# Proverbial Corollaries

Proverbs are pocket‑sized IF‑statements: folk pseudocode that ships the trigger but hides the ELSE.

To find alpha: treat the proverb as *true*, then ask what happens in the missing branch.

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1 RECIPROCITY
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The sayings in this bucket assume social payoffs are maximized when inputs and outputs match.

*   **“Treat others as you wish to be treated.”**
    *   Implication: *The way they treat you is the way they want to be treated by you.*
    *   Mirror their style. Tell stories to the storyteller. Ask the question-asker questions. Criticize the critic.
    *   Warm feedback? Great. Cold recoil? You are in a non-reciprocal setting.
*   **“Give credit where credit is due.”**
    *   Implication: *Undue credit is a loan. Expect to repay it.*
    *   When you receive unearned praise, log it as an attempted leverage hook. Bank the flattery, audit the motive, and don’t accept the IOU until verified.
*   **“Honesty is the best policy.”**
    *   Implication: *Dishonesty harms somewhere. Figure out where.*
    *   Map the system by modeling precisely *how* dishonesty would destroy you. Failure points reveal where the policy actually matters.
*   **“Absence makes the heart grow fonder.”**
    *   Implication: *If your heart’s not fonder, they weren’t absent enough.*
    *   Too-near absence is just muted presence. Extend the gap until longing spikes, or no-one cares anymore. Clarity either way.

Anyone who enacts one of these norms is broadcasting a personal desire. Echo to confirm; if they recoil, you’ve unmasked a performance.

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2 THRESHOLDS
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These proverbs embed a hidden boundary, *x ≥ k*, beyond which the advice reverses.

*   **“A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.”**
    *   Implication: *A bird in the hand is worth less than three in the bush.*
    *   The risk‑adjusted math flips once the opportunity is big enough. Trade away the sure thing.
*   **“A picture is worth a thousand words.”**
    *   Implication: *A picture is worth less than ten thousand words.*
    *   When a 10,000‑word technical doc costs pennies to create, store, and search, prefer text. Pictures smuggle ambiguity.
*   **“Look before you leap.”**
    *   Implication: *If others are leaping, assume they looked.*
    *   A mass of people already leaping marks discovered value. Verify quickly, then jump while uncertainty is still cheap.
*   **“No pain, no gain.”**
    *   Implication: *If there’s no gain, there should be no pain.*
    *   Discomfort untracked by progress is malpractice. Make sure your pain is paying you.

There is a point beyond which proverbial guidance still applies, but in reverse. Locate that point; once crossed, do the opposite.

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3 SIGNALING
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Here the wisdom isn’t about truth, but about the heuristics people use to guess at truth.

*   **“The grass is always greener on the other side.”**
    *   Implication: *Your grass looks greener to them.*
    *   If outsiders envy your lawn, sell them the fertilizer. Monetize their projection.
*   **“Actions speak louder than words.”**
    *   Implication: *Pay attention to unexplained actions.*
    *   Quiet, decisive moves can shout the loudest. Big promises with limp follow‑through are noise.
*   **“Slow and steady wins the race.”**
    *   Implication: *Anyone cruising at turtle pace thinks they’re in an endurance match.*
    *   Either sprint early and finish before their compounding hits, or start selling gatorade to both tortoises and hares.
*   **“Birds of a feather flock together.”**
    *   Implication: *Change your feathers, change your flock.*
    *   Change your visible signals first (clothes, jargon, writing topics) and your network will reconfigure around the new feathers
*   **“Those in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.”**
    *   Implication: *If you don’t live in a glass house, feel free to throw stones.*
    *   If you’ve bullet‑proofed your own reputation, stone‑throwing can be an offensive moat. Fragility is the real glass.

Play with the heuristic to change the game.

### CALL FOR CONTRARIAN MAXIMS

Know a proverb that evades these buckets? Drop it in the comments. Let’s find its ELSE together.