Charlie Munger, the vice chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, is a renowned investor, business thinker, and philanthropist. Over the course of his career, Munger has shared his insights on investing, decision-making, and life in general. In this blog post, we’ll share some of our favorite Charlie Munger quotes.
Munger’s advice is often simple but effective. He is a big believer in mental models, and he encourages people to think for themselves and to question everything. Munger is also a big proponent of lifelong learning.
He believes that it’s never too late to learn, and that it’s important to keep learning new things throughout your life.
Munger’s legacy is his ability to share his wisdom with others. He has taught many people about investing, business, and life. He has helped countless people achieve success. Munger is a role model for many people, and his advice is respected by all.
Here are some of our favorite Charlie Munger quotes to get you inspired and motivated for success.
43 Charlie Munger Quotes
- “Go to bed smarter than when you woke up.”
2.“Remember that reputation and integrity are your most valuable assets—and can be lost in a heartbeat.”
3. “It takes character to sit with all that cash and to do nothing.
4. “I didn’t get top where I am by going after mediocre opportunities.”
5. “To get what you want, you have to deserve what you want. The world is not yet a crazy enough place to reward a whole bunch of
6. “What are the secret of success? -one word answer :”rational”
7. “There is no better teacher than history in determining the future… There are answers worth billions of dollars in 30$ history book.”
8. “The world is full of foolish gamblers and they will not do as well as the patient investors.”
9. “Great investing requires a lot of delayed gratification.”
10. “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. You’d be amazed at how much Warren reads–and at how much I read. My children laugh at me. They think I’m a book with a couple of legs sticking out.”
11. “Knowing what you don’t know is more useful than being brilliant.”
12. Just because you like it does not mean that the world will necessarily give it to you.”
Charlie Munger Quotes on Reading and Acquiring Knowledge
13. “Acquire worldly wisdom and adjust your behavior accordingly. If your new behavior gives you a little temporary unpopularity with your peer group…then to hell with them.”
14. “Spend each day trying to be a little wiser than you were when you woke up. Day by day, and at the end of the day-if you live long enough-like most people, you will get out of life what you deserve.”
15. “The big money is not in the buying or the selling, but in the waiting.”
16. “How to find a good spouse? -the best single way is to deserve a good spouse.”
17. “The iron rule of nature is: you get what you reward for. If you want ants to come, you put sugar on the floor.”
18. “Envy is a really stupid sin because it’s the only one you could never possibly have any fun at. There’s a lot of pain and no fun. Why would you want to get on that trolley?”
19. “All I want to know is where I’m going to die so I’ll never go there.”
20. We all are learning, modifying, or destroying ideas all the time. Rapid destruction of your ideas when the time is right is one of the most valuable qualities you can acquire. You must force yourself to consider arguments on the other side.”
21. “People calculate too much and think too little.”
22. “I believe in the discipline of mastering the best that other people have ever figured out. I don’t believe in just sitting down and trying to dream it all up yourself. Nobody’s that smart…”
23. “Mimicking the herd invites regression to the mean.”
24. “I try to get rid of people who always confidently answer questions about which they don’t have any real knowledge.”
Charlie Munger Quotes on Life
25. “I constantly see people rise in life who are not the smartest, sometimes not even the most diligent, but they are learning machines. They go to bed every night a little wiser than they were when they got up and boy does that help, particularly when you have a long run ahead of you.”
26. “If something is too hard, we move on to something else. What could be simpler than that?”
27. “When you locate a bargain, you must ask, ‘Why me, God? Why am I the only one who could find this bargain?’”
28. “It’s dishonourable to stay stupider than you need to be”
29. “I think life is a whole series of opportunity costs. You know, you got to marry the best person who is convenient to find who will have you. Investment is much the same sort of a process.”
30. “Take a simple idea, and take it seriously.”
31. “I did not succeed in life by intelligence. I succeeded because I have a long attention span.”
32. “The best armour of old age is a well spent life preceding it.”
33. “Develop into a lifelong self-learner through voracious reading; cultivate curiosity and strive to become a little wiser every day.”
34. “We have three baskets: in, out, and too tough. … We have to have a special insight, or we’ll put it in the “too tough” basket.”
35. “I believe in the discipline of mastering the best that other people have ever figured out. I don’t believe in just sitting down and trying to dream it all up yourself. Nobody’s that smart.”
36. “Those who will not face improvements because they are changes, will face changes that are not improvements.” – Charlie Munger
37. “A lot of people with high IQs are terrible investors because they’ve got terrible temperaments. And that is why we say that having a certain kind of temperament is more important than brains. You need to keep raw irrational emotion under control. You need patience and discipline and an ability to take losses and adversity without going crazy. You need an ability to not be driven crazy by extreme success.”
38. I paid no attention to the territorial boundaries of academic disciplines and I just grabbed all the big ideas that I could.”
40. “The best thing a human being can do is to help another human being know more.”
41. “Usually, I don’t use formal projections. I don’t let people do them for me because I don’t like throwing up on the desk, but I see them made in a very foolish way all the time, and many people believe in them, no matter how foolish they are. It’s an effective sales technique in America to put a foolish projection on a desk.”
42. “Understanding how to be a good investor makes you a better business manager and vice versa.”
43. I would argue that a majority of the horrors we face would not have happened if the accounting profession developed and enforced better accounting.”