Seeking Wisdom: From Darwin To Munger by Peter Bevelin [Actionable Summary]

The Book In Three Or More Sentences:

Packed with wisdom, this book will help you see the world as it is. Not as you want it to be. Peter Bevelin offers a compilation of the sage advice from outstanding scientists like Darwin, Einstein, and the famous investors Charles Munger and Warren Buffett. Primarily, it’s a book about studying wisdom. The text explores what influences our thinking, what psychological flaws in our brains cause errors in our thinking, and finally, it offers ways to improve the way we reason.

The Core Idea:

Avoid the roads that lead to unhappiness. Understand when and where you are going to “die” to guarantee that you will never go there. Seeking Wisdom dumps insights from a range of books to ensure that you will never repeat the same mistake twice. The main concept of the book is to introduce the casual reader to the way smart folks think so he can defend himself, from himself. Plainly, change the way you think about business and life to change the way you act.

Reason To Read:

Rarely do we have the chance to speak with intelligent people. But we do have the chance to peek behind the curtain of their grey matter and get closer to their way of thinking thanks to books like this. The ideas and the rules to play the game of life and avoid misery suggested in the book are nothing new – especially if you have read Thinking, Fast and Slow. Yet, refreshing your knowledge on how our thoughts can influence our behavior in a bad way will distance you away from destruction and closer to making better judgments.

7 Key Lessons From Seeking Wisdom:

Lesson #1: How You Think is How You Behave

What happens to us is not that important. What really counts is what we think about what happens to us.

Our behavior is based on our thoughts and state of mind.

You are having a bad day not only because something awful happened. But because you interpret the events as harmful.

As Marcus Aurelius, the Roman emperor and philosopher, said a long time ago: “Our life is what our thoughts make it.”

Think you won’t do a good job, and you probably won’t.

In the book, the author shares a study that observes people who are constantly worried about their health. The results reveal that these folks who have negative expectations about their health were four times more likely to actually have health problems.

Or in other words, if you plant a seed in your head about having problems. Guess what? It’s almost certain that you will have such problems.

Opposingly, if you encode thoughts about a healthy body and a clear mind. These will take shape eventually.

I know, it sounds too good to be true.

Just change how you think to change how experience life. Where is the science in that?

But as observed by the author, the placebo effect is a famous therapeutic treatment.

The only requirement for it to work is for the patient to believe in the treatment.

If you are convinced that the medication will clear your mind and lessen the pain, it will surely do – regardless of whether the remedy is real or just a sugar pill.

Wondering why this is important?

Simply put, you can’t change the way you behave unless you first change the way you think.

Our thoughts guide our actions.

So, the conclusion is simple: Change your thoughts to change the way you act.

“A placebo is an inactive or ineffective treatment or substance (for example, sugar pills or injections with saline solution) that is often used in comparison with active treatments. Studies show that a placebo can improve a patient’s condition simply because the patient expects it will work.” Peter Bevelin

Lesson #2: Instead of Intelligent, Be Consistently Not Stupid

A counterintuitive thought by Charles Munger from the book worth exploration is the following: “It is remarkable how much long-term advantage people like us have gotten by trying to be consistently not stupid, instead of trying to be very intelligent.”

How come not being stupid beats intelligence?

The examples are countless.

But it boils down to this: You can’t be extraordinarily smart in all areas. If you are an intelligent person. This will usually mean that you are masterfully skilled at one particular subject. Therefore, your thinking will be heavily influenced by what you know about your field. However, you will completely neglect what you don’t know about all other fields which might diminish your progress.

Focusing on not being stupid refers to our ability to take into account what we know, but also what we don’t know. What can go wrong and the consequences if we choose poorly.

If you are a great swimmer, you might try to prove your superiority to others by swimming into a hazardous sea. Is this going to be a smart move though?

You can keep being great and consistently swim where it’s safe.

The above is actually the reason the following tale exists: “It’s the strong swimmers who drown.”

Similarly, it’s better to focus on working on your average one idea instead of constantly trying to produce plenty of “groundbreaking” ideas.

Consistently avoiding stupid decisions (investing only in a set of stocks) is a lot better than consistently trying to find new ways to become rich (investing in all the stocks).

“By developing only a handful of strengths, we have an impoverished toolbox – only hammers. We need a full toolkit. Since problems don’t follow territorial boundaries, we must compensate for the bias of one idea by using important ideas from other disciplines.” Peter Bevelin