THE COMPANION VOLUME
The Modern Golden Rule
Don’t Be an Asshole
The Golden Rule as you learned it is only half the story — and maybe the less useful half. The oldest versions, four thousand years old, were phrased in the negative: not do unto others, but don't do what's hateful. This is a modern, personal guide to that older wisdom — the floor you stand on and the aspiration you reach toward.
Price TBC
The floor and the aspiration. Don't be an asshole. Live with grace, dignity, and compassion.
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The floor
Don't be an asshole. Be a decent human. The floor keeps you from doing harm — and most of us can recognize an asshole move when we see one. The harder part is catching our own.
See the merch →The aspiration
Grace, dignity, and compassion. The aspiration helps you do good — assume good intent, treat people as worthy, and pair empathy with action.
The floor keeps you from doing harm. The aspiration helps you do good. Both are necessary, and both can be learned.
Paperback & ebook ~255 pages
WHAT’S INSIDE
Eleven chapters that climb from the floor, through the inward work, out toward contribution.
The floor
Why the Golden Rule isn't enough, and why the older, negative formulation is the more useful half. The litmus test, the case for "be a decent human," and the starting line everything else is built on.
The inward work
Self-awareness through the Inner Eye, the inner critic and its committee of self-doubt, finding your purpose, and the chapter most people skip — learning to extend the same grace to yourself.
The outward work
Compassion as a practiced skill, leadership and the wake you leave, relationships and communication, team chemistry, daily practice, and stewardship — the shift from me to we.
FORMAT & WHAT YOU GET
Paperback and ebook, about 108 pages at 6×9 short enough to finish in an evening or two, structured enough to actually use, with the planning canvas printed right where you're reading. $10–15, print-on-demand on Amazon.
WHO IT’S FOR
For anyone standing at an inflection point who wants a place to begin: people laying down a foundation, professionals who've drifted from the reason they started, recent graduates who were never handed a planning practice, and managers who landed in the role without a map. If you've been meaning to sit down and figure out what's next, this is the sitting-down.
FROM THE WISDOM WALL
We may not always know what kindness looks like in a given situation, but most of us can recognize an asshole move when we see one.
— Andy Temte
THE COMPANION
If this is the why, here's the how: Stop Standing Still.
The Modern Golden Rule is the framework. Stop Standing Still is the practical planning guidebook that turns it into a plan you'll actually follow, purpose, vision, and a roadmap you can fill out in an evening.