.” — 220 likes

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