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Charlie Munger – Feeling Like a Victim Is Perfectly Disastrous

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Re: Charlie Munger – Feeling Like a Victim Is Perfectly Disastrous

#231

Post by EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK »

happytiger wrote: post #157
nullindividual wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For every Charlie Munger there are tons of working poor that get up everyday Not tons. Millions. If not hundreds of millions.

Billions. It is literally most of us. Wealth concentration is unintuitive in the extreme. But let’s debate the merits of yet another billionaire lecturing everyone about the merits of pulling yourself up by your bootstraps and not being a victim. Hard work doesn’t make billionaires. Systems that accelerate privileged positions and concentrate wealth to the top do. And that’s not necessarily bad. But it’s generally ba…

At least some billionaires created something useful. Finance guys don't create anything, they are just leeches who found ways to game the system.

Re: Charlie Munger – Feeling Like a Victim Is Perfectly Disastrous

#232

Post by jodrellblank »

sethammons wrote: post #101
bmitc wrote: post #2

[flagged]

I grew up poor. Something I realized early on is I had a lot of victim-mentality people around me. The world happened to them. I decided at an early age (like, under 10) that everyone is 100% responsible for everything that happens to them, including by chance. You get hit by a car? You were standing there. In this world view, you can have more than 100% responsibility because the driver that hit you is also 100% res…

> "I decided at an early age (like, under 10) that everyone is 100% responsible for everything that happens to them"

Do you think you were responsible for thinking like that when you were 9 years old?

Re: Charlie Munger – Feeling Like a Victim Is Perfectly Disastrous

#233

Post by anonuser123456 »

dexwiz wrote: post #65
profsummergig wrote: post #23

Charlie Munger had great advice in general. And I've learned a lot of good from him. But I will never get over the hypocrisy of owning a quarter of Coca Cola and constantly criticizing Americans for being overweight (he used words like "sloth").

He sponsored what essentially was a prison style dorm. He might have great advice, but it will probably make you a worse human. https://www.fastcompany.com/90740511/heres-what-its-like-liv...

A private room for a reasonable price in the world’s most desirable climate that a student can just go walk to on a lark. Why don’t we just send them to a super max!

Munger is an awful person for trying to help students get an education without resorting to crippling debt.

Re: Charlie Munger – Feeling Like a Victim Is Perfectly Disastrous

#234

Post by anonuser123456 »

dexwiz wrote: post #227
profsummergig wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had read about this dorm plan, and thought it was very brutal. Then I found myself in a windowless room for a day (voluntarily) with a PC and no internet. Literally staring at a wall. The most productive day I've had in a couple of decades. And I started to have second thoughts about his dorm plan. Maybe he was on to something.

I want to hear what day 100 of that is like, not day 1.

I’ve worked in such a room/rooms for most of my professional career (20 years now). It seriously makes zero difference. When you need fresh air you simply get up and go for a walk.

People work in submarines for 6 months at a time. Humans are adaptable.

Re: Charlie Munger – Feeling Like a Victim Is Perfectly Disastrous

#235

Post by anonuser123456 »

to1y wrote: post #174
dexwiz wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He sponsored what essentially was a prison style dorm. He might have great advice, but it will probably make you a worse human. https://www.fastcompany.com/90740511/heres-what-its-like-liv...

>Munger’s $200 million donation to the university is contingent on the structure being built to his windowless specifications. Reason being: >“Our design is clever,” Munger assured skeptics. “Our buildings are going to be efficient.” In addition to cutting costs and foiling potential defenestrations, his design would force students out of their sleeping cubbies and into communal spaces—with real sunlight—where, he sa…

Munger clearly understands the real suffering crippling debt causes and seems to be trying to move the needle on that front.

Re: Charlie Munger – Feeling Like a Victim Is Perfectly Disastrous

#236

Post by kamaal »

pjmorris wrote: post #37

This reminds me of something a friend said that's stuck with me for ~30 years: 'The bad news about taking responsibility is now it's your fault. The good news about taking responsibility is now you can do something about it.'

Taking extreme ownership of things might make you feel very uncomfortable while starting, but its makes things a lot more easier as they go, because you are for better or worse in control.

You either way in control, you just wish to not exercise it if you don't take extreme ownership of things.

Reminded of two things while we are at it. Sam Altman, once told this in a class - Its easier to start a hard company, than to start an easy company. Then something I heard on Joe Rogan- The more you indulge yourself in doing hard uncomfortable things, the more easier and content it gets as it goes. Its the people who do the easy things that end up bad.

“Tom, don't let anybody kid you. It's all personal, every bit of business. Every piece of shit every man has to eat every day of his life is personal. They call it business. OK. But it's personal as hell. You know where I learned that from? The Don. My old man. The Godfather. If a bolt of lightning hit a friend of his the old man would take it personal. He took my going into the Marines personal. That's what makes him great. The Great Don. He takes everything personal Like God. He knows every feather that falls from the tail of a sparrow or however the hell it goes? Right? And you know something? Accidents don't happen to people who take accidents as a personal insult.” ― Mario Puzo, The Godfather

One of the greatest pieces I’ve read on extreme ownership.

Re: Charlie Munger – Feeling Like a Victim Is Perfectly Disastrous

#238

Post by xboxnolifes »

KittenInABox wrote: post #151
codegeek wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Munger didn't say that you should deny being a victim. You should just not use that situation as an excuse for your future actions. Anyone can be victim of anything. But what you choose to do after that experience is the key.

The quote is... "If you just take the attitude that, however bad it is in anyway, it’s always your fault and you just fix it as best you can – the so-called ‘iron prescription’ – I think that really works." ...does not work for e.g. victims of child abuse. Child abuse is never the fault of the child.

hackernews really will look for a counter example to any advice, metaphor, or simile in the pursuit of being technically correct.

Re: Charlie Munger – Feeling Like a Victim Is Perfectly Disastrous

#239

Post by tomhoward »

JohnFen wrote: post #137
negamax wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, I have to counter you. Because someone close to me has always been about countering survivorship bias. And they have absolutely ruined their life. It's an easy out that people who are sharing their successes with you and the world have a survivorship bias. This is a fairly recent idea and quite a poison in itself. What it actually preaches is don't look and emulate the successful people in your environment and…

It's not all luck at all, but luck is critical. Skill and hard work are what buy you the lottery ticket. Luck is what determines if the ticket pays or not. That's why almost all successful people have a string of failures behind them, and why the truism "you've only really failed when you stop trying" exists. However, you can have skill and put in hard work and still never have the success you're seeking. It happens…

I think the luck factor is over-interpreted in this comment.

The reason most successful people have a string of failures behind them is because they learn from past experience and build networks and profile over the course of their career.

Luck applies most at the starting line - your location, your family and their wealth/status/connections [1], the traits and health you inherit, your education and the people you know who can mentor you, invest in you and work with you.

Over time the role of luck recedes and the role of experience becomes more significant (which is why, a few 20-something tech billionaires notwithstanding, most high-growth companies are founded when the founder is in their mid 40s [2]).

Also, “skill and hard work” are not the most important factors; in my experience the most important factor is the ability to self-improve, which takes humility and patience.

[1] It’s certainly not a given that being born into vast wealth equals luck in this context: plenty of heirs to vast fortunes turn out to be deadbeats. They may still be able to become successful in their own career but in a fairly pathetic, unearned kind of way. The right kind of luck for entrepreneurial success is a moderate degree of privilege (just enough not to spoil you) with a moderate degree of hardship (just enough not to break you). This certainly applied to Steve Jobs. Bill Gates too if you include the bullying at school.

[2] https://hbr.org/2018/07/research-the-average-age-of-a-succes...

Re: Charlie Munger – Feeling Like a Victim Is Perfectly Disastrous

#240

Post by yetihehe »

didntknowya wrote: post #229
SoftTalker wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's more self-serving for those in power to encourage a culture of victimhood, where they set themselves up as the saviors. This is a standard political gambit: create or identify a group of victims, and declare that you will get "payback" for them and make their situation better. Of course you don't, but that's OK, you got their votes and you just recycle and amplify that play next time.

those exploiting power have no interest in becoming "saviors". trying to appear as one does not last long as victims as in human nature soon looks for someone to blame- often the most visible

Becoming saviors is not a perfect strategy (is there one). It's still used by a lot of those exploiting power. Not all of them are perfect or know the perfect way to exploit power. They make mistakes and sometimes when their mistakes in strategy accumulate, they end up on pitchforks.
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