Charlie Munger’s USC Law School Commencement text on May 13th, 2007.
-Safest way to get what you want is to deserve what you want
-Wisdom acquisition is a moral duty
-Nothing has served me better in my long life than continuous learning
-What do you want to avoid to be a failure in life? Sloth and unreliability
-Avoid extremely intense ideology. I’m not entitled to have an opinion on a subject unless I can state the arguments against my position better than the people that support it
-Don’t overspend your income. Mozart became the most famous composer in the world, but was utterly miserable most of the time, and one of the reasons was he always overspent his income
-Envy, resentment, revenge, and self-pity are disastrous modes of thought
-Ben Franklin, “if you would persuade, appeal to interest not to reason”
-Perverse incentives and perverse associations are to be avoided. You particularly want to avoid working under somebody you really don’t admire and don’t want to be like
-If at all feasible, drift into something where you have an intense interest
-Have a lot of assiduity: “Persistent application or diligence; unflagging effort.”
-Life will deal heavy blows, but your duty is to utilize the terrible blow in a constructive fashion and not to submerge yourself in self-pity