The Secret to a Happy Life from 98-Year-Old Billionaire Charlie Munger

“The first rule of a happy life is low expectations. That’s one you can easily arrange.”

~ Charlie Munger

Charlie Munger is a 98-year-old billionaire investor, best friend of Warren Buffett, and vice chairman of the multinational conglomerate holding company Berkshire Hathaway. He is one of the most successful people in the history of the world in terms of wealth, health, and longevity. Munger has exceeded the typical person’s wildest expectations. But here, he gives an unexpected answer for the secret to a happy life.

Why would someone so fortunate, who has crushed most conceivable expectations for a human life, say something as tame as “have low expectations?”

Here’s the problem: Low expectations are commonly misconstrued with ideas of low effort, apathy, and indifference to results. But quickly, let’s question these ideas.

  • Can you put forth great effort without high expectations? Yes!
  • Can you do something without being desperate for an exact result? Yes!
  • Can you care a lot about your life without expecting it to be amazing or nearly perfect? Yes!
  • Can you desire great results without explicitly expecting them (and feeling awful if they don’t happen)? Yes!
  • Can you have low expectations and still get great results? YES!

Perhaps this explains why such a successful man could say something as humble as this:

“I was good at having low expectations and that helped me.”


~ Charlie Munger

Low expectations are the single best way to simultaneously protect yourself against hardship and increase your happiness. Even better, they don’t prevent success as some high expectors might assume they do. They actually increase your odds of success by letting you focus on processes instead of outcomes.

Life is not about ensuring a smooth and seamless experience, it’s about being mentally focused and functional in any situation.

Self help literature can give us the wrong idea sometimes. Most of it is about improving your perspective, behavior, and life. Good things, but it can give us an unrealistic picture of what life “should look like.” If we know 89 secrets to be happy, productive, and relaxed, why would we ever be sad, lazy, or stressed out?

It’s not wrong to have bad days. It’s not unusual to have significant problems spring up out of nowhere and stick around longer than you want. It’s not to be unexpected for life or Mike Tyson to punch you in the mouth, and for it to hurt.

How to Be Miserable

munger's secret to a happy life

The quickest way to misery is to have unrealistic, high expectations. It sounds positive, like you’re “shooting for the moon.” But it usually leads people to panic or become depressed when life takes even a slight turn for the worse. This is perfectionism, which I’ve done extensive research in. The mechanism?

High expectations create hypersensitivity to flaws, even insignificant ones.

Hypersensitivity is problematic in every area. Hypersensitive skin overreacts to otherwise non-harmful substances. Hypersensitive immune systems can lead to devastating diseases and lower quality of life. Hypersensitive minds suffer from miserable reactions to tame imperfections.

One of the five subsets of perfectionism in my book, How to Be an Imperfectionist, is unrealistic expectations. Perfectionism is the harmful root of more problems than people realize. The book provides 22 actionable solutions to five types of perfectionism. You can buy it on Amazon. People love it!

The Low Expectations and Confidence Connection

The secret to a happy, more confident life? Low expectations build confidence.

Think about how a confident person acts in conversation–when there is a lull or awkward moment, do they panic and start yelling nonsense to fill the silence? In an imperfect moment, confident communicators will most likely act as if nothing is wrong, which alleviates awkwardness and makes everyone feel more comfortable. Communication doesn’t have to be perfect to be successful!

When we understand that imperfections are not a big issue, they don’t end up being a big issue. Make sure that your biggest problems are real problems, and not small problems that you’ve let swell in your mind to an unreasonable size.

“When you get a reverse, if you just suck it in and cope… that helps if you don’t fretfully stew yourself into a lot of misery.”

~ Charlie Munger

Acting as if nothing is wrong seems like poor advice when something IS wrong. But it isn’t ignoring, it’s acknowledging and moving forward. And it isn’t rooted in complacency, it’s confidence! You have confidence that you won’t be threatened by these roadblocks, and confidence that setbacks will be temporary.

Whatever happens, you can overcome it. (And even if you can’t, ruminating on it won’t make it better.)

How to Be Happy

Set your expectations low. So humble and uninspiring, I know. Not as flashy as the “shoot for the moon” hypesters, I know. But most of life’s greatest wisdom is incredibly simple.

Think about this. By default, low expectations prepare you to face and overcome any and all setbacks. There’s no sense of panic or haste when trouble comes, because you expect to experience imperfect outcomes. You know you can’t predict the future, but you will do your best to make it a good one.

It also helps knowing what you want to do. You don’t need to have the next five years mapped out, but you should know what direction you want to go in both the next few weeks and the next few months.

If you don’t know where you’re headed, then any problems in your life are automatically going to be your focal point. From there, it’s too easy to let them stew.

Aimless people are at the mercy of circumstance, because with no plans, all that remains is whatever life throws at you. In my experience, life tends to throw a lot of garbage, so that’s not ideal. Choose your path intentionally, not based on current circumstances, but on your desires for the future. The difference between having a motor on your boat and being at the mercy of ocean currents is vast.

In conclusion, a person will be happier with low expectations and more successful with clear direction. Remember, there will always be very successful people who are miserable because they let their success raise their expectations so high that they’ll never be satisfied. Keep your expectations low and your appreciation for life will skyrocket regardless of how successful you are and will become. It’s not what most people think, but that’s why it’s the secret to a happy life— it’s not well known!

It's Free to Subscribe

Free book - 10% Off Coupon - Newsletter

Share this article

Shopping Cart

Subscribe for

Updates & Gifts!

No spam. Easy unsubscribe. Life-changing newsletter!

15585

Subscribe for all bonus content

I send my newsletter every Tuesday morning at 6:30 AM.

15856

Instant Access

FREE PREVIEW

Read Part One of

Mini Habits

500,000 copies sold. 21 languages.

This book can change your life.

Start reading it now for free!

No thanks

 

You will also be subscribed to my excellent newsletter.

Unsubscribe easily anytime.

Scroll to Top