Reflections from my dinner with Charlie Munger

Reflections from my dinner with Charlie Munger. Order the new updated version of Poor Charlie’s Almanack: The Essential Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger Charlie Munger episodes: #295 I had dinner with Charlie Munger #286 Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger All I Want To Know Is Where I'm Going To Die So I'll Never Go There: Buffett & Munger – A Study in Simplicity and Uncommon, Common Sense by Peter Bevelin. #221 Charlie Munger Damn Right: Behind the Scenes with Berkshire Hathaway Billionaire Charlie Munger by Janet Lowe. #90 Charlie Munger Poor Charlie’s Almanack: The Essential Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger #79 Charlie Munger Charlie Munger: The Complete Investor by Tren Griffin #78 Charlie Munger Tao of Charlie Munger: A Compilation of Quotes from Berkshire Hathaway's Vice Chairman on Life, Business, and the Pursuit of Wealth With Commentary by David Clark ---- Get access to the World’s Most Valuable Notebook for Founders by investing in a subscription to Founders Notes ---- ---- Founders Notes gives you the ability to tap into the collective knowledge of history's greatest entrepreneurs on demand. Use it to supplement the decisions you make in your work. Get access to Founders Notes here. ---- “I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  What you're about to hear, I have never released on this feed before. Earlier this year, I got to have dinner with Charlie Munger. I spent over three hours with them. Shortly after that happened, I was asked the question, "What did you learn from that experience?" And I actually recorded my answer to that question. And so you're about to hear that recording now. Before we get to that, I want to tell you one of the first thoughts that I had when I woke up this morning. I heard the news of Charlie passing away yesterday. And I was actually surprised at one of the first things I thought about this morning was, it was actually a quote of something that Sam Walton had said in his autobiography. Sam Walton said that he borrowed more ideas from Sol Price than anyone else. And Sam was in the business of learning from other entrepreneurs.

• 0:45Speaker 00

  In fact, in that same book, he says, "Everything that I've done, I've copied from somebody else." I'm in the same business. That is why founders exist. I'm in the business of learning from other entrepreneurs. And I realized this morning that I've borrowed more ideas for my own life and my own business from Charlie Munger than anyone else. Charlie's a hero to me. Charlie changed my life, and I'm going to miss him. I hope you enjoy these notes from my dinner with Charlie Munger.

• 1:15Speaker 00

  What did you learn from having dinner with Charlie Munger? In case you haven't seen it yet, I just made an episode. It's episode 295. It is about the book, The Tao of Charlie Munger, but it is also about the fact that I got invited to have dinner at Charlie Munger's house. I got to spend over three hours with him. And I got to ask him any question, no limits. Like, you could ask him whatever you wanted. And so the first thing that I learned is he's exactly as advertised. The Charlie that you see at the Berkshire meeting, the Charlie that you've maybe watched speeches on, the Charlie that you've read books on, that is the same guy. He really does read all the time. His bookshelves were filled. When he says, "Hey, you should become friends with the eminent dead." He says he's a biography nut. I thought, you know, I'm close to 300 biographies for the podcast to far.

• 2:00Speaker 00

  He makes me look like a biography amateur. He had books on his shelves, and don't worry, he let me look through his shelves, and I'm going to order a bunch of these books. They're really hard to find. I've already tried to track a bunch of them down. But-

• 2:10David Senra?

  He lives what he preaches. The fact that, hey, you should become friends with the amen and the dead. The fact that you should find what you're good at and you should pound away at it forever. It took him 41 years to find his life's work. But once he became a full-time investor, he knew that that's what he was going to do for his whole life. He's just obsessed with it. He loves this idea where he could design his own schedule. He never wanted to have people to manage much of people. He wanted to read all the time and make money with his mind. And so while I was with Charlie, it was so incredible to be able to meet one of your heroes. Like, he had, you know, a heavy influence. Like, I've stolen so many of his ideas. That I had prepared a list in advance of a ton of questions and things that I wanted to talk to him about. I never looked at my phone once.

• 2:53David Senra?

  So the way I'm going to answer this question is what I did is when I got back to my hotel after, I knew, I was like, this, you know, Charlie Munger, this is like a night Charlie Munger may never remember, right? Because you think he's 99 years old, think about all the life experiences that this guy's had, what's in his brain, right? It's a night that he may never remember, and it's a night I'll never forget. So I just wrote down, like, what are the things that I wanted to remember? And so to answer this question, I just want to run through some of my notes with you. There's like one main theme. What's interesting about Charlie is like, a lot of his ideas interact with each other and they combine and they become even more powerful. It's like this Lollapalooza effect that he talks about all the time. So what I would say is like, the main thing that I took away from the dinner that I think

• 3:37David Senra?

  is something I've already tried to put in practice. It's really important to me, like, something that clicked when I was reading. It's episode 286. I think the book is called, has a terrible title. It's like, "All I Want to Know Is Where I'm Going to Die So I Won't Go There." But while I was going through the words of Charlie and Warren Buffett in that book, something clicked. And I think it clicked with a lot of people because when you put a podcast out, right? I just do these things by myself and then I release it and I have no idea what the reception will be. And what's interesting to me is like, people will pick up on specific lines and like, those lines will resonate far and above everything else that you said on the podcast. And so something I said on that podcast that clicked for a lot of people and clicked for me was that learning is not memorizing information. Learning is changing your behavior.

• 4:20David Senra?

  If I spend all this time reading about Charlie Munger, watching his Q and As at the Berkshire meeting, listening to his speeches, reading books, reading people that were influenced by him, and it doesn't change my behavior, then I'm just wasting time. And so the main theme, the thing that jumped out the most was Charlie has an almost complete indifference to problems. His perspective, if I could summarize it, would be like, hey, troubles from time to time should be expected. They're an inescapable part of life. So why let it bother you? Just handle them and then move on. And this idea, he's talking about in business, there's problems that are inescapable and in your personal life. And this idea combines with two other ideas that he talked about at the dinner and he talks about, you know, in the books and in speeches and everything else.

• 5:05David Senra?

  In that Charlie looks at nearly everything through the lens of history. And his perspective, if I could summarize it, it was like, you're not changing human nature, things will just keep repeating forever. And so the fact that this guy has deep historical knowledge, right? He knows that human nature just repeats over and over again. And the fact that because of that deep historical knowledge, he knows that no one's getting through life without problems. So then that leads to the summation and what's going to change, hopefully changes the behavior, which is actually the learning part, right? Where it's like, okay, just because problems are inevitable, it doesn't mean that you want an abundance of them. So his whole thing is like wisdom is prevention, which is only three words. And it's crazy if you just sit there and think about what that actually means. And his whole point is like, listen, problems are inescapable, but you need to do your best to avoid problems.

• 5:49David Senra?

  And the way you do that, this is the third idea that ties together, is you go for great. It's harder to do, but it makes your life easier if you go for great. Great businesses are rare. Great people are rare, but they're worth the time to find. Great businesses throw off way less problems than average or poor businesses. Just like great people have way, will cause way less problems in your life than average or low quality people in the podcast. I hope you listened to the whole thing. I hope it seemed good. I was just so excited and on such like a high, I don't even know if it made sense. I listened to it back and I'm like, okay, I think this is good. But, um, but I, you know, I was just so, I was just so influenced by just being able

• 6:34David Senra?

  to meet him. You know, I'm just incredibly grateful for it. And like, I didn't want to try to hide my excitement, you know, and the fact that, yeah, he is my hero. Like, I know he's a human being, just like you and I, but I do admire him and I do think he's the wisest person I've ever come across and I am. You know, trying to in many ways like pattern my life after him like in my own unique way. On that episode, I talk about like a description of you know, if you're around like a low quality or average quality human, there's this phrase that my wife says in Spanish that it's just perfect and it describes it and it says that person could drown in a cup of water. And so that one thing, go for great, like spend the time to find a great business. I already think like this, you know, took me 30 something years to find my life's work,

• 7:18David Senra?

  which obviously I think founders is my life's work. I believe it to be my life's work. I think it's a absolutely great business. It's something I'm obsessed with. And so now taking Charlie's advice, I know that the likelihood is that I'm not going to be, my business isn't going to go away because of competition. My business is going to go away because humans can't handle success. And so they always say it's like, another line that Charlie says is fantastic. He's like, it's not that getting, it's not getting rich that you have to worry about. It's staying sane. Most people never find a great business, right? Then once they get into a great business, they get bored or their attention span dwindles or whatever the case is, and then they just screw it up by jumping around. And that's why a lot of Charlie's theme is like patience, patience, patience. He said something in the dinner that was fantastic. I wish I could have wrote it down, but he said that like the advantage that him and

• 8:01David Senra?

  Warren have, you know, they repeat this, it's like it's temperament. And he used an adjective, I couldn't remember what it was, but he's like, we just, part of our success is we had this, this unusual combination of extreme patience, extreme patience and like ferocious aggressiveness when they find like a good business. Cause they're just sitting, sitting, sitting, waiting for something, they find it and they act incredibly fast. So I just want to tie this up before I go on to other, because I can go off on a bunch of tangents on here, but this idea, it's just like, okay, go for great. It'll make your life easier if you go for great, just find great business. And you know, maybe that's one great business, maybe it's two. It's certainly not 50. And I really think you just need one. So find a great business and then surround yourself with great people. And if you do that, you're still gonna have problems in life.

• 8:46David Senra?

  You'll just have a lot less and then you'll know. What did Charlie say, right? I got a little Charlie Munger on my shoulder. Oh, this is a problem. That's fine. I'm gonna handle it. I'm not gonna whine about it. I'm gonna handle it. I'm gonna move on my life because problems are just part of life. If you're truly getting wiser, you'll learn how to avoid most of the problems that are underneath, that are under your control. So that is the main lesson. Here's a few other ones that, that we talked about. Do not spend time on regrets. That doesn't mean you shouldn't be learning from your mistakes. Like, everybody's gonna make mistakes. Rub your nose in your mistakes so you're making sure that you're not making that mistake again. He talked about the early part of his career when they were just buying quote unquote, "great values," but crappy businesses. And he's like, you, you have to learn from that. It's just like, no, these crappy businesses are, you're getting them for that price for a reason.

• 9:30David Senra?

  It's like, just pay a little bit more and get a great business and then just keep that business forever. And so that's part of him saying, hey, I don't regret that I made these mistakes and getting in these bad investments or getting in these bad businesses. Like, they taught me something and then I just moved on. I'm not gonna worry about it. And then I also got to ask him, I was like, well, what I love to do, and you see this on the podcast, hopefully, is like, I spend a ton of time in these books thinking about like their earlier life. And not the, the 90 or 70 or 80 year old version of Charlie, but like, what was Charlie doing when he was 20? What was he doing when he was 30? What was he doing when he was 41? When he decided, hey, I'm gonna be a full-time investor. I'm not gonna practice law anymore. And I was talking to him about that. I was like, man, I'm like, reading about you at this young age. And you kind of see they're, they're stumbling onto their ideas.

• 10:14David Senra?

  They're kind of trying to figure them out and they're getting closer and closer to like what Berkshire is going to be. And at that time Berkshire didn't even exist. And I was just like, looking back at this now, you know, at your age, like, are you surprised how successful? Cause I'm thinking about the young Charlie Munger, the young Warren Buffett. And like, are you surprised how successful that you and Warren turned out to be? And he goes, how could you not be? And then that led to this tangent, cause- You could tee Charlie up with a question, but Charlie's gonna talk about whatever Charlie wants to talk about. And he should, because the amount of information that's in this guy's brain, and the entire night, he just told story after story after story of this, this amazing business they bought, or this amazing deal, or this went bad, or, oh, I thought this was right. And his recall was absolutely incredible.

• 10:58David Senra?

  And this went on a tangent. He's like, actually, I think that me and Warren get too much credit. I thought that was interesting. And he was talking about the fact that he finds it really odd to be so wealthy and so loved. And his point is like, that's not a normal human reaction. Like, there is this egalitarianism in human nature that, you know, that people, just in general, like, you have any level of success, especially on his level, right? Multi-multi-billions of dollars of wealth produced for himself and his family. Like, that's not usually, you know, people's can react, most people will react poorly to that. And what I thought about this after, I was like, you know what? I wonder if it's because he spent, him and Warren spent so much time

• 11:43David Senra?

  teaching other people. Like, if you think about what poor Charlie's Almanack is, what the questions that he takes at the Berkshire meeting is, are, what the Warren Buffett shareholder letters are. Like, those are, they're lessons. Like, they're, all they're doing is saying, hey, we learned all this stuff, and this is what we learned. Let's take time into writing out the lessons in the form of shareholder letters, and then sharing the lessons that we learned through answering the questions at the meeting. And in, and in aggregate, you know, you have, what is that? Four, five decades? I think it's like 50 or 60 years they've been doing this. Let's just say half a century. A half a century of documented lessons. And then they turn it out and they just make it available for free for everybody else. And so how many entrepreneurs, investors, executives,

• 12:26David Senra?

  people interested in business have been educated by Warren and Charlie over their lifetimes? Millions, that's not an understatement. Millions of people. And this is certainly the way I feel like I don't look at. I don't, I don't do this anyways, because I, it's remarkable how many smart and successful people I meet that are still like caught up in envy, that are worried about like, this is crazy to me. And it's something I learned from Charlie. He's like, the world isn't run by greed. It's run by envy and like, you just have to have a good life. You have to cure yourself of envy. Like, somebody else is getting richer than you. Who gives a shit? That is always going to happen. It has nothing to do with you. Why does it bother you? And I think that's how most people view Warren and Charlie. They're like, yeah, these guys are super rich, way more successful. But like, look at all the information they put out there that's valuable. Look at all the information that could change your life. So that's my own personal opinion.

• 13:11David Senra?

  Like, I didn't get a chance to ask him. I didn't even have that thought at the time. I just thought about that when I was writing these notes. I was like, oh, that is kind of like, why, why is that so different? You know, there's no, there's nobody outside of Warren Buffett's or Charlie Munger's house, you know, protesting or like with a guillotine or all those crazy things that people do. When you, you get to like the top of like the world's richest people list, you know? There is like a, an interesting, like, why is that the case? Like, why are they the, the exception? So my guess is, again, they spent a ton of time teaching others. Another thing, ask the question, like, what role did like your parents play in like your drive for success? Like, were you trying to like show mom and dad, like, hey, this is what I could do? And, you know, Charlie's like, no.

• 13:56David Senra?

  He's like, I always had an inner clock. I just do what I want to do and I don't care about the ideas or thoughts of other people. And as a result, this inner clock, he talks about like deals, like they turn down, they could make. They, they get all kinds of crazy deal flow from their positions, as you can imagine. I think the teaching aspect of that is a huge part of it. And yet they, they have an opportunity to make like a bunch of money risk free. And it's like a business that, you know, may harm other people or they just didn't like it. And they would turn it down. So that's his whole like inner clock thing. It's like, I'm just going to do what I want to do. And that was a larger theme too, where Charlie's not. His whole thing is like, he likes people that, like, one of his favorite entrepreneurs is Jim Sinigal from Costco. I, I gotta ask him, I was like, why can't I find any information on Jim? He doesn't give speeches, there's no books. He's like, because he's busy working.

• 14:41David Senra?

  I thought that was hilarious. But, um. He just like, if you think about it, he's like, well, just go out and build a business that helps other people. Like, what is, the whole business model of Costco is like, they use their size to get unbelievably deals, unbelievable deals for their customers. And then, instead of like, marking up more than they could, they just pass that savings on to their millions and millions of customers. And I think I read in the Tao Charley manga, they have like 150 million checkouts a year. That, that information's, you know, maybe a decade old, so it's probably even more now. So like, what is the aggregate goodwill of like, just amount of savings that, that this idea that Jim had, and that he grew over multiple decades? Like, what is the benefit to his customers and to society at large? Like, it's, it's large.

• 15:23David Senra?

  Like, you're saving a ton of money because of this unique business that, that Jim built. And I think that's what Charlie would give you advice to do. It's just like, do something that other people value, and then do it for a long time, and really, really, really give a shit about the business that you like. You can tell, his whole thing is like, hey, you're gonna, you're gonna have more success. Another like hack of his, and I hate using that word, or another like, good idea of his, maybe that's a better way, is just like, if, if you just move yourself into a business where you have an intense interest, that's gonna cure most of your problems. Like, you're just gonna think about it all the time, you're gonna constantly improve it, you're not gonna quit, and that right there is probably, you know, 80 to 90% of it. And then, something else I was lucky about is the fact that the night started in Charlie's library.

• 16:06David Senra?

  So he was sitting there, we're in a small group, and he is back as to like, behind him is all his bookshelves. And I was just scanning his bookshelves as he was talking, and I noticed a bunch of books that I had read, so I was able to like, bring up these obscure books. Like, I brought up the fact that I saw Henry Kaiser's biography on the shelves. And I read that book like, four years ago. It was episode 66 of, of Founders. And so then Charlie just goes into, I just bring up Kaiser and like, what he thought about him, and like, his recall was just unbelievable. You know, he hadn't read that book in a long time. Winds up knowing Henry Kaiser's partner, could tell you about the, the businesses that Henry built, could tell you about the role that he played in World War II, building the Liberty ships.

• 16:49David Senra?

  We talked about the fact that Kaiser bought, was one of the people that built, helped build the Hoover Dam. And so this, this kind of thing just happened. You just mentioned one person, he could talk about it forever. And that really made me realize, it's like, okay, anybody at 99 years old is gonna have some kind of cognitive decline. But imagine like just how powerful this guy's mind was when he was younger. And like that's, he did a lot of work to do that. You know, he's read thousands and thousands of books, books, spent thousands and thousands, not even tens of thousands, I don't know, a hundred thousand hours deep in thought, thinking about the stuff he's learning, thinking about the things that are going on in the world, thinking about what he wants, like how the businesses that he wants to build. And so that knowledge firsthand, he's always talked about how knowledge compounds, like be a learning machine, go, you know, he says, go to sleep every more night, a little smarter than you were.

• 17:34David Senra?

  And if you do that over a long period of time, it really makes a difference. Like you see that in his conversations, like, oh, this guy lives his ideas. He's not just out there BSing people. He's like, this is just, I'm just telling the ideas that I used in my life. And if it was valuable for me, it's probably valuable for other people. Like, I just think that's, it's, it's part of his wisdom is just how simple it is. And what Charlie would tell you is like, well, okay, well, if it's simple advice, like, why aren't more people using it? It's just like, it's in human nature to overcomplicate things. And so that's just his whole point is like, why he repeats things over and over again. Because like, you just have to keep it as simple as possible, because you're likely, just by like, your natural tendency is going to overcomplicate your life. And then, of course, one of the questions I had to ask him was, I wanted to talk to him about Ben Franklin, because Ben Franklin was his hero. Charlie makes like these busts of people he admires.

• 18:19David Senra?

  And two of the people he has busts of are Ben Franklin and Lee Kuan Yew. Calls Lee Kuan Yew like the Warren Buffett of Singapore. But when we were talking about Ben Franklin, I brought up this book that covered, I think it was episode 251. It's Franklin and Washington about their, their partnership they had. And he didn't, he hadn't read the book yet, but he knew all about like Franklin's relationship with Washington. And so what he, he was talking to us a lot about, like, you know, he believes it's unlikely to ever have another life as remarkable as Ben Franklin. That he was number one in business, number one in science, number one in politics, all like at the same time in one life form or lifetime is just like, that's never, we're never gonna see that again. And he just thinks he's just absolutely wise and remarkable.

• 18:59David Senra?

  And if you read Ben Franklin, you realize that what Charlie did is just take a lot of Franklin's ideas and then update them and reword them. But a lot of it's, they think very similarly. And the way they communicate is very, it's very similar as well. But what I thought was interesting is the important part that jumped out to him is the fact that Ben Franklin did something very smart. He says Ben Franklin did something very smart his whole life was that he sought out other impressive people like George Washington. He did this when he was young. He did this when he was old. He did it his entire life. And then Charlie went in and he says Andrew Carnegie did this too. And then I got to ask him a follow up question. I was like, well, is this something that you did in your life? And immediately he says absolutely and still do. And he was pointing out, I was like, you find, go for great. Goes back to that main idea, right? Go for great. Find other.

• 19:44David Senra?

  First of all, build yourself up into an impressible, impressive, formidable person. That takes a lot of work, right? But once you do that, you find other people that are like you. And then you build relationships with them. And they made, in many cases, they had friendships and business relationships with the same people that they met in their youth their entire lives. A lot of them have, you know, passed away since then. But it was something very important. And Charlie still does this where he seeks out other, you know, young, interesting, smart people, or whatever the case is. Every single person at this dinner with me, it was only, I think, five of us. We're all 50 years, 60 years younger than Charlie. And he was also talking about like, if he doesn't see people in person, like he'll seek out and he'll talk to other smart people on Zoom, you know? He's still doing this. At 99, he's still curious. He's still reading, still paying attention to

• 20:28David Senra?

  what's going on in businesses. He's like, never gonna stop. He's like, the only way this is gonna stop is when he dies. Another thing goes back to like, just building your business around a set of simple ideas. They have that notoriety, that like cult-like following because of their just constant teaching, constant sharing everything they learn. You know, a lot of people call them first. They see a lot of deals first. And so they combine that idea with the fact that they made so much money because they always had a ton of cash and they could move fast. And he would tell deals, you know, crazy examples where like, somebody calls them like a Saturday and they're like, hey, this business is like, having a bunch of trouble. There's maybe one subsidiary that Charlie and Warren knew about in advance because they're like,

• 21:11David Senra?

  they know what's going on, they know what they're interested in, they're just waiting for the opportunity to get it. And in one case, they're like, hey, if you want this, we need $450 million. And this is like on a Saturday morning or something, and we need it by Monday. And it was interesting because the lawyers are telling Warren and Charlie, no, we can't do this. Like, we don't have a contract yet, we have to go through it, we should inspect it. And because of their relationships, because of the fact that they know in their mind like what assets they want. And Charlie said, like, Warren and Charlie ignored the lawyers. They're like, no, we think this is a good deal. Warren wired the money first thing Monday morning without even an email. No contract, no email, just on the strength of the relationship with the person calling them and the fact that they knew the actual value of the asset that they were buying.

• 21:54David Senra?

  And Charlie said something like they made a couple billion dollars on that deal, risk free. And so that's just like one example of a bunch of, he just walked us through like the way they thought about things. And again, it's like, yes, if you look at Berkshire today, unbelievably complicated. You can't imagine like how the hell this thing came to to exist. But if you look at it from their perspective, it was like, okay, we started out doing one thing. I mean, like 40, he's like 41, I think, Warren. Let's say he's mid 40s, Warren's like late 30s, you know, as they're like trying to figure this out. And then they just keep building on it, keep learning from it. And over time, that's when you get it's like super complicated. But from their, from their perspective, it was like, oh, it's like simple because we were learning as we went. And then we had an idea, it's like, oh, whoop, we made a wrong mistake here. Okay, we'll just course correct real quick and then we'll keep, we won't do that next time.

• 22:38David Senra?

  And then we'll just keep building and building and building. This goes back to like, I really do believe in something that's so important. Time is just going to carry most of the weight. Time is going to do most of the work. The hard part for you and I is like finding a truly great business with truly great people around us and just staying there. And not all of the advice that he was giving us was was business advice. Like, something is interesting, a few people there were parents. He says, he's like, listen, I didn't try to steer my kids or my grandkids into what they should do for a living. This is very similar. And I, this is like also being self-aware. It's like Charlie knows he's rare. Like, he's very aware that he is rare. Like, the idea that you're going to have somebody like him, like you're just going to keep birthing. You know, I think he's got like 10 kids, like 30 something grandkids, who knows how many? This is just unlikely. Like, he's a one in a 10 million kind of person.

• 23:23David Senra?

  And so he's like, listen, one, he thought it was beneficial that he got rich, he got wealthy later in life. But if you ask him, like, this is something people struggle with. You know, they're like, hey, in many cases, you are interested in entrepreneurship. You're interested in investing. You build a very successful life. Some of that success is financial. And then all of a sudden, like, your kids are growing up in, like, comfort that Charlie didn't grow up in. And so, like, how do you deal with that? And he's like, of course, of course, some of them are going to be less motivated because they were born rich. Like, there's no solution to that problem. And then he talked about, like, what do you do? Like, you know, people struggle with, like, when they're wealthy. He's like, what are you doing? Like, are you gonna give that money to your kids? And his advice was the most unique, because this is something that appears over and over again in these biographies that I read.

• 24:08David Senra?

  And no one has the answer. Everybody's like, I don't know. I don't know what to do. Like, sometimes it turns out well, sometimes it turns out bad. And his whole point, he goes, you have to give them the money, or they're gonna hate you for it. And his whole point is, it's like, you wanted, you had kids, you wanted to build a good relationship with them. You've tried to lead by example. That's all you can do. And what's the point of, like, building wealth and then saying, sorry, kids? Like, I'm giving this all away. And then having, he's like, it's just in human nature. His whole thing, let's go back to what's at the very top of my list. He's like, he looks at everything through the lens of history. You aren't changing human nature. Things will just keep repeating forever. Are you learning from that? Are you learning from history or not? And in Charlie's case, he's obviously learning from history. He's like, oh, you know, they're just gonna hate you for it. So I think when his wife died, he said something like, his wife died, I think, 10 or 12 years ago.

• 24:53David Senra?

  And they had given away, I think they gave away half their fortune to, like, their kids and grandkids. You know, and that's dispersed through, like, a big amount, a large amount of people, but it's still a lot of money. And, you know, he thought that's what you should do. And he's like, there's no point in doing all this and then having, getting to the end of your life and you're having a bad relationship with your kids or having your kids resent you. He's like, that just doesn't make any sense. And so, yeah, of course. In some cases, they're gonna be less motivated because they're born rich. That, too, is also human nature. And then I had a selfish question I got to ask him. I was like, Charlie, like, why didn't you write an autobiography? Like, what, come on, man? That would be fantastic. And he says, he answered his question. He said, his answer was very simple. He's like, well, it's too hard to do correctly, and I didn't want to do it.

• 25:37David Senra?

  And there's also enough people out there, like, categorizing and summarizing and organizing his thoughts. I thought it was funny. It was like, one of my personal goals is like, okay, live a life so remarkable that somebody writes a book about it, and then you can have that book on your shelf before you die. And so I found, there's a few books about him on his shelf. One of them I haven't done for the podcast, and it's shame on me. It's called Seeking Wisdom From Darwin to Munger, I think. So I'll do that soon. Maybe I'll like, maybe like a month or two. I don't want to keep doing just not all Charlie Munger episodes, but I'll definitely do that episode. And I don't think I want to wait too long because I want like the, this like dinner from him to still be, you know, in like fresh in my mind. So he didn't want to write an autobiography.

• 26:19David Senra?

  He did talk about that Poor Charlie's Almanack is being reprinted and there's going to be an online version soon through Stripe Press. And I think that's coming later on this year, which is fantastic because I have the physical book, but I would love to be able to search that book and to have a Kindle version would be excellent. Charlie is who he says he is. Like, he loves a good deal. He talked about like, "Look at this shirt I bought. You know, it was $12. I've had it forever. Look at this watch. You can't get it cheaper." He lived in a modest house. It was, it was, don't get me wrong, it was a nice house, but there's no way that you think that a multi-billionaire lives in that house. And so that goes back to, you know, he is who he says he is. He's just like, "Listen, I like to read. I like to make money with my mind. I like to talk to interesting, smart people. I like to think about the world." And he's like, he built a world around that. He just happened to be

• 27:04David Senra?

  unbelievably good at that, to the point where like, you know, his brain can essentially produce an unlimited amount of money. And that leads me to the last thing that I wrote down, and I think it applies, not, he's going to say this for investing, but it applies to building a business. Like, if done, done at the highest levels, entrepreneurship, investing at the highest levels, they produce the most material, they produce the most wealth in the world. That should tell you right from the outset, at least it's not easy. It's supposed to be hard. It's going to be hard. It fights against your nature, every bone of your body, all of your nature. Because most of these businesses, like, all the, what Peter Thiel says in Zero to One, it's like, the problem with the technology industry now is that they optimize for growth at the expense of durability. And that doesn't make any

• 27:48David Senra?

  sense because all the value of a company is coming 10, 20, 30 years into the future, and everybody quits before they collect the value. Charlie and Warren just said, okay, well, this is going to compound. We'll just ride this thing for the rest of our lives, which again is obviously the smart thing and go for great. And so the last thing he said was, being good at investing is a very rare skill. It is not distributed widely and it will never be. And so when I think of entrepreneurship, it's not an art or a science, it's a practice. And so when I'm hearing Charlie say that to me, it's like being good, being a good founder is a very rare skill. It is not distributed widely and it will never be. And so what I'm doing with that information is I'm going to keep it my practice for as long as possible. I'm going to use the lessons from history's greatest entrepreneurs as leverage and then

• 28:32David Senra?

  I'll let time carry most of the weight. And at the end of that, I will be in possession of a very rare skill.

• 28:39Speaker 00

  And that is where I left it. I just have one ask or one suggestion for you. One of my favorite things that Charlie ever said, he said at the Berkshire meeting, Berkshire Annual Meeting back in 2010, and he said that the best thing that a human being can do is help another human being no more. And so the one suggestion I have for you is I'm going to leave a link in the show notes. In the last, for the last few years of his life, Charlie was working hand in hand with Stripe and Stripe Press to republish a new version of Poor Charlie's Almanack. There's going to be a digital version for the first time. There is a several hour interview that Charlie recorded with John Collison, one of the co-founders of Stripe. I already have an advanced copy.

• 29:21Speaker 00

  In fact, I have two advanced copies of the Stripe Press version of Poor Charlie's Almanack. It's incredibly well made. The book is actually released next week. It is a great collection of the knowledge that Charlie Munger accumulated over his lifetime and that he wanted to share with other people. So I will leave that link down below. I highly recommend pre-ordering the book and buying copies for yourself and for your loved ones. I will also leave a list of all the Charlie Munger episodes that I've made so far. I would start with episode 295, which I referenced in this. It's called, I Had Dinner With Charlie Munger, episode 286. It's titled, Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger. It's based on the book, All I Want To Know Is Where I'm Going To Die, So I'll Never Go There, Buffett and Munger, A Study in Simplicity and Uncommon Common Sense.

• 30:06Speaker 00

  Then episode 221 is on Charlie Munger's biography titled Damn Right. Episode 90 is the first time I ever did an episode on Poor Charlie's Almanack, the original version. I'm rereading Poor Charlie's Almanack now, the Stripe Press version, and eventually we'll do an episode on that in next week or two. That's episode 90. Episode 79 is on the book The Complete Investor, which is about Charlie Munger. And finally, episode 78, which is the first time I made an episode on this fantastic little book called The Tao of Charlie Munger. That list of episodes will also be in the show notes as well. I highly recommend starting with episode 295 if you have not listened to it yet. Thanks for listening and I'll talk to you again soon.