Today, let's write about reading experiences, as a way to output what we have input.

Revisiting: "Poor Charlie's Almanack."

The concept of reverse thinking mentioned in "Poor Charlie's Almanack" is very much worth emulating. For instance, when we invest in a project, we should think in reverse: what is the greatest risk we might encounter? Is it the risk of losing all our principal investment, or is it the risk of floating losses?

In facing our lives, the book mentions that Johnny Carson once said in a speech that he couldn't tell others how to achieve happiness, but based on personal experience, he could tell people how to ensure a miserable life.

He tried these things over and over, and each time it was painfully miserable. These prescriptions for a miserable life include:

1. The use of chemical substances to change one's mood or feelings;

2. Jealousy;

3. Resentment.

Once a person develops bad habits, such as alcohol or drug abuse, life will take a straight downward spiral into depravity.Drugs, needless to say, once a person becomes addicted to drugs, there is no difference between them and the devil.

Jealousy and resentment are the elixirs that lead to a painful life. Johnson said that life is already hard to swallow, why bother to stuff it into the bitter rind of resentment?

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Jealousy and resentment, on the surface, seem as if they do not exist, but if you pay attention, my neighbor has just changed to a new car, and his investment project made a lot of money in just two months. These subtle thoughts that slip through the cracks all reveal jealousy and complaints.

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What impressed me the most was Charlie Munger's speech at Harvard University's commencement ceremony. He continued Johnson's "good medicine" for making life continue to be painful and also prescribed four types of medicine. As long as one takes these four types of medicine, people are guaranteed to live a miserable life.

▌The first type of medicine: Inconsistency, never stick to what you are doing

Once you develop this habit, you can nullify all your inherent strengths.

Did you say with confidence yesterday that from today onwards, I will wake up early to exercise and run, and then forget about it tomorrow? Did you set a work plan for yourself yesterday, only to procrastinate with excuses today?

Last week, my husband and I watched the movie "The King's Speech" at home, which restored the true history. The king was the father of Queen Elizabeth II, Albert, who suffered from a severe stutter since childhood. Under the treatment of his speech therapist Lionel Logue, he persevered and overcame obstacles to deliver an inspiring speech to the entire nation before World War II.Every successful person possesses a certain quality, and that is persistence.

Munger said: If you want to live in pain and achieve nothing, go ahead and be fickle and give up easily.

▌ The second medicine: Gain knowledge only from your own experiences, and don't learn from the successes or failures of others.

This medicine guarantees a painful life and second-rate achievements.

There is a way to live a second-rate life: never learn, never read, and stop educating yourself.

Once upon a time, there was a man who diligently mastered the finest achievements of his predecessors. Although his foundation was not good when he started studying analytic geometry and he found it very difficult to learn, he ultimately achieved remarkable success. He evaluated his own achievements in this way:

"If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants."

This man was the great Newton.

Only by understanding how to widely absorb knowledge can one achieve success.▌The third ingredient: When you encounter your first, second, and third serious failures, please become disheartened and never recover.

Once you take this medicine, it will ensure that you are forever mired in the quagmire. Because even the smartest and luckiest people will encounter many failures throughout their lives.

This medicine will surely guarantee that we are perpetually stuck in the quagmire of pain.

Recall our experiences from childhood to adulthood; in fact, we are quite resilient and have not been deeply entrenched in failure, because we have not achieved anything significant.

So what we need to do now is to continuously seek your achievements and breakthroughs. It is only after encountering obstacles that we can speak of failure. At this point, think about this medicine again, and you will find that if you want to live in pain, then give up on challenges.

▌The fourth ingredient: Indulge in subjectivity and ignore objective facts.

When facing investments, people often fall into two extremes.

The other day, my childhood friend and I were chatting, and I mentioned that I now go out almost without cash. She was surprised and asked if I wasn't worried about safety. She said she had seen many news reports stating that online payments are very unsafe, with hackers invading systems and stealing money.

Many times, we remain stuck in old perspectives, unwilling to face objective facts. They always view new things with suspicion and skepticism. They stand still, satisfied with their existing knowledge, and never bother to understand new things.

If you remain true to yourself and never change your original views, then not only will you be steadily on the path to obsolescence and ignorance, but you will also experience setbacks in your career development.Charlie Munger likes to compare a person's concepts to tools. Tools need to be updated and iterated, embracing new tools and objects, analyzing objectively, and viewing things as they are.

Rousseau once said that no one's life can be called happy until it has ended.

Therefore, there is no method that can guarantee happiness. However, there are surefire recipes for causing suffering.

Stay away from the above prescriptions and pursue success and happiness.

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The process of reading is a process of dialogue with the author. The way of thinking mentioned in "Poor Charlie's Almanack" reminds me to frequently apply it in life and work.

For example, I have also found that endless scrolling through screens shows me other people's lives and stories, but how much of it is truly relevant to me.

Investing is the same; which risks are you truly willing to bear? Objective analysis and judgment, minimizing subjective and entrenched conceptual judgments, will yield greater rewards.