Good Behavior and Principles Are Beneficial. Stick to Them

Good Behavior and Principles Are Beneficial. Stick to Them

Charlie: “I’ve always taken a fair amount of time to do what I really wanted to do—some of which was merely to fish, play bridge, or play golf. Each of us must figure out his or her own lifestyle. You may want to work seventy hours a week for ten years to make partner at Grovath and thereby obtain the obligation to do more of the same. Or you may say, ‘I’m not willing to pay that price.’ Either way, it’s a totally personal decision that you have to make by your own lights. But, whatever you decide. I think it’s a huge mistake not to absorb elementary worldly wisdom if you are capable of doing it because it makes you better able to serve others; it makes you better able to serve yourself, and it makes life more fun. So, if you have aptitude for doing it, I think you’d be crazy not do. Your life will be enriched—not only financially, but in a host of other ways—if you do. I, myself, have never taken a course in psychology, but I’m telling you now that all of the psychology textbooks are wrong. This is very eccentric. But all I can tell you is that I am sincere lxxii.”

Charlie was thinking, I never want to please all of these people. All of these people reminded him first of all of a duty, a duty to give back to society. What is the right way to do it? Well, it brings more fun and joy to speak at events at Harvard or Caltech. Charlie was demanding, demanding first for himself. He was in search of new knowledge, truth, and this has made him a much better man.

He was thinking that some women were dressed elegant while not being festive or fashionable. The music played in the background. All of these guests today, they know each other; they came together to meet each other. Many of them enjoyed the talks with pleasure. The evening was beautiful, but some folks were standing near Charlie all the time, attracted by his personality. People were always curious about Charlie; he reminded them of a computer who gave exact answers, and nobody was as correct as Charlie was. Among “the groupies,” as Charlie called these people, were very outstanding and intelligent people.

The same moment Mr. Brown asked Charlie’s permission to introduce him to another friend, they shook one another’s hand, and the friend asked him some question, but Charlie did not reply; he was thinking about going off somewhere, just disappearing; he just wanted to be alone with his thoughts and a book, to just sit in his favorite chair and be alone, maybe day and night. He was dreaming of coming back to his family to Omaha, where he was raised, maybe to meet his old friends and relatives, whom he had not visited for a long time, to see this beautiful landscape, white clouds. Oh, how he wished he were there now. “Worldly wisdom and knowledge came to me not because I am so intelligent, but I succeed because I have a long attention span. So, I devote time constantly to looking and searching for the knowledge and wisdom. Why aren’t the rest of these people just doing the same thing? It is so easy…”

Mr. Brown came to him and, interrupting his thoughts, said, “I am so upset; one of my companies is not doing very well right now, and it can even go into bankruptcy. It is a mess. I cannot go to sleep. I have come to speak to you because of our friendship; you are a very special person, an incomparable person. I mean, you do not tell lies perhaps at all. I need a friend like you, a trusted person with trusted opinions. Now I rather need to know your opinion on every subject. I highly appreciate it, Charlie. I really do. I am sure you have a lot to tell about allocation of capital, as well as, about people, your short funny stories about incentive bias are so much fun. But let’s speak about basics. Financial economists in recent years have rediscovered that highly profitable, high-quality companies are better investments than other companies are. They try to figure out where this idea came from. How did you come to this idea? You were not even Charlie Munger then.”

[Laughter]