I would always advise young people to follow their star - not my star. They have to live their own life. If they decide they want to go into the investment business, do it, but make it a better business than it is today.
John C. BogleRead
Rely on the ordinary virtues that intelligent, balanced human beings have relied on for centuries: common sense, thrift, realistic expectations, patience, and perseverance.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the importance of fundamental virtues like common sense and perseverance in achieving success.
John C. Bogle highlights that throughout history, intelligent and balanced individuals have depended on essential virtues such as common sense, thriftiness, realistic expectations, patience, and perseverance. These timeless qualities are foundational for personal and financial success, reminding us to cultivate and rely on them in our lives.
In practice
During a workshop on personal finance, one could quote this to illustrate the importance of practical virtues.
I would always advise young people to follow their star - not my star. They have to live their own life. If they decide they want to go into the investment business, do it, but make it a better business than it is today.
When our financial system - essentially our money managers, marketers of investment products and stockbrokers - put up zero percent of the capital and assume zero percent of the risk yet receive fully 80% of the return, something has gone terribly wrong in our financial system.
Entrepreneurs or international conglomerateurs, or large financial institutions buy or create mutual fund management companies to create a return on their own capital. It's capitalism at work, where the rewards tend to go to the managers rather than the investors.
Net return is simply the gross return of your investment portfolio less the costs you incur. Keep your investment expenses low, for the tyranny of compounding costs can devastate the miracle of compounding returns.
Investing is a virtuous habit best started as early as possible.
Wise investors won't try to outsmart the market.
Your nervous system cannot tell the difference between an imagined experience and a 'real' experience. In either case, it reacts automatically to information which you give to it from your forebrain. Your nervous system reacts appropriately to what you THINK or IMAGINE to be 'true.
For in the end, it is all about memory, its sources and its magnitude, and, of course, its consequences.
The easiest way to solve a problem is to deny it exists.
You could say, in a vulgar Freudian way, that I am the unhappy child who escapes into books. Even as a child, I was most happy being alone. This has not changed.
It is a modern tragedy that despair has so many spokesmen, and hope so few.
There's a certain kind of research you have to listen to - the factual stuff, not opinion. Facts are facts. Sugar is sweet - it's not a matter of opinion. It just is.
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