Immutable Laws: 23 Stories About Things That Never Change (Hardcover)

Author Morgan Housel · Publisher Seosamdok · Publication Date 2024-02-28 · ISBN 9791198517425

About the Book

Praised by 30 million people worldwide
A new masterpiece by Morgan Housel, author of 『The Psychology of Money』!
★ Amazon Bestseller ★ New York Times Bestseller ★ Exported to 36 countries worldwide ★

『Same as Ever』 transcends the realms of money and psychology.
This book covers everything from human 'birth' to 'death'!
- Amazon Reader -

A word from Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon
“What do I think will change? Your question is wrong.”

Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, often gets asked, "What do you think will change in the next 10 years?" He added, "But I rarely get asked, 'What will NOT change in the next 10 years?' I actually think this second question is more important."

In 1994, Bezos first created an online bookstore business and named it Amazon. The following year, he ran an advertisement that read, "We sell countless books at low prices."

Look at the ad he ran in 1995. Today, in 2024, Amazon's business philosophy is not much different. Bezos said he couldn't even imagine a future where Amazon customers' desire for low prices and fast delivery would disappear. He focused on 'what doesn't change' rather than what does, and maintained this in his business for decades. Thanks to this, he was able to grow Amazon into the world's leading e-commerce platform, with a market capitalization of over 1.4 trillion won today.

What Morgan Housel realized after 10 years of studying history
“The human brain is the same in 1920, 2000, and 2020.”

Jeff Bezos' story clearly conveys the following message: 'Things that don't change are important. Knowing them can give you confidence and help you gauge the future.'

Morgan Housel also focused on the same point as Jeff Bezos. He states the reason for writing a book on the subject of 'immutable laws' as follows: "About a decade ago, I set a goal to study more history and read fewer forecasts. That decision brought an astonishing change to my life. Ironically, the more history I knew, the less anxious I became about the future. When you stop making clumsy attempts to predict an uncertain future and instead focus on what never changes, things you couldn't see before begin to appear. These are the immutable laws that remain relevant no matter how much time passes."

He re-emphasizes that "the human brain is the same in 1920, 2000, and 2020," and that only when one realizes 'what doesn't change' in a changing world can one truly gauge a better direction for the future.

“I thought it was an investment book, but I learned about life.”
23 immutable laws that were true 1000 years ago and will be true 1000 years from now

In his new book 『Same as Ever』, released three years after his previous work, Morgan Housel summarized 23 'immutable laws' that were true 1000 years ago and will be true 1000 years from now. He tells interesting historical stories and anecdotes about human behavior and repetitive patterns with his unique storytelling ability. Warren Buffett's sneakers, Bill Gates' hidden anxieties, why Yuval Harari received unexpected criticism, Howard Schultz's regrets, the invisible variables of the GameStop incident, the final stand of the Battle of the Bulge, the death of magician Houdini, and so on. Each chapter unfolds like a documentary novel.

Within these fascinating anecdotes, insights into human history and life lessons are strung together like pearls. The immense impact of 1% risk, the leverage of expectations and reality, the secret of probability and certainty, the usefulness of imperfection, the power of stories stronger than statistics, the process by which a 1-second mistake can crumble 100 years of achievement, and so on. The 23 'immutable laws' subtly woven into each episode evoke both sighs and admiration.

"I thought it would be as good as the previous work, but I was wrong. This is more than that." "I thought it was an investment book, but I learned about life." These reader reviews are not exaggerations. Anyone who follows Morgan Housel's excellent narrative will experience the same "fullness and regret after a 3-hour meeting with a young guru who has enlightened the world's principles" as mentioned by leaders both domestically and internationally.

Table of Contents

Foreword Small Laws of Life

1. This Precarious World
- Looking back at the past, we realize that the future is unknowable.

2. The Unseen, Risk
- In fact, we are quite good at predicting the future. We just can't predict surprising unexpected events. And that often determines everything.

3. Expectations and Reality
- The first principle for happiness is to lower your expectations.

4. Humans, Those Unknowable Beings
- A person with unique but excellent traits also has unique but not so excellent traits.

5. Probability and Certainty
- What people want isn't accurate information. What people want is certainty.

6. The Better Story Wins
- A story is always more powerful than statistics.

7. What Statistics Miss
- Unmeasurable forces move the world.

8. Peace Sows the Seeds of Chaos
- A market that is furiously overheated doesn't mean it's broken.
Furious overheating is normal. More furious overheating is also normal.

9. More, Faster
- Even a good idea becomes a bad idea if pursued at an unreasonable speed.

10. The Moment Magic Happens
- Unlike peace, pain brings focus.

11. Tragedy is Instant, Miracles Take Time
- Good things happen through the accumulation of small, gradual changes, so they take time,
Bad things happen due to sudden loss of trust or a fatal mistake that occurs in the blink of an eye.

12. Trifles and Great Results
- Small things accumulate to create something enormous.

13. Hope and Despair
- Progress requires the coexistence of optimism and pessimism.

14. The Trap of Perfection
- A little imperfection is actually useful.

15. Every Journey is Hard by Nature
- Anything worth striving for comes with pain.
What's important is a mindset that doesn't mind the pain.

16. Keep Going
- Competitive advantage eventually disappears.

17. On the Wonders of the Future
- Progress always seems to be sluggish.
So we tend to underestimate the potential of new technologies.

18. Harder Than It Looks, Not As Enjoyable As It Seems
- "The grass is always greener on the other side, fertilized by lies."

19. Incentives: The Most Powerful Force in the World
- Incentives sometimes lead to insane behavior.
People can justify or defend almost anything.

20. You Have to Experience It to Know
- Nothing is as convincing as direct experience.

21. On Looking Far Ahead
- Saying "I'm going with a long-term strategy" is like pointing at the summit from the base of Mount Everest and saying,
"I'm going to climb that." Well, it's a great idea.
And now, countless trials and tribulations begin.

22. Complexity and Simplicity
- There's no benefit to being more complex than necessary.

23. Wounds Heal, But Scars Remain
- What did that person experience that I haven't, to have such a view?
If I experienced the same thing, would I think that way too?

Questions for You to Consider
Acknowledgments
Notes
Regarding the Translation