Quotation Collection

Your book bill ought to be your biggest extravagance. Clive Staples Lewis

• reading
• books

In my whole life, I have known no wise people (over a broad subject matter area) who didn't read all the time - none, zero. Charlie Munger

• education
• reading
• wisdom

Experience tends to confirm a long-held notion that being prepared, on a few occasions in a lifetime, to act promptly in scale, in doing some simple and logical thing, will often dramatically improve the financial results of that lifetime. A few major opportunities, clearly recognizable as such, will usually come to one who continuously searches and waits, with a curious mind that loves diagnosis involving multiple variables. And then all that is required is a willingness to bet heavily when the odds are extremely favorable, using resources available as a result of prudence and patience in the past. Charlie Munger

• patience
• investing

I find it quite useful to think of a free-market economy - or partly free market economy - as sort of the equivalent of an ecosystem. Just as animals flourish in niches, people who specialize in some narrow niche can do very well. Charlie Munger

• free enterprise
• capitalism

Faced with a choice between changing one's mind and proving there is no need to do so, almost everyone gets busy on the proof. John Kenneth Galbraith

• perspective

The here and now is all we have, and if we play it right it's all we'll need. Ann Richards

• contentment

Waiting for perfect is never as smart as making progress. Seth Godin

• progress
• perfection

The number one idea is to view a stock as an ownership of the business and to judge the staying quality of the business in terms of its competitive advantage. Look for more value in terms of discounted future cash-flow than you are paying for. Move only when you have an advantage. Charlie Munger

• investing

I'm no genius. I'm smart in spots, and I stay around those spots. Thomas Watson Sr.

• intelligence

The fate of the country does not depend on how you vote at the polls - the worst man is as strong as the best at that game; it does not depend on what kind of paper you drop into the ballot-box once a year, but on what kind of man you drop from your chamber into the street every morning. Henry David Thoreau

• character
• politics

A government is the most dangerous threat to man's rights: it holds a legal monopoly on the use of physical force against legally disarmed victims. Ayn Rand

• rights
• government

Individual rights are not subject to a public vote; a majority has no right to vote away the rights of a minority; the political function of rights is precisely to protect minorities from oppression by majorities. Ayn Rand

• rights

By desiring little, a poor man makes himself rich. Democritus

• desire

One of the common failings among honorable people is a failure to appreciate how thoroughly dishonorable some other people can be, and how dangerous it is to trust them. Thomas Sowell

• trust
• honor

I have an ideal life. I get to do what I want to do everyday. And money can't buy any more than that. Warren Buffett

• happiness

All history is one long story to this effect: men have struggled for power over their fellow men in order that they might win the joys of earth at the expense of others, might shift the burdens of life from their own shoulders upon those of others. William Graham Sumner

• tyranny

An organization that wins by exercising power starts to lose the ability to win by doing better work. And it's not fun for a smart person to work in a place where the best ideas aren't the ones that win. Paul Graham

• power

This is the source.

Happiness is not a station you arrive at, but a manner of traveling. Margaret Lee Runbeck

• happiness

Respect is love in plain clothes. Frankie Byrne

• respect
• love

You must constantly ask yourself these questions: Who am I around? What are they doing to me? What have they got me reading? What have they got me saying? Where do they have me going? What do they have me thinking? And most important, what do they have me becoming? Then ask yourself the big question: is that okay? Jim Rohn

• associates
• friends

Over the very long term, history shows that the chances of any business surviving in a manner agreeable to a company's owners are slim at best. Charlie Munger

• business

In investing, just as in baseball, to put runs on the scoreboard, one must watch the playing field, not the scoreboard. Warren Buffett

• investing

It’s not given to human beings to have such talent that they can just know everything about everything all the time. But it is given to human beings who work hard at it - who look and sift the world for a mispriced bet - that they can occasionally find one.

And the wise ones bet heavily when the world offers them that opportunity. They bet big when they have the odds. And the rest of the time they don't. It's just that simple. Charlie Munger

• gambling
• investing

Mimicking the herd invites regression to the mean. Charlie Munger

• uniqueness
• imitation

Develop into a lifelong self-learner through voracious reading; cultivate curiosity and strive to become a little wiser every day. Charlie Munger

• wisdom
• reading

Acknowledging what you don't know is the dawning of wisdom. Charlie Munger

• wisdom

Above all, never fool yourself, and remember that you are the easiest person to fool. Charlie Munger

• judgment

Determine value apart from price; progress apart from activity; wealth apart from size. Charlie Munger

• investing
• wealth
• progress

Recognize reality even when you don't like it - especially when you don't like it. Charlie Munger

• judgment

Remember that reputation and integrity are your most valuable assets - and can be lost in a heartbeat. Charlie Munger

• reputation
• integrity

I think track records are very important. If you start early trying to have a perfect one in some simple thing like honesty, you're well on your way to success in this world. Charlie Munger

• honesty

I'm right, and you're smart, and sooner or later you'll see I'm right. Charlie Munger

• funny

Trickery and treachery are the practices of fools that have not the wits enough to be honest. Benjamin Franklin

• lies
• honesty

I am a little pencil in the hand of a writing God who is sending a love letter to the world. Mother Teresa

• love
• God

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary. Steve Jobs

• purpose

As men, we are all equal in the presence of death. Publilius Syrus

• death

He will always be a slave who does not know how to live upon a little. Horace

• thrift

Many people set rules to keep from making decisions. Mike Krzyzewski

• rules
• decisiveness
• leadership

No one will really understand politics until they understand that politicians are not trying to solve our problems. They are trying to solve their own problems - of which getting elected and re-elected are number one and number two. Whatever is number three is far behind. Thomas Sowell

• politicians
• politics

The rule is not to talk about money with people who have much more or much less than you. Katherine Whitehorn

• money
• manners

We try more to profit from always remembering the obvious than from grasping the esoteric. Charlie Munger

• investing

Intelligent people make decisions based on opportunity costs. Charlie Munger

• judgment
• intelligence

If all you succeed in doing in life is getting rich by buying little pieces of paper, it's a failed life. Life is more than being shrewd in wealth accumulation. Charlie Munger

• money
• success
• wealth

Someone will always be getting richer faster than you. This is not a tragedy. Charlie Munger

• wealth
• money

Spend each day trying to be a little wiser than you were when you woke up. Discharge your duties faithfully and well. Step by step you get ahead, but not necessarily in fast spurts. But you build discipline by preparing for fast spurts. Slug it out one inch at a time, day by day. At the end of the day - if you live long enough - most people get what they deserve. Charlie Munger

• patience

Before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. When you become a leader, success is all about growing others. Jack Welch

• leadership
• success

Over the long term, it's hard for a stock to earn a much better return that the business which underlies it earns. If the business earns six percent on capital over forty years and you hold it for that forty years, you're not going to make much different than a six percent return - even if you originally buy it at a huge discount. Conversely, if a business earns eighteen percent on capital over twenty or thirty years, even if you pay an expensive looking price, you'll end up with one hell of a result. Charlie Munger

• investing

You must have the confidence to override people with more credentials than you whose cognition is impaired by incentive-caused bias or some similar psychological force that is obviously present. But there are also cases where you have to recognize that you have no wisdom to add - and that your best course is to trust some expert. Charlie Munger

• experts

Fools act on imagination without knowledge; pedants act on knowledge without imagination. Alfred Whitehead

• imagination
• knowledge

It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it. Upton Sinclair

• understanding

The safest way to try to get what you want is to try to deserve what you want. It's such a simple idea. It's the golden rule. You want to deliver to the world what you would buy if you were on the other end. Charlie Munger

• service

If you're not ready to die for it, put the word 'freedom' out of your vocabulary. Malcolm X

• freedom

Left-wing politicians take away your liberty in the name of children and of fighting poverty, while right-wing politicians do it in the name of family values and fighting drugs. Either way, government gets bigger and you become less free. Harry Brown

• freedom
• government

The [American] government's War on Poverty has transformed poverty from a short-term misfortune into a career choice. Harry Brown

• welfare