We both (Warren Buffett) insist on a lot of time being available almost every day to just sit and think.That is very uncommon in American business.We read and think.
Ninety-nine percent of the troubles that threaten our civilization come from too optimistic, therefore we should have a system where the accounting is a way more conservative.
A lot of people think if you just had more process and more compliance- checks and double-checks and so forth-you could create a better world.We just try to operate in a seamless web of deserved trust and be careful of whom we trust.
Part of what you must learn is how to handle mistakes and new facts that change the odds.Life, in part, is like a poker game wherein you have to learn to quit sometimes when holding a much-loved hand.
In my whole life, I have known no wise people...who didn't read all the time --none, zero.You'd be amazed at how much Warren reads --at how much I read...They think I'm a book with a couple of legs sticking out.
Another thing, of course, is that life will have terrible blows in it, horrible blows, unfair blows.It doesn't matter.And some people recover and others don't…
Confucious said that real knowledge is knowing the extent of one's ignorance.Aristotle and Socrates said the same thing.Is it a skill that can be taught or learned? It probably can, if you have enough of a stake riding on the outcome...
Wisdom acquisition is a moral duty.It's not something you do just to advance in life...You are not going to get very far in life based on what you already know.You're going to advance in life by what you learn after you leave here.
Spend each day trying to be a little wiser than you were when you woke up.Discharge your duties faithfully and well.Systematically you get ahead, but not necessarily in fast spurts...At the end of the day if you live long enough most people get what they deserve.
One solution fits all is not the way to go.All these cultures are different.The right culture for the Mayo Clinic is different from the right culture at a Hollywood movie studio.You can't run all these places with a cookie-cutter solution.
There's a tendency to think that our present politicians are much worse than we had in the past.But we tend to forget how awful our politicians were in the past.
The highest form that civilization can reach is a seamless web of deserved trust-not much procedure, just totally reliable people correctly trusting one another...