Same as Ever Quotes

“Everything worthwhile has a price, and the prices aren’t always obvious.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“When someone is viewed as more extraordinary than they are, you’re more likely to overvalue their opinion on things they have no special talent in.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“Warren Buffett, the most-admired person in the investing industry has at times had a miserable family life—partly his own doing, the collateral damage of a life where picking stocks was the highest priority.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“I’m confident in other people’s overconfidence, so I know there will be mistakes and accidents and booms and busts along the way.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“It’s good to always assume the world will break about once per decade, because historically it has.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“The irony is that when markets are guaranteed not to crash—or more realistically, when people think that’s the case—they are far more likely to crash”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“• When an economy is stable, people get optimistic. • When people get optimistic, they go into debt. • When they go into debt, the economy becomes unstable. Minsky’s big idea was that stability is destabilizing.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“If we could launch intercontinental ballistic missiles and walk on the moon, surely we could prevent two quarters of negative GDP
growth.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“Every investment price, every market valuation, is just a number from today multiplied by a story about tomorrow.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“Ho Chi Minh once put it more bluntly: “You will kill ten of us, and we will kill one of you, but it is you who will tire first.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“Take the stock market.You can show people that the market historically crashes every five to
seven years”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“Harry Truman—a failed retailer, failed farmer, failed zinc miner, failed oil driller, almost universally panned when he became president after Franklin Roosevelt died”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“A little cool air from the north is no big deal. A little warm breeze from the south is pleasant. But when they mix together over Missouri you get a tornado. That’s called emergent effects, and they can be wildly powerful. Same with new technology. One boring thing plus one boring thing can equal one world-changing thing in a way that’s hard to fathom if you don’t respect exponential growth.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“Philosophers have spent centuries discussing the idea that there are an infinite number of ways your life could play out, and you just happen to be living in this specific version. It’s a wild thing to contemplate, and it leads to the question: What would be true in every imaginable version of your life, not just this one?”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“The Battle of Long Island was a disaster for George Washington’s army. His ten thousand troops were crushed by the British and its four-hundred-ship fleet.
But it could have been so much worse. It could have been the end of the Revolutionary War.
All the British had to do was sail up the East River and Washington’s cornered troops would have been wiped out.
But it never happened, because the wind wasn’t blowing in the right direction and sailing up the river became impossible.
Historian David McCullough once told interviewer Charlie Rose that “if the wind had been in the other direction on the night of August twenty-eighth [1776], I think it would have all been over.”
“No United States of America if that had happened?” Rose asked.
“I don’t think so,” said McCullough.
“Just because of the wind, history was changed?” asked Rose.
“Absolutely,” said McCullough.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“Who has the right answers but I ignore because they’re not articulate? Which of my current views would I disagree with if I were born in a different country or generation? What do I desperately want to be true so much that I think it’s true when it’s clearly not? What is a problem that I think applies only to other countries/industries/careers that will eventually hit me? What do I think is true but is actually just good marketing? What haven’t I experienced firsthand that leaves me naive about how something works? What looks unsustainable but is actually a new trend we haven’t accepted yet? Who do I think is smart but is actually full of it? Am I prepared to handle risks I can’t even envision? Which of my current views would change if my incentives were different? What are we ignoring today that will seem shockingly obvious in the future? What events very nearly happened that would have fundamentally changed the world I know if they had occurred? How much have things outside my control contributed to things I take credit for? How do I know if I’m being patient (a skill) or stubborn (a flaw)? Who do I look up to that is secretly miserable? What hassle am I trying to eliminate that’s actually an unavoidable cost of success? What crazy genius that I aspire to emulate is actually just crazy? What strong belief do I hold that’s most likely to change? What’s always been true? What’s the same as ever?”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“Risk is what’s left over after you think you’ve thought of everything.” That’s the real definition of risk—what’s left over after you’ve prepared for the risks you can imagine. Risk is what you don’t see.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“The Battle of Long Island was a disaster for George Washington’s army. His ten thousand troops were crushed by the British and its four-hundred-ship fleet. But it could have been so much worse. It could have been the end of the Revolutionary War. All the British had to do was sail up the East River and Washington’s cornered troops would have been wiped out. But it never happened, because the wind wasn’t blowing in the right direction and sailing up the river became impossible. Historian David McCullough once told interviewer Charlie Rose that “if the wind had been in the other direction on the night of August twenty-eighth [1776], I think it would have all been over.” “No United States of America if that had happened?” Rose asked. “I don’t think so,” said McCullough. “Just because of the wind, history was changed?” asked Rose. “Absolutely,” said McCullough.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“The irony is that growth and progress are way more powerful than setbacks. But setbacks will always get more attention because of how fast they occur.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“Real GDP per capita increased eightfold in the last hundred years.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“Good news comes from compounding, which always takes time, but bad news comes from a loss in confidence or a catastrophic error that can occur in a blink of an eye.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“Overnight Tragedies and Long-Term Miracles”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“The excess energy released from overreaction to setbacks is what innovates!” wrote Nassim Taleb.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“When the Magic Happens”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“Robert Greene writes: “The greatest impediment to creativity is your impatience, the almost inevitable desire to hurry up the process, express something, and make a splash.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“A good idea on steroids quickly becomes a terrible idea.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“Too Much, Too Soon, Too Fast”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“Modern life in general is about as safe as it’s ever been. And effectively all the improvement over the last century has come from a decline in infectious disease. In 1900 roughly eight hundred per one hundred thousand Americans died each year from infectious disease. By 2014 that was forty-six per one hundred thousand—a 94 percent decline. This decline is probably the best thing ever to happen to humanity.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes

“Here you have one of the top cancer researchers in the world, and he’s saying he could make a bigger impact on cancer if he focused on getting people to quit smoking—but that’s not intellectually stimulating enough for him. Or for many scientists, for that matter. Now, I don’t blame him—and Weinberg has added enormous value to the war on cancer. But here we have an example of complexity being favored for its excitement, when simplicity may actually do a better job. And that, I’ll tell you, is a big lesson that applies to many things.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: Timeless Lessons on Risk, Opportunity and Living a Good Life

“The irony is that when markets are guaranteed not to crash—or more realistically, when people think that’s the case—they are far more likely to crash.”
― Morgan Housel, Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes