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BAD! Kitty Art Studio
BAD! Kitty Art Studio
BAD! Kitty Art Studio
BAD! Kitty Art Studio
BAD! Kitty Art Studio
BAD! Kitty Art Studio
I would like you all to meet Jina Davidson
We Reap
For my Friend!
BAD! Kitty Art Studio
Darren D. Johnson: The Wisdom of Warren Buffett
You all must read this blog post...I have been following this for awhile, it amazes me and inspires me to ...uuummm, just be thankful and work as hard as I can to be the best I can be...check it out. I repost it here for you to read...easy like, but the links are above if you would like to read more or the comments which in my opnion are just as great.
Love to all,
Heather
I spent 6 hours last week in Omaha with Warren Buffett.
As I walked into the meeting I was pleasantly surprised to find Mr. Buffett dressed more like a scroungy sophomore chemistry student than the greatest investor of all time.
It was an open Q&A session with some of my colleagues and me for about 3 hours.Going into the meeting, I was thinking that I would receive a great deal of advice about investing and how to quantify intrinsic value.
I figured he'd tell us all about "Mr. Market" and how his favorite holding period is forever. Then I figured we'd get around to his bet on the Euro or his belief that the market is irrational and ineffecient. Or perhaps the second richest man in the world would, I don't know, talk about money?
Total time spent talking about any of the above: Zero. Zilch. Nada.
Let's get to what he DID talk about.
As a big fan of "Top" lists, I've compiled the "Top 5" things (prioritized) I learned from Warren Buffett that day:
1. Be Grateful -There are roughly 6 Billion people in the world. Imagine the worlds biggest lottery where every one of those 6 Billion people was required to draw a ticket. Printed on each ticket were the circumstances in which they would be required to live for the rest of their lives.
Printed on each ticket were the following items:
- Sex-
Race-
Place of Birth (Country, State, City, etc.)-
Type of Government-
Parents names, income levels & occupations
- IQ (a normal distribution, with a 66% chance of your IQ being 100 & a standard deviation of 20)
- Weight, height, eye color, hair color, etc.
- Personality traits, temperment, wit, sense of humor
- Health risks
If you are reading this blog right now, I'm guessing the ticket you drew when you were born wasn't too bad. The probability of you drawing a ticket that has the favorable circumstances you are in right now is incredibly small (say, 1 in 6 billion). The probability of you being born as your prefereable sex, in the United States, with an average IQ, good health and supportive parents is miniscule.
Warren spent about an hour talking about how grateful we should all be for the circumstances we were born into and for the generous ticket we've been offered in life. He said that we should not take it for granted or think that it is the product of something we did - we just drew a lucky ticket. (He also pointed out that his skill of "allocating capital" would be useless if he would have been born in poverty in Bangladesh.)
2. Be Ethical & Fair
Continuing on the analogy above, consider this scenario:
Imagine that you were selected as the one person (out of 6 Billion) to create the systems of the world. This includes the type of government, social programs, tax systems, military systems, job markets, laws, regulations, etc.
The only catch was this: You had to come up with systems that you believed were fair and that you wanted to live with, before you were allowed to look at your ticket.
When Warren talked about this it made me reconsider the definition of ethical behavior - what type of system would you create if you didn't know what ticket you had drawn? Would you take a different position on some of the programs you are for or against if you were surrounded by a different set of circumstances?
3. Be Trustworthy
This may be a minor point that Mr. Buffett was trying to make, but he told a simple story that affected me greatly. He told of the Founder of the Nebraska Furniture Mart, one of his companies, and how she came from a poor Jewish family and couldn't read, write or speak English.
She had survived the Holocaust, spent 16 years bringing her family to the U.S. (at $50 per person), and grew the Nebraska Furniture Mart from a $500 initial investment to do $350 Million annually from a single location in Omaha.
Update: A friend of hers told Warren at one point that the way she evaluated people was simple: She simply asked herself, "Would they hide me?"
What a great way to judge your instincts about whether to trust someone or not.
4. Invest in Your Circle of Competence
Warren talked at length about investing within your circle of competence. This applies as much to entrepreneurship as it does to investing in public securities. One thing that continually amazes me is how much discipline Warren has in never letting himself get excited about a deal that he doesn't understand. He understands his weaknesses, limitations, and the types of businesses that he gets.
He said that it is crucial that people clearly recognize what they don't understand, and place their effort and energy on businesses or career paths that allow them to bet big on themselves doing something that they do understand. He said that it's "not so important how big the circle is, but it's important that you know where the perimeter is, and when you're outside of it."
5. Do What You Love
Perhaps the reason that we've heard this a million times is that it's true. Warren talked at length about how excited he is to wake up in the morning and to do what he loves. He talked about how important it is to have the freedom in your life to paint your own canvas any way that you like. He said that many people talk about how they are going to just work at a high-paying job "for a little while" and then go do what they love - he equated that to "saving up sex for old age." He said to "never do something that doesn't excite you or that you dislike." Not the advice you'd expect from somebody worth over $40 Billion?
I only hope that as I gain success throughout my career that I can mirror the image of humility, charity, intelligence, optimism and justice that Warren Buffett represents.
***
Pretty great huh? I told you!
Again my love to all,
Heather
http://www.badkittyartstudio.com
Buy Some Art, Support A Living Artist!
BAD! Kitty Art Studio
I am still sick...and wondering when this will end. OMG! I can't stand it anymore.
Worse is the fact that Middle child (or as he likes to be known as "oldest in the house") is worse off than I am, and had to spend a long day sitting in the doctor's office yesterday. He is so sick it breaks my heart for him. So today I am tending to the ill, and trying to putter around the house getting some things put away in the studio, between the fever peaks and cold chills.
I hope all is well in your world today, and if you have a little extra in your life...consider putting Oldest in the house on your get well energy list. Poor guy could use a little more than Mom is able to give. We are two sickies in a pod.
Oh yeah, if you need some art for your home, office or a loved one, consider shopping at my place...Valentine's day is tomorrow! I really need to buy some art supplies for the Gallery show (I am out of paint! Alert the Media, it's a crisis!) and can't afford to do so at the moment...so, go buy some of my work...pretty please! :)
Love to all,
Heather
Support Living Artists
Buy Art Today
Hello everyone! I found this cool meme over at Chrysti's blog, and thought it was super neat-O...and thought to myself..."self why don't you do it too?" So I did, here it goes...if you decided to do it too...let us know with a link so we can all come over to your place and see!
Heather
(again I got this over at Chrysti's blog) Ok, Here is how this meme works:
Copy the list and highlight only the things that YOU have done yourself.
1. Bought everyone in the bar a drink
2. Swam with dolphins
3. Climbed a mountain
4. Taken a Ferrari for a test drive
5. Been inside the Great Pyramid
6. Held a tarantula
7. Taken a candlelit bath with someone
8. Said “I love you” and meant it
9. Hugged a tree
10. Bungee jumped
11. Visited Paris
12. Watched a lightning storm at sea
13. Stayed up all night long and saw the sun rise
14. Seen the Northern Lights
15. Gone to a huge sports game
16. Walked the stairs to the top of the leaning Tower of Pisa
17. Grown and eaten your own vegetables (retired organic farmer)
18. Touched an iceberg
19. Slept under the stars (I hate tents)
20. Changed a baby’s diaper
21. Taken a trip in a hot air balloon(it was more of a ride, not really a trip)
22. Watched a meteor shower
23. Gotten drunk on champagne
24. Given more than you can afford to charity
25. Looked up at the night sky through a telescope
26. Had an uncontrollable giggling fit at the worst possible moment (A funeral)
27. Had a food fight
28. Bet on a winning horse
29. Asked out a stranger
30. Had a snowball fight
31. Screamed as loudly as you possibly can (every time I go to the ocean, if the surf is really up and crashing loud, I stand at the waters edge and let er rip... I do a great Tarzan, it can be heard for miles...really.)
32. Held a lamb
33. Seen a total eclipse
34. Ridden a roller coaster
35. Hit a home run
36. Danced like a fool and not cared who was looking (all the time)
37. Adopted an accent for an entire day (so many times, it's fun!)
38. Actually felt happy about your life, even for just a moment
39. Had two hard drives for your computer
40. Visited all 50 states
41. Taken care of someone who was shit faced
42. Had an amazing friend (and lost her)
43. Danced with a stranger in a foreign country
44. Watched wild whales
45. Stolen a sign (High Street)
46. Backpacked in Europe
47. Taken a road-trip
48. Gone rock climbing
49. Midnight walk on the beach
50. Gone sky diving
51. Visited Ireland
52. Been heartbroken longer than you were actually in love
53. In a restaurant, sat at a stranger’s table and had a meal with them
54. Visited Japan
55. Milked a cow
56. Alphabetized your CDs (can we say OCD, I do this with my books too, it's a sickness)
57. Pretended to be a superhero (wonder woman and Super Mom)
58. Sung karaoke
59. Lounged around in bed all day
60. Posed nude in front of strangers
61. Gone scuba diving
62. Kissed in the rain
63. Played in the mud
64. Played in the rain
65. Gone to a drive-in theater
66. Visited the Great Wall of China
67. Started a business (5)
68. Fallen in love and not had your heart broken (still married to him!)
69. Toured ancient sites
70. Taken a martial arts class
71. Played D&D for more than 6 hours straight
72. Gotten married
73. Been in a movie
74. Crashed a party
76. Gone without food for 5 days
77. Made cookies from scratch
78. Won first prize in a costume contest (my friend and I made matching boob costumes, we were a couple of uber large boobs!)
79. Ridden a gondola in Venice
80. Gotten a tattoo
81. Rafted the Snake River
82. Been on television news programs as an expert
83. Got flowers for no reason
84. Performed on stage
85. Been to Las Vegas
86. Recorded music
87. Eaten shark
88. Eaten fugu (pufferfish)
89. Had a one-night stand
90. Gone to Thailand
91. Bought a house
92. Been in a combat zone
93. Buried one/both of your parents
94. Been on a cruise ship
95. Spoken more than one language fluently
96. Performed in Rocky Horror Picture Show (come up to the lab and see what's on the slab!)
97. Raised children (3)
98. Followed your favorite band/singer on tour
99. Taken an exotic bicycle tour in a foreign country
100. Picked up and moved to another city to just start over (several times)
101. Walked the Golden Gate Bridge (that was fun but scary because I don't like bridges all that much)
102. Sang loudly in the car, and didn’t stop when you knew someone was looking
103. Had plastic surgery
104. Survived an accident that you shouldn’t have survived
105. Wrote articles for a large publication
106. Lost over 100 pounds (118)
107. Held someone while they were having a flashback
108. Piloted an airplane
109. Petted a stingray
110. Broken someone’s heart
111. Ridden a bike
112. Won money on a T.V. game show
113. Broken a bone
114. Gone on an African photo safari
115. Had a body part of yours below the neck pierced
116. Fired a rifle, shotgun, or pistol ( and I am an expert archer)
117. Eaten mushrooms that were gathered in the wild
118. Ridden a horse
119. Had surgery
120. Had a snake as a pet
121. Hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon
122. Slept for more than 30 hours over the course of 48 hours
123. Visited more foreign countries than U.S. states
124. Visited all 7 continents
125. Taken a canoe trip that lasted more than 2 days
126. Eaten kangaroo meat
127. Eaten sushi
128. Had your picture in the newspaper
129. Changed someone’s mind about something you care deeply about
130. Gone back to school
131. Parasailed
132. Petted a cockroach
133. Eaten fried green tomatoes (still do, all the time)
134. Read The Iliad and The Odyssey
135. Selected one important author who you missed in school, and read
136. Killed and prepared an animal for eating (just once, and it cured me from wanting to eat animals)
137. Skipped all your school reunions
138. Communicated with someone without sharing a common spoken language
139. Been elected to public office
140. Written your own computer language
141. Thought to yourself that you’re living your dream (all the time)
142. Had to put someone you love into hospice care (5 times now, all AIDS related deaths, I miss my friends)
143. Built your own PC from parts
144. Sold your own artwork to someone who didn't know you (almost all my work is sold this way)
145. Had a booth at a street fair (so many times)
146. Dyed your hair (there is Not a color I have not tried)
147. Been a DJ
148. Shaved your head (before it all fell out when I had cancer, just to get it over with)
149. Caused a car accident (my one and only that I caused when I was 16 and taking the test for my driver's license HA!)
150. Saved someone’s life (twice given CPR to heart attack victims, one lived the other did not)
