Avoid working directly under somebody you don't admire and don't want to be like.

As I continued through Cicero's pages, I found much more material celebrating my way of life.

We have to have a special insight, or we'll put it in the 'too tough' basket. All of you have to look for a special area of competency and focus on that.

Even bright people are going to have limited, really valuable insights in a very competitive world when they're fighting against other very bright, hardworking people. And it makes sense to load up on the very few good insights you have instead of pretending to know everything about everything at all times.

A lot of people think if you just had more process and more compliance -- checks and doublechecks and so forth -- you could create a better result in the world. Well, Berkshire has had practically no process. We had hardly any internal auditing until they forced it on us. We just try to operate in a seamless web of deserved trust and be careful whom we trust.

I regard the amount of brainpower going into money management as a national scandal. When some idiot would get rich, they'd say, 'Well, old Charlie was out in the field playing the big brass tuba on the day it rained gold.' A lot of people have become rich lately who were playing the tuba on the day it rained gold.

All intelligent investing is value investing - acquiring more that you are paying for. You must value the business in order to value the stock.