No amount of money that I am going to give to charity will atone for the ass fucking I’m going to give you in this business.

If we had come together in some other way I feel certain that we might have been something akin to friends. But that can never happen now. Despite the ranks of your gifts, I hold to a code of loyalty (which may very well be outdated) but has served me well. And to be honest, I like the way it feels when we choose sides.

I feel like I should volunteer something too in the spirit of honesty

The fucking oppertunities I’ve had. And I have not waivered once. In 15 years. I get no credit for that? For the life that I’ve built? For the kind of man I am? I could have been out every single night models, musicians, your own so called friends, I could have done you like that. Maybe I should have, I get the same treatment from you now but at least then I would have earned it. By getting my fucking rocks off

The best way to bond with someone isn’t doing a favor, it’s asking for one.

Don’t serve rabbit food to an elephant and ask if he’s full.

No one quits while they’re ahead. This isn’t France. It’s America.

You need me because I am willing to stare into the abyss beyond conventional morality and do what needs to be done.

When I walk out that door today, we are friends for life or you don’t exist to me ever again.

You can’t have it appear you’re illegally meddling, especially when you’re illegally meddling.

You know your shopper isn’t your friend, a personal trainer doesn’t think you’re actually making progress, and all the charities you give money to don’t actually honor you when they honor you.

Rich guys head to the city when their marriages fall apart for the same reason birds fly south instead of freezing their asses off.

My father always said laughter was the best medicine, which is why I was so confused when I finally tried cocaine in the ’80s.

Are you running all four downs, playing every play like it’s your last? Is your mouth guard always in, chin strap always buckled? If that’s you, we’re good.

I like nightmares. When I wake up, they leave me deeply valuing my reality.

A man facing a firing squad has only two choices, accept it or push against his restraints.

Our practices leave grooves over time. And eventually, those grooves become walls that box us in.

Impose your will on him until he does what he needs to and repays the debt.

The individual sacrificing themselves for the whole can be the most beautiful thing there is. But not if it’s done under duress or for the wrong reasons.

We will retreat so we can attack when it is to our advantage.

China is a pig on LSD, you never know which way it’s going to run.

What words do you need me to say to make you feel safe?

You get one life, so do it all.

Only people with money forget about money.

You don’t want to be in politics, you want to be beyond politics.

Foolishness is right next door to strength.

Nobody leaves a negotiation happy.

Surrendered like a French fucking soldier!

What is it you do that you’re the best in the world at? You offer a service you didn’t invent, a formula you didn’t invent, a delivery method you didn’t invent. Nothing about what you do is a patentable or a unique user experience. You haven’t identified an isolated market segment, haven’t truly branded your concept. You need me to go on?

Do you know what it takes to find a truffle? A hog, a dog, whatever keenly scented, carefully trained animal gets the assignment, spends a lifetime traipsing through the dark, sniffing out the slightest aroma. And only then the digging begins. And what do you think they’re digging through? Shit. That’s the thing we don’t say much about, right? The things we most value, the things we pay most dearly to ingest are grown in shit.

I don’t believe in the soul not in the way it’s traditionally used, nor in the more modern meaning, which connotes connectedness and being spiritually awake. What I do believe in is actions, purpose, purity of vocation, and the challenges that come along with those things, the things that make me feel alive. Axe Capital gives me all of that and more. So, you worry about my soul, and I’ll just keep doing my job.

That suit is the mark of a lawyer who is successful at everything that doesn’t really matter.

But like all men of consequence, we put aside our differences in pursuit of a greater goal.

What do you think happends when a man resorts to threats in an effort so solicit my attention. What do you think happens to that man when I’m the XXXX.

And I know who they are, I know their help comes CHEAP. Hell sometimes free. You’re too old to not know that what comes free is oftem flimsy. You want this so badly, it’s got you believing in unicorns.

I hide in shame now, and people willl wonder what other weaknesses and depravities there are to discover

Some will quit, or die, but legends never quit

Don’t let all these motherfuckers get to you, just stay standing, longer than the other guy, and the next one, and the guy after that, whatever you need to do to outlast him. If he loses, you win. 

I’ve exchanged handshakes with 100,000s of truly disagreeable people, and whatever it says about me as a person, I’ll admit I’m willing to do it wth a million more of them to achieve my ends.  Willingness to fraternize with the depraved is a powerful weapon. Cause someone else out there certainly is.

Dying in your thirties or forties? “Tragic.” Fifties? “Such a shame.” Sixties? “Too soon.” Seventies? “A good run.” Eighties? “A life well lived.” Nineties? “Hell of a ride.”

The Fleshlight, the repository for the sadness and desperation of a single man.

You have to make them fear you, your vengeance, your whim, your everything.

That what warms the cockles. How our bond isn’t merely one of trading short term favors. 

Men seldom realized things are rigged in their favor. It wouldn’t help their ego if they had a realistic and limited view of their skills.

When heathens quote from the book of the good, I recoil

Elbow grease alone will not solve what elbow grease and a few silver coins will.

All I can do is X instead of Y, as an act of friendship that goes beyond the norm. As you have done for me. 

Of course, I will defend you in public against that prick… But between us, I think you fucked up. The risk-reward ratio is off, And there are better ways to impress girls, than putting your whole future at stake. I’m not mad you ran a scheme, I’m mad you didn’t plan it all out. 

How often does someone give you the chance to do the smart thing, even when ego and lifelong wiring are trying to pull you into a different direction? I understand, firsthand, what it is to choke down the bile of compromise for the sake of the greater good. Yes it feels gross, and you shudder and shake but you wake up the next day with your mind at ease because you have protected the long term. Instead of indulging in the momentary feeling of being strong. 

Perception and optics are at all times important levels in our business and life. And a unified team is much more powerful than either of you individually. 

I need to maintain a shred of credibility, we both know you missed it, and I was trying to broker the least embarrassing version. 

Certainly, an expert like yourself is familiar with the concept of taking a line of credit. Now imagine the interest that I can repay. Do this for us, and if you are ever in desperate straits, reach out for us and just watch what we can do. 

I trust that you will judge me not on your fears but my results when the time comes. 

Conscience is like those nonstick pans, Flakes off under heat. produced noxious fumes that ruin the whole enterprise. Now what you are looking for is a cast iron soul. Durable, seasoned.  

I am asking you to take down a larger thread, My mistake does not have to snowball into our mistake. 

I don’t believe corporations are people, they are better than people because they don’t fuck up when they get so obsessed with one thing they can’t see reality. 

You can take it right now, and you can leave while I’m down. Tell yourself and everyone you did it because you’re XXX and don’t consort with my kind. Because you XX will not be associated with someone who could do something like this. But power is atomic, and eventually, this moment, where one electron is slightly out of whack will end, the world will right itself again, and I will be on top again. And the curious thing is that I will have forgotten your name. I don’t believe in enemies, it’s not that I don’t have them, it’s that when you become my enemy, my next move, my only move, is to continue to rise. While you will sink, not by my hand, but by your lack of connection to me. So walk out on me now, but you won’t be done with me. As the song goes, On every wall and place my fearsome name will be heard, I’m the atomic punk. I will remain so, and you will simply evaporate. 

Some would say that by virtue of how much money you have, you have by definition done much wrong. 

Wealth is always going to exist, power alongside it, people are so consumed by the idea that money buys freedom that they can’t demand better of the powerful… or themselves.  As soon as they gain some power themselves, they forget about being better and just want to be rich. So the powerful have to demand it of ourselves, that is what I was trying to do. I can’t save the world, but I am going to leave it a lot better than I found it. 

I thought I meant it at the time, but we’re here now. 

Reassurance does no good because once you have been reassured, you are not becalmed for long, instead, you become trained for more reassurance.

In our world, we’re either driven by greed, ambition, or fear., if you’re driven by fear, I don’t even know why you’re standing in my fucking building. 

Happy? What’s that? Family dinners every night? Playing 18 on the weekend? Is that the kind of happiness are you aiming at? 

She is right, you won’t recognize yourself by the end of our time together, because that person lied to herself about who she was and what she wanted. That was a person who became artsy and quirky and analytical as a kid, instead of using what she felt. Which was hatred. 

You’ve turned it into something else Like I used to. But it impressed upon me that instead, and listen to me here, instead, it’s best turned into fuel, because it’s effective. And nothing burns as clean.