We first become salesmen as children in the confession booths of our parents.

Deception and privileged secrets are common facets of politics.

The values most important to us are always the most easily exploitable.

The thing about lying is it’s like creating your own world, controlling your own little world. A tiny innocent, or as some people call them white lie, can lead eventually to the break-up of a...

The black widow, who had dispatched a lover or two, was sought out for her wisdom. The young spider asked her, “Did you keep his harmful secret under the threat of danger, or did you...

There’s a huge swath of humanity that has developed verbal abilities to extract resources from guilt-ridden people.They used to be priests, and now they’re leftists.

That is how it is with lies. If you can have enough people believe your lies, before you know it, even the one you have lied against will be confused. The lie will make itself...

There are types of people who want to have leverage over other people’s lives. For no other reason than they feel the need to have leverage. I find this to be a certain type of...

To dream” means to focus and zoom the photos of destiny called visions for clearer view, manipulation and exploitation.

sodoyouthinkyoucouldtrustmetogotothedancetonight?” she blurted before losing her nerve. Viktor and Viveka exchanged a quick glance.Are they considering it? They are! They trust -“No,” they said together. Frankie resisted the urge to spark. Or scream. Or threaten...

Part of the problem was that I couldn’t seem to get past the fact that I hadn’t tried to escape from Kas. Even in France, when he’d left me on my own for several days,...

I have a problem with receiving help in any form. I have lived a life where more often than not if something was given to me, it came at a price. An emotional price, a...

I too often allow people to become a sterile commodity to be bartered in the service of my greed, and in doing something so absurdly reckless I foolishly barter away everything that meets my need.

In a culture that is becoming ever more story-stupid, in which a representative of the Coca-Cola company can, with a straight face, pronounce, as he donates a collection of archival Coca-Cola commercials to the Library...

Gender roles suck,” says Swift Fox.Then you should stop playing them, thinks Toby.

The witch-hunt narrative is a really popular story that goes like this: Lots of people were falsely convicted of child sexual abuse in the 1980s and early 1990s. And they were all victims of a...

Always think at least two steps ahead [in everything, with everyone].

Just because something isn’t a lie does not mean that it isn’t deceptive. A liar knows that he is a liar, but one who speaks mere portions of truth in order to deceive is a...

We can be seduced…by powerful political groups that promise more wealth and lower taxes. Those with power can use clever, psychological tricks and play upon our weaknesses and brokenness in order to attract us to...

And the priests looked down into the pit of injustice and they turned their faces away and said, ‘Our kingdom is not as the kingdom of this world. Our life on earth is but a...

There are those whose primary ability is to spin wheels of manipulation. It is their second skin and without these spinning wheels, they simply do not know how to function. They are like toys on...

Virtually all organisations known to you work largely by means of your greed. They attract you because… they appeal to your greed.

Young girls are like helpless children in the hands of amorous men, whatever is said to them is true and whatever manipulation on their bodies seems like love to them, sooner or later, they come...

[W]hat we also see in sex is a kind of submissiveness. But not a kind of submissiveness which is simply ‘do what you like, I’m just here for you’, but it…is, or can be, very...

How can you measure progress if you don’t know what it costs and who has paid for it? How can the “market” put a price on things – food, clothes, electricity, running water – when...

I’m very depressed how in this country you can be told “That’s offensive” as though those two words constitute an argument.

She loved him. But he didn’t know how to love.He could talk about love. He could see love and feel love. But he couldn’t give love.He could make love. But he couldn’t make promises.She had...

And she liked it. The power over this man. The ability to choose who survived. To take lives and twist them as she pleased. She was power.

interview from Ross E. Cheit about The Witch-Hunt Narrative: Politics, Psychology, and the Sexual Abuse of Children (Oxford University Press, February 2014).In the foreword to your book you mention a book titled Satan’s Silence was...

[Everything you write is] not simply a collection of words, but a means of influence not to be taken lightly. Let your recipient’s emotions be the gondola, and your words, its gondolier.

What man ever openly apologizes for slander? It is not so much a feeling of slander as it is that of a massive lie, a misdeed not only to the slandered but also to those...

Betrayal is too kind a word to describe a situation in which a father says he loves his daughter but claims he must teach her about the horrors of the world in order to make...

Readers must be given room to bring their own emotions to a piece so crammed with emotional content; the writer must tenaciously resist explaining why the material is so moving.

I am sure that I am in possession of a soul that is at the very least, a thousand years old. And I say this not on a whim; I say this as someone who...

Instruction would be wasted on me. Just to give me the form and I’ll sign on the dotted line.

Once you have money and fame, the next thing you should expect is scandal and shame.

The household was pervaded by this atmosphere of a calm adult woman and a man who gave into animal impulses. She reported to him in great detail what her analyst … said about his binges...

Emotions manipulates the man more than habits do.

And pity–people who inspire it in you are actually very powerful people. To get someone else to take care of you, to feel sorry for you–that takes a lot of strength, smarts, manipulation. Very powerful...

illegitimate” sources of satisfaction: experiencing a loss of self-respect for indulging in activities contrary to personal moral standards of conduct; risking the displeasure and misunderstanding of others important to her; and opening oneself to the...

The men and women who continue to hold Lynn’s mind hostage against her will believe the future will be tilled with terrorism, death, destruction and a challenge to the survival of America. They believe Lynn...

I have control over how I plan to react, feel, think and believe in the present. No one guides the tone of my life, except me!

Every man walks his own path, and every path has its fair share of locked doors. You never know who holds the key to a door you’ll need to open one day, so you best...

We humans always seem to take a manipulative posture. No matter what the particulars of the situation, or the subject matter, we prepare ourselves to say whatever we want in order to prevail in the...

The time we spend caring about people and loving them could have also been used for manipulating and seducing.

advice” in a spirit of love and helpfulness, but we can be much more helpful when we help them to find their own ways of changing things. It can be incredibly freeing to spend an...

I always feel anxious if anyone’s close to uncovering my secrets.

How did you get back?’ asked Vautrin. ‘I walked,’ replied Eugene.’I wouldn’t like half-pleasures, myself,’ observed the tempter. ‘I’d want to go there in my own carriage, have my own box, and come back in...

Its funny when people recently change their attitude to gain entrance into your heart, which may only ignite your passion to close the door.

Convincing someone to have sex is the same as manipulation and does not actually count as getting consent.