Yesterday I read about my friend’s good friend in his diary. He said that his good friend is a talented person with both political integrity and talent. His friend’s online name is ‘Brother Dawai’, and he is a legendary figure in the engineering surveying world. He said that Brother Dawai was an angry young man who dared to tell the truth and shook his head repeatedly when criticizing some professors who were seeking fame. But he is very principled in how he behaves and always considers things from the other person's perspective.

Once when he was responsible for purchasing surveying and mapping instruments for his unit, when the manufacturer wanted to bribe him during the inquiry stage, he flatly refused. During the epidemic, Brother Dawai called him directly and told him that he would not have to pay him wages in March and April, and he would stay in his hometown. When he usually travels on business, he will try every means to save money for him. Seeing this, I have to sigh, big crooked brother, usually many of us try to find ways to report more false accounts on the way to deceive the company's money into our own pockets. And Brother Dawai has always been something that doesn't belong to him, and he doesn't touch it.

Later I told my friend that after reading your diary, I remembered Buffett’s partner Charlie Munger. I think there are many similarities between Big Brother and Charlie Munger.

In "Poor Charlie's Almanac", it is mentioned that Charlie Munger is an outspoken person. When he saw that Bill Gates was being studied by the U.S. Congress on whether to split up his When Microsoft came to power, he directly attacked the U.S. Congress. He said that it is not easy to find a competitive enterprise, but you must kill it. When he criticizes people, his most common metaphor is that if you put some raisins on shit, it's still shit. No matter how much you make it look good, or add more good-looking rhetoric to it, it will still be a piece of shit.

We all know that when Munger invests, he will look for a margin of safety. One time when I had the opportunity to buy a stock at a high price, the sellers were two old ladies. It was obvious that the price could be lowered, but Munger told everyone not to lower the price, and then they bought it.

Another time, one of his friends was in urgent need of money, and then handed over the stock in his hand. His partner wanted to transfer his stock to Munger. The man sold it to him for $130,000. Munger said it was at least $230,000. Then he was given $230,000 to buy stocks. Why?

Munger said that it is one thing to try to find a margin of safety, but it is another thing to buy stocks from orphans and widows and make money from partners. He thinks that is a moral aspect. So he will have special moral requirements.

Are you envious of my friend for having a friend with qualities like Munger? Don't be envious, just be yourself and you will naturally attract people of the same frequency. My friend is such a person, so he surrounds himself with such people.

How can you become such a person? Let's continue reading "Poor Charlie's Almanac" together!

Charlie Munger is an old man with super wisdom. What are the personality characteristics of this person?

001? I especially love reading

Charlie Munger will bring a book with him wherever he goes, and he has a particularly classic saying, he said that as long as I have a book in my hand, I never feel like I'm wasting my time. He went to take a plane and found that the flight was delayed. It didn't matter. He just sat there with a book and read.

Charlie Munger is a person who loves reading very much, and he said that there is no one he knows who is not a person who loves reading. For example, his partner Buffett said to each other that the other person is like a bookcase with two legs or a book with two legs, because he is too good at reading. And his good friend Bill Gates also likes to read books.

The reason why Charlie Munger attaches so much importance to reading is because he always firmly believes in a particularly important sentence. This sentence comes from a small picture book read by American children. This small picture book is called "Little Red Mother" chicken". That little red hen encountered many difficulties. After encountering difficulties, the little red hen often said one sentence, "I will do it myself." This sentence, then I’ll do it myself, became Charlie Munger’s motto.

Charlie Munger went to Caltech and Harvard Law School, but he thought it did not help him. He felt that this education did not provide many valuable things, but he thought of the words of the Little Red Hen and the picture book he read in his childhood, and said, I will do it by myself, so he started reading by himself.

The recommended preface to this book was written by a Chinese friend of Charlie Munger. He said that because Munger was so old, they all respected him and he was never late. Whenever he makes an appointment with Munger, he usually goes five minutes early. He went there five minutes early and found Munger sitting there reading a book. Then he didn't speak to him when he came. You must see the agreed time. For example, if you meet at 9:30, he goes there at 9:25 and is still reading there. You only raise your head to talk to him at 9:30.

Because the appointment was to talk at 9:30, I will talk at 9:30 and read before 9:30. Later he said no, he couldn't let the old man wait for me, I would go earlier. Then he went there half an hour early and found Munger still sitting there reading. The two of them formed a tacit understanding. Even after he went there, he would take a book by himself and sit across from Munger and read like this.

Later he said, no matter how cruel I was, I would go an hour earlier, and finally I would go earlier than Munger. As soon as Munger walked in, he found him sitting inside and ignored him. He sat there and continued reading. He must read and see the appointed time before talking to him.

The extreme love of reading is a very important characteristic of these successful people. Successful people all love reading very much. In fact, I know that it is not that successful people love reading, but that people with good reading habits are more likely to succeed.

He continued to improve his thinking through reading and formed his own meta-thinking model. What is pluralistic thinking? Multiple thinking models cannot be obtained through the study of a certain subject. That is, the solutions provided by any single discipline are single, and this single solution is not enough to be applied when facing the world.

The example given is that when a person holds a hammer, he will look at others as nails. Because he only knows how to type and use one method to analyze problems, we often see people with economic thinking. He sees everything as economics and treats everything as economics. The relationship is particularly boring.

This is what I often say to my friends, don’t limit yourself, let yourself accept more other people’s opinions, read more good books, let yourself grow and form your own diverse thinking. We need to read a lot like Munger to exercise our diverse thinking. You know the most important discoveries in many disciplines, so Charlie Munger solved this problem through a lot of reading. This is his first characteristic, love to learn.

Let’s take a look, how much does Munger love reading?

The recommendation preface of this book was written by a Chinese friend of Charlie Munger. He said that every time he meets Munger, they all respect him because he is very old. He is never late and usually goes five minutes early. He went there five minutes early and found Munger sitting there reading a book. Then he didn't talk to him when he came. He had to wait until the appointed time before talking to him. For example, if we meet at 9:30, he goes there at 9:25 and is still reading there. It’s only at 9:30 that he raises his head to talk to him.

Because the appointment was to talk at 9:30, I will talk at 9:30 and read before 9:30. Later he said no, he couldn't let the old man wait for me, I would go earlier, and then he went half an hour earlier. He found that Munger was still sitting there reading a book, and he also read for half an hour. The two of them formed a tacit understanding. Even after he went there, he would take a book by himself and sit across from Munger and read like this.

Later he said, no matter how cruel I was, I would go an hour earlier, and finally I would go earlier than Munger. As soon as Munger walked in, he found him sitting inside and ignored him. He sat there and continued reading. He must read and see the appointed time before talking to him.

The extreme love of reading is a very important characteristic of these successful people, including many of our Chinese entrepreneurs. I also know that successful people especially love to read.

002? Modesty

He is very humble. He told others why the board of directors wanted him to sit on the stage, in order to appear that Buffett is not that old. Because he is six years older than Buffett, the two of them are from Omaha in the Midwest. They hold a shareholders' meeting once a year. At this shareholders' meeting, many people around the world go to see these two wise old men with the mentality of pilgrims.

Usually Buffett talks more. After Buffett talks, he often asks Munger, "Do you want to say a few words?" Munger's most classic answer is, I have nothing to add. This is what he says most often. He always believed that he had no particularly high talent. He just believes in diligence, he just believes in learning, and he can continue to learn and change. This is what makes him different from others.

003? Simplicity

Charlie Munger’s wealth is more than twice that of donations received by Harvard University since its founding, Berkshire Hathaway This is how much money the company has. They once became the richest people in the world, and were later surpassed by Bill Gates. All in all they are very rich people. He has a private jet, but his private jet is basically for his wife and children. He thinks that his wife has been with him for so many years and it is very hard. He went out and took a big plane, and it was in economy class. Later, people asked him why? He said that big planes are safer than small planes, and there is no evidence that small planes fly faster. I can get there in that time just sitting here. And the most important thing is that it is enough for him to be able to study there with peace of mind. Munger is a very simple man.

004? Sense of humor

As I said at the beginning, if you put some raisins on poop, it is still poop. No matter how much you make it look good, or add more good-looking rhetoric to it, it will still be a piece of shit. That's his sense of humor. Others asked him, Mr. Munger, can you play the piano? He said I don't know because I haven't tried it. We usually say I don't know, but he said he didn't know.

He often gives an example. He said that if a person does not know mathematics, what will he do? For example, he said that if a person does not have mathematical concepts in his brain, he will not be able to calculate permutations and combinations, he will not be able to calculate compound interest, he will not have the concept of probability theory, and he will not be able to solve calculus problems. A one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest.

Everyone thinks about the butt-kicking contest, where everyone kicks each other’s butts on the field. Whoever kicks others’ butts wins. But you are one-legged. How can you kick when you only have one leg? So this is one of his most commonly used metaphors, which is that you are the one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest, which is particularly fun because you can’t do math.

Humor is when wisdom is greater than its use. When a person's wisdom exceeds the need for use, humor occurs naturally without any effort.

005? Have a “multiple thinking model”

So let’s see next, what is a multiple thinking model? In Charlie Munger's concept, the most important thing is to be able to find multiple thinking models to explain the world.

Charlie Munger said something particularly important. He said that you must know the important theories of important disciplines and use them frequently. You must use them all, not just a few.

Most people only use the thinking model of one subject they have studied, such as economics, and try to use one method to solve all problems. Do you know what the proverb says? To a man with a hammer, the world looks like a nail, which is a stupid way to deal with problems. Charlie Munger believes that if we try to understand something that seems to exist independently, we will find that it is connected to everything else in the universe.

That is, when we use a single thinking mode to solve a problem, we usually think that this thing has its own separate attributes.

But Charlie Munger believes that everything is universally related to other things, and this universal correlation may require the use of the most important knowledge from different disciplines. He listed different subjects, including what? History, Psychology, Physiology, Mathematics, Engineering, Biology, Physics, Chemistry, Statistics, Economics and more.

Charlie Munger himself believes that he has about a hundred mental models. He believes that a person should basically master 80 to 90 mental models, and none of these mental models are what he has learned from. I learned it in college. All his subjects, including subjects like chemistry and biology, were learned by him through his own reading. After I was inspired by Charlie Munger, I also deliberately looked at important theories in some important disciplines for a period of time.

Charlie Munger is now over ninety years old. He said that every year he takes a look at his multiple thinking models and eliminates some of them that are never used or that he feels are inappropriate. Already obsolete. One or two more new things to learn, he's still adding new things to learn, so he's always changing. This is the cleverness of a smart person. He is always learning and changing, making his multiple thinking models richer, which is also a very interesting process.

I often say that a book and a person’s thinking at least have a way to solve a problem. If a hundred books are the thinking of a hundred people, then there are at least a hundred ways to solve the problem. Then you said that if you master these 100 problem-solving methods, will your speed of doing things, solving problems, and learning be much faster than those who do not know these methods?

Munger said that even if you cannot learn more than a hundred multiple thinking models, you must at least learn the most important ones. Which ones are the most important?

He said that the first and most important thing is mathematics. Just like the concept of compound interest, the concept of permutation and combination, and the concept of algebra in mathematics, these are some of the more important concepts in mathematics.

As for accounting, if you want to start a business, if you don’t understand accounting, it will be difficult for you to do well. You can easily be deceived by others, such as the Enron fraud incident, etc., and you will be deceived.

Then engineering, biology, and psychology, these are the things that Charlie Munger believes are the most basic things that you should learn if you can’t learn anything else. Don't wait for school to teach you, just learn it yourself.

006? Perseverance and Diligence

Munger is 93 years old, but he is still working and making money so diligently today, and he is very generous and has donated a lot of money to charity. project. One thing he often said was that body bags don't have pockets. This is what Westerners often say, that is, after you die, your bag will have no pockets, so it is useless to ask for so much money.

Let’s summarize some of Munger’s outstanding qualities. First, he loves reading very much. He carries a book with him wherever he goes, and he is like a walking bookcase. Second, he is very humble. Every time he is asked if he has anything to add? He would always say I had nothing to add. Third, although he is very rich, his wife and children can fly on small planes, and he always flies in economy class on big planes. Fourth, he has a great sense of humor, and what he says is not only humorous but also vivid. Fifth, he has multiple thinking models. His head is like an encyclopedia, containing the knowledge of every subject. Sixth, he is perseverant and diligent. He has reached the level of our grandfather. He is still working hard and doing charity. I really admire him.

The more I read, the more I find that successful people have some good habits, such as loving reading, being humble, simple, persevering and diligent, etc. From now on, when I am in meetings, I can no longer grab the microphone. I have to be more humble. It is not good to always be in the limelight. I want to learn from Munger’s perseverance and humility.