Learning Machines

A reporter asked Warren Buffett how he was such a good investor. Buffett picked up a stack of papers on his desk and lightly dropped them back down, saying, "Read five hundred pages of this a day."

Charlie Munger, his right hand man, says he's a learning machine--that's why he's so successful. 

I read a blog post the other day entitled the Ten Percent Method, or something similar. It simply said that each day you should read ten percent of a book (easy to do with an eReader, but pretty easy with paperbacks too). If you do that, you should be able to move through anywhere between 30-50 books a year. I started it a few days ago, and God is good is all I will say about it.

I've found myself watching television more and more over the years. When I was young, my mother gave me a book for my birthday. It was like a new world opened before me. I think it was The Babysitter's Club (don't say anything). Even in college, I read a lot more than I do now. 

Facebook. News aggregators. Twitter. The Sopranos. Breaking Bad. All of it has taken time away from reading. From learning. 

You improve through a couple of ways, I believe. Practice. People. Reading. All of that increases what you know. Reading Facebook for the tenth time in a day does nothing.

Ten percent a day.