Warren Buffett is one of the most successful investors and businessmen in the world. With a net worth of more than $80 billion, he is definitely among the highest in the world. He spends most of his time doing charity and acts as a consultant to those who are willing to learn.

I overheard his lectures, courses and suggestions while studying how to invest, what to do, and how to realize the whole idea.

You will find many articles about his investment philosophy, wisdom and philosophy on the Internet. If you are not interested in investing or becoming a shareholder in a company, you are still likely to miss out on some good advice.

But if you read his point of view carefully, you will find that his advice is not only valuable to people who want to be entrepreneurs and financing enthusiasts. Even if it is just to change a few nouns, his experience is correct on many different occasions.

Next, let's take a look at his most valuable experiences.

1. First understand, then act.

The first may be obvious. Warren Buffett put it more accurately:

Never invest in a business you don't understand.

-- Warren Buffett

We can say "invest in an idea" rather than "invest in a business". Never invest in ideas you don't understand.

You can often see people who want to be artists, musicians or try other creative approaches, and one of their first impressions is that in order to succeed, they need to spend money on the best equipment.

People who like to paint will soon realize that to be a good artist, he needs to spend thousands of dollars on the latest graphics tablet with an integrated screen. Similarly, a new guitarist will spend a lot of money on expensive music equipment endorsed by superstars.

This is not right. You don't need fancy equipment. A good musician can play even the worst guitar beautifully. A great artist can surprise you with an old ballpoint pen and a piece of paper.

First of all, don't invest your hard-earned money in such an effort. Make sure you've made up your mind to meet the challenge and can stick to it.

You can consider spending some spare money on courses and training instead of expensive equipment. Gears may break at some point, but the lessons you learn will always be with you.

Which leads to Warren Buffett's next piece of advice, and the most frequently quoted one--

two。 Invest in yourself

Warren Buffett himself has said many times that this is the best advice he can give others.

The most important investment you can make is to invest in yourself.

-- Warren Buffett

You are your greatest asset. Any investment that can help you improve your skills and learn new things is worth investing in.

You can always monetize your knowledge-whether you learn programming through intensive training courses or a second language, you are now proficient enough to be a freelance translator.

By investing in improving your skills, rather than buying new tools, you will become a more valuable asset for a long time to come.

There is a famous saying: it is better to teach people to fish than to teach people to fish.

By focusing on improving your skills and spending a little time each day learning new things, you can open up new business opportunities, enter new markets, and discover new possibilities for yourself.

3. Focus on one thing.

Some of us may be good at doing several things at the same time. However, when you choose a career or something you want to pursue seriously, you should not shift your energy elsewhere.

In the field of investment, many people are often advised to "diversify" their assets, as the old saying goes: "Don't put all your eggs in one basket." "

For Warren Buffet, this suggestion is futile. He replied:

Diversification is a protection against ignorance. If you know what you're doing, there's no need to diversify.

-- Warren Buffett

If you get one thing done, you don't need any backup plan. They only drain your energy, and you could have better invested that time and energy in what you are doing.

For people like me, it means focusing on one thing and sticking to it. What I sometimes lack is the effort and self-discipline necessary to persist in doing something. I didn't get the result I expected right away, so my motivation dropped, and I put less and less into it until I gave it up completely.

Success does not come overnight. If we want to succeed, we must make a lot of efforts. If you don't make any progress immediately, don't lose heart. Keep going and you will see the results sooner or later.

Don't be distracted by other things. If you are too distracted by your main goals, you will waste time and may even take you longer to achieve them, which may make you more discouraged.

4. Price and value have different meanings.

It is often difficult for us to find something at the right price. But Warren Buffett believes that we should not give priority to price at all. Instead, we should focus on the value we get from it.

The price is the price you pay. Value is what you get at a price.

-- Warren Buffett

In fact, this sentence applies everywhere, not only in the field of investment. Look not only at the price tag, but also at the value behind it. Because the two are not always the same.

You can find two marketing courses on Udemy. One two-hour course costs $40, and the other about the same time costs $250.

Judging from the price tag, a $40 course is much cheaper, so what about the quality? You are likely to learn something that is out of date, or something you could have spent an hour on Google to teach yourself.

At the same time, more expensive courses may cost you a lot of money now, but the knowledge and skills they share can earn ten times as much in your future.

Ignore the price (whether cheap or expensive) and just try to estimate the real value you get from the payment, which is the basis of the most decision-making.

This "law" also applies to you as a freelancer.

You may think that setting a cheaper price for your work will have more benefits, for example, more customers will be willing to pay, so there will be more income as a whole. But you probably underestimate your true worth. You may have made some money from your good work, but did you really earn the money you deserve?

If the quality of what you offer is good enough, a higher price will not necessarily shut out consumers. Some people may decide not to adopt you because you are "too cheap". Although it may seem counterintuitive to charge more than your competitors, you will find it worth it.

5. Don't neglect quality in order to save money.

The following advice is part of Warren Buffett's personal investment strategy, but it doesn't just apply to buy-out companies.

It is far better to buy a good company at a reasonable price than to buy a reasonable company at a reasonable price.

-- Warren Buffett

This is conceptually similar to the previous suggestion on price and value. Your first reaction may be to choose a cheaper option. But cheaper doesn't always mean better.

When my coffee machine broke down (a cheap $10 coffee machine in the store), we went to buy a new one. I took a fancy to a coffee machine from Nescafe, but it was priced at more than $50, so we decided to change to a $10 coffee machine. We thought coffee was coffee, and we could use the money in a better way.

In about three years, this cheap coffee machine broke down, and we traded $15 for another cheap coffee machine according to our idea, and we recycled it several times. In the end, we spent more than $100 on a coffee maker, and then we had to get a new one after using it for an average of a few months.

Finally, we chose an expensive coffee, which is not only of good quality, but also tastes better subjectively.

If we had understood the difference between price and value, we could have saved some money.

Therefore, be sure to keep your eyes open when faced with a cheap offer.

You may be familiar with phone shopping and the "incredible" offers they offer you. "this amazing mattress costs $250, but we love you, so you can buy it for $180 now! "

This is a common marketing trick. The mattress was not worth $250 from the start, and the company certainly wouldn't spend that much to make or import it. But they give you an impulse to buy.

So don't be fooled by things like discounts and value packages.

Don't buy a mediocre "company" just because they offer you a good price. Look what's hidden behind it. And make your judgment.

6. Learn to say "no"

This is also a lesson you learn from people who want to help you become a better entrepreneur, freelancer or employee.

Especially when we first started working, we wanted to please the upper echelons. We tend to agree to any help that others may ask of us. Our workload is more than we can bear, and as a result, we are under more and more pressure, but we do not get the gratitude or recognition we expect.

The difference between successful people and truly successful people is that truly successful people say no to almost everything. You must control your time. You can't let others set your life schedule.

-- Warren Buffett

The most difficult thing-especially when you try to be your own boss through freelance and entrepreneurship-is to stand your ground. You need clients, so objectively speaking, you will accept most of the job offers you get, no matter how ridiculous they are.

If we say "yes" too often, we won't get the recognition we expect. Sooner or later, someone will abuse this fact. The price we pay is unpaid overtime, more work than we get paid, and solving problems for others for free. Our personal morale and private life will be greatly affected, and we will be further and further away from the success of our dreams.

Learn to say "no". Some people may think you are unreliable or selfish. But in any case, these people are not good partners for your career. For others, your ability to refuse may even be attractive. You know your worth, and you stand your ground. People will accept that they have to pay for your services.

In every office, there is a guy who does everything for everyone. He came early and left late. Don't be that kind of person. Trust me, he won't be happy when he comes home.

7. Don't trust others blindly, especially those who want to "help you".

Almost everyone has ulterior motives. If you are as naive as I am, you will often fall in love with people who look like saints, and they just force their agenda on us.

Wall Street is the only place where Rolls-Royce riders turn to subway riders for advice.

-- Warren Buffett

Unfortunately, this doesn't just apply to Wall Street. We may not drive a Rolls-Royce, but you will see many "successful people" sitting on the subway peddling their secrets of success to you.

Now it's full of liars who fool you with successful chicken soup. Who doesn't want to fight for money day by day? But if you believe those who have successfully learned chicken soup, congratulations, you have been successfully charged IQ tax by them.

My article may not be much different in a sense. But I really hope it gives you new insights.

Be careful who you trust and the advice you take. Try to observe what they do and how they do it. If they preach the same thing over and over again, they may be eager to take money out of your pocket.

There's a good chance you help them more than they help you.

8. Invest in things that are consistent with your own values

Warren Buffet mainly buys shares in companies he personally likes, and he agrees with the ideas of those companies. He said:

Why not invest your assets in a company you really like? As Mae West said: good things that go too far can be wonderful.

-- Warren Buffett

It feels great to make money from something. But if you don't put your heart and soul into it, you will soon lose your original passion. If you want to be a writer, don't ignore the topic you really like and cater to the market.

If you don't like this idea, don't let the protagonist in your novel die miserably, because a recent reader survey shows that most readers like heroes to die.

Don't rewrite a sentence you think is good just because someone tells you they don't like it.

No matter what you do, you should put yourself and your own satisfaction first. If you feel stuck in a job you hate, don't waste your time complaining. Don't think there's no way out. There's always a way out. It's not easy to find a way out, but if you focus, you can make a change-remember, find something you love to do.

If we like to do something, it will be ten times easier to do.

For me as a freelance writer, this means that I will not accept contracts that I personally find inappropriate. For content writing, that means I don't write about things I don't really care about, and I don't make money just for clicks.

I won't write any articles like "how did I make $5000 in 24 hours" because it doesn't feel right. Some people may really make a lot of money. But for 95% of people, I strongly doubt it.

Don't sell your soul to make some extra money. Remember to buy only the company you like.

9. Don't dwell on past failures for too long

You may have lost a client because you asked for "too much money" (in their view), or an article you wrote disappeared in the depths of the Internet and didn't get any attention.

Or you've done something you regret afterwards. But you should know that even Warren Buffet has experienced failure.

In business, what you see in the rearview mirror is always clearer than what you see on the windshield.

-- Warren Buffett

We all know the phrase "Zhuge Liang afterwards". It is easy to find mistakes afterwards. It's just as easy to dwell too much on past failures. It's one thing to learn from your mistakes. This is normal, and it is the main motivation for us to try to do better next time.

However, if we dwell too much on past failures, we may subconsciously expose ourselves to more failures in the future. Instead of spending time in the wrong place, treat it as bad luck, and then try to improve your program and try again.

Like Warren Buffett's rearview mirror analogy: if you drive too fast and miss a good opportunity, you may end up seeing it getting smaller and smaller in the rearview mirror.

But if you look back for too long, you may accidentally miss a second chance.

So don't look back for too long.

10. Don't put success and money above everything else.

To be honest, this may seem easy for someone with more than $80 billion in assets to say, but it's still true. For Warren Buffett, money itself is not a real sign of success:

If you reach my age, no one likes you. I don't care how much your bank account is, your life is a disaster. Among the billionaires I know, money only exposes them to basic qualities. If they were assholes before they were rich, then they are assholes with 1 billion dollars now.

-- Warren Buffett

There's nothing wrong with dreaming of becoming a millionaire or a billionaire. We are all fighting for success. The worse your financial situation is, the more excited you will be when you imagine great wealth.

The most important thing here is to keep your heart in the right place. Don't sell yourself in order to make money.

You must know the saying "money can't buy happiness", but you are often retorted: "I'd rather cry in a Lamborghini than cry on a rusty bike." "

I don't care where you cry. The bottom line is, you're crying. There's something really wrong with your life. All the money in the world is not enough to solve the problem.

Emotionally, I agree with this suggestion. I am surprised at all the millionaires and billionaires. But I respect only those who show human dignity and admirable character. Warren Buffett is one of them.

Elon Musk is another example of going to great lengths to achieve good goals.

On the other hand, I despise Jeff Bezos because all the negative headlines are related to Amazon, including the bad treatment suffered by the company's employees.

I wish you all the best, but please be a decent person.

Write at the end

Warren Buffett is one of the most successful people in the world. However, he is decent, has a great personality and leaves a deep impression. The advice he shares, though aimed at people who want to be investors like him, applies to many aspects of our lives. I am glad to listen to his teachings.

For me, these reminders are helpful to my work as a freelance writer and to my life as a consumer who often mishears and saves money in the wrong place.

I hope you can find something worth thinking about, too.

Thank you for reading.

# Buffett's adviceNiu friends.How many things can be done?