Always Look Forward (You Are NOT Your Past)

Nugget from Charlie Munger (Narrated by Mohnish Pabrai)

Hey friend!

In today’s letter I picked one of the most important lessons that Mohnish Pabrai learned from Charlie Munger.

It really resonated with me, so I wanted to share it with you :)

👤 Doers

💡Nugget

🟠 Mohnish Pabrai (on Charlie Munger):

I developed a very good friendship with Charlie over the last 14 years; a very unlikely thing to happen, but it did happen. Over the last 14 years, I had many bridge games and dinners at his place with him. I got to observe him in a very intimate setting.

When I looked at the way Charlie was, one of the things I noticed over time was that he did not look back. I would always tell Charlie, “Charlie, look at the work that you have done in your lifetime. It is so immense and impressive. You are going to go down as one of the great historical figures of all time, especially as a philosopher and an investor.” He would always brush it off, and his focus would always be on whatever problem he was looking at in front of him.

Berkshire has been successful, but he would moan and say, “We have too much cash. We cannot find investments. We are looking, things are so expensive.” He would not spend time talking about the past of Berkshire Hathaway or the past of Charlie Munger.

He was also chairman of a company called the Daily Journal Operation, and he was looking for a CEO successor for the Daily Journal. He would moan and groan to me that he needed to find someone, and that he was not able to find someone.

What I found is that all of his energies were focused on taking the next step forward; they were not focused on looking back and saying, “Wow, I have covered a lot of distance behind me.” Anyone else looking at Charlie would say, “Forget what is in front of you; the Daily Journal CEO, or Berkshire's money. Drop that today. It is fine.” The history [of Charlie] is so impressive, but that is not how he thought. That is also not how Warren Buffett thinks.

I tried to learn from that.

I used to be like a lot of others. Humans, by instinct, look back, and say, “We did well at school. We did well in business. We did well in the investment fund...” But, in my opinion, it is a better mental model to focus the energies going forward.

Source → Mohnish Pabrai's Interview at Morningstar, The Investor's Mind on December 1, 2023

🟠 Robert Greene:

Be future-oriented…

That's one of the key elements about people who are very successful in life—they're always sort of oriented towards the future: What's the next project? What am I going to be doing in five or ten years? As opposed to obsessed with the past.

I think people who have the hardest time in life are so obsessed with the past… “that scumbag… he destroyed me… he ruined my last project…” They hold on to all this crap. They're so weighed down by the past… They whine, they complain…

People who are future-oriented: “I’m on to the next thing.” It's like they say in basketball: “Next man up! Our star player was injured? All right, next player come on! Let's just go, we gotta win this game!”

Source → "These LAWS OF POWER Will Change Your Future!" | Robert Greene

📁 All the ideas in this article are saved and classified in a searchable Database, which (as of July 2024) contains nearly 2,000 timeless ideas (sourced directly from the most influential doers and entrepreneurs — captured on books, interviews/podcasts and articles).

I call this Database the Doers Notebook, and I’ve recently opened it for anyone who wants it.

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It’s like having a 🧠 second brain from which we can pull wisdom on demand.

And this is super valuable because it can significantly decrease the error rate in our judgment.

“In an age of infinite leverage [code and media], judgment is the most important skill.”

- Naval Ravikant

I actually made a video where I went through the list of insights I got for the keywords “sales” and “creative”.

So, if you wanna get better at sales and learn to be more creative (and also see all the features of the database and how you can get access) then definitely check out the video 👇

💥 Stuff I Loved

Walking on the oldest streets in Guayaquil, Ecuador! (Wednesday 17th of July)

I hope you enjoyed today’s edition!

Happy Friday ;)

Julio xx

P.S. If you liked this article, you'll definitely enjoy my free 80-page ebook. It’s packed with 23 big ideas (from top influential doers and entrepreneurs) to become better, richer and wiser. Download your copy here!