Warren Buffet is well known for being one of the richest people in the world. However, what makes him unique to me is the happiness that the man shows. He lives in a house he bought in 1958 and he still calls it the best investment he ever made. The house is fairly modest and less special then you might think. With this, he shows that he never lost himself in all his success. How did he not lose himself with all his success, how did you keep focus?
The pilot story
Mike Flint was Buffet’s personal airplane pilot for 10 years. Flint was a very good pilot and had flown for 4 different U.S. Presidents. Yet he still felt like he didn’t achieve everything that I wanted to. He didn’t feel like his life goals were getting closer over the years.
One day Buffet joked and said to flint: ”The fact that you’re still working for me tells me I’m not doing my job. You should be outgoing after more of your goals and dreams.”
So Flint asked Buffet how? And Buffet gave him a few simple tasks to do. Here’s what Buffet told Flin:
“First you need to write down your top 25 goals. These goals need to be the things that come to mind when you think about success in your life and career.”
So Flint followed and did what Buffet told him to do. When he was done, Buffet said:
“Now, review your list and circle the top 5 goals you have. This are the things that are most important to you and that you want to reach more than anything in the world.”
This was a lot harder for Flint, everything on the list seemed important to him. But Warren insisted that he could only pick five. After a while, Flint made up his mind and he had 5 goals circled. Buffet asked:
“Are this truly you highest priorities right now?” Flint confidently replied with a yes.
Alright, Buffet said. ‘Now you have two lists, Buffet said. You have a list of 5 things you really want to do, list A and you have a list of 20 things you also want to do, list B. So what are you going to do now? Buffet asked while pointing at the list A. Flint replied and said: ”I’m going to work on them starting tonight, I know what to do know. I will complete each of them for sure!” Now Buffet asked:
“So, what are you going to do with the other 20 goals, list B?”
“I’m going to work on them intermittently. It’s not as important as my top 5. I will work on them when I feel like it, but the top 5 will be my main priority.” Flint said.
‘NO’, Buffet responded. “You don’t understand the point of the exercise Mike” Buffet said. Everything you didn’t circle isn’t important enough RIGHT NOW. These other 20 things are your ‘avoid at all cost items.’ You don’t want to spend time on them right now since it will only distract you from your main goals, the top 5.” And so Mike Flint went on to do so.
The unique logic of Mr Buffet
I would say that in a way, this sounds very logical. You have your main priorities and although the other priorities are important to you. They aren’t important to you right now, because if they were important enough, you would have picked them. The other goals will come with time, once you have time again because you finally finished something. This type of thinking is what makes Warren Buffet truly unique. His way of minimum risk, minimum time investment so he could get maximum result out of everything he invested time or money in, is truly wonderful.
In the end, one of the best pieces of advice he tends to give is:” Enjoy your work, it’s not worth it to take on a job that you dislike just for the success that it might bring you.” Warren Buffet believes that life is to short to spend time, money and/or effort on things we don’t love. He only invests in things he loves and believes in.
Lesson to think of
Maybe you want to apply the technique that Buffet taught his pilot yourself. In the end, I don’t think that just this 1 thing made him successful. The way of thinking and doing that created the technique is what made Warren Buffet so successful. And that’s where most lessons can be learned, not just following the technique. What values and question did Buffet ask himself to create such a technique?