Thus [if you embrace wisdom and reject the ways of wicked men and the adulteress] you will walk in the ways of good men and keep to the paths of the righteous (Proverbs 2:20).

This Proverb seems to lay out a simple formula for goodness, righteousness, and well-being:  Embrace wisdom >> Reject the ways of wicked men >> Reject the temptations of the adulteress >> and -- BAM! -- you're good to go.  The only problem is that it's much easier said than done.

The first -- and most important -- part of the process is embracing God's wisdom.  As I've previously noted, there seems to be some strong overtones of the Gospel in the Proverbs repeated admonishments towards embracing God's wisdom.  In many passages, I believe that the word wisdom could be interchangeable with the word Jesus (or the phrase "Salvation in Jesus" or "God's grace, extended to us through Jesus").  Like I said before, I encourage you to check this for yourself; it's genuinely englightening, and it presents surprisingly consistent biblical theology.  But however much you buy into this substitution trick, it's ultimately undeniable that righteousness has a lot more to do with what you embrace more than what you reject.  Embracing the wisdom of God's Word -- and the physical embodiment of this Word (i.e. John 1) -- is the most essential part of finding good ways and righteous paths.  Without this, you can reject all the "bad stuff" you want, and your situation will not be significantly changed.  But if you can embrace wisdom / Jesus, then everything changes.

Even so, part of following God and following Jesus means rejecting all other forms of idolatry or self-fulfillment.  Most notably, we tend to do this through trying to accumulate wealth (even through illicit means) or through seeking relational and/or sexual satisfaction (even through illicit means).  But if we really want to be able to embrace wisdom with both arms, we have to let go of some of the other crap that we're carrying.  We have to repent -- drop what we've been doing and deliberately start up with something new.  But old habits die hard.  And a lot of times, I find myself subconsciously drifting back towards sinful, misleading, descructive, idolatrous patterns -- until I wake up again, and remind myself to reject the ways of wicked men (including my own wicked tendencies) and reject the adulteress, and freshly and fully embrace the wisdom of God and the person of Jesus.

As previously mentioned, Proverbs 2:20 can sound simple and formulaic, to a fault; but it really is true.  If I can embrace wisdom (as described in Proverbs 2:1-11) and use it to reject the ways of wicked men (as described in Proverbs 2:12-15) and to save myself from the adulteress (as described in Proverbs 2:16-19) -- thus will I walk in the ways of good men and keep to the paths of the righteous.  But it all hinges on God's grace and goodness, as demonstrated in the sacrifice of Jesus.  It's not just that if I do right, then I will be right.  It starts with embracing... and then if my hands and arms are sufficiently occupied in the act of embrace, I just won't have the room for anything else.