Quotes from Max Gunther

One excellent way to reinforce the 'ending' feeling is to rig up some kind of reward for yourself.

Knowing how to get out of a bad situation may be the rarest of all speculative gifts.

It is essential to take risks. Examine the life of any lucky man or woman, and you are all but certain to find that he or she was willing, at some point, to take a risk. Without that willingness, hardly anything interesting is likely to happen to you.

Well, now, kid, I'll tell you", Livermore said. "Every occupation has its aches and pains. If you keep bees, you get stung. Me, I get worried. It's either that or stay poor. If I've got a choice between worried and poor, I'll take worried anytime.

The fact is, no formula that ignores luck's dominant role can ever be trusted. This is the great, liberating truth of the Fifth Axiom.

The commandment of the Second Technique is: Go where events flow fastest. Surround yourself with a churning mass of people and things happening.

If you're a hermit, nothing ever happens in your life," he said. "If you're the opposite of a hermit, things happen.

Kirk Douglas had engineered his social life with the cynical goal of meeting the rich and powerful, he would have ignored this Lauren Bacall. But so cynical and narrow-focused an approach isn't likely to produce good luck. The lucky personality gets to know everybody in sight: the rich and the poor, the famous the humble, the sociable and even the friendless and the cranky.

We can't all be the life of the party. Some of us are quieter than others. But we can all go around with a look and attitude that says we want to be friendly. We can stay active. The worst thing you can do is withdraw from the network of friendships and acquaintanceships at home and at work. If you aren't in the network, nobody is ever going to steer anything your way.

Am I making this decision because it's smart or because a majority says it's smart?

In speculation, you should put your money into ventures that genuinely attract you, and only those.

Always remember that you are dealing with chaos and conduct your affairs accordingly. As the Axiom says, chaos is not dangerous until it begins to look orderly.

Except in such unusual circumstances, get in the habit of selling too soon. And when you've sold, don't torment yourself if the winning set continues without you. In all likelihood it won't continue long. If it does, console yourself by thinking of all the times when selling too soon preserved gains you would otherwise have lost.

There are some situations in human life, it is true, in which it may seem wiser to wait out bad times. But that is seldom a wise course where your money is concerned. If you let it get stuck in a bad venture, and if the problems last, you can go for years without having the use of that money. It's locked up when, instead, it should be out chasing gains for you in other, livelier ventures.

The willingness to abandon is usually the more trustworthy response. If you don't sense or can't cultivate this willingness in yourself, speculation of any kind could be difficult for you, and speculation on margin could be disastrous

Both made the completion of the chain possible by making themselves and their wants known to a lot of people.

You may be amazed at how tough you can become with a little practice – and that will be an extra reward of the risk-taker's way of life.

Go where events flow fastest. Specifically what does that mean? It means, simply, make contact with people. Get involved. Don't be a sideliner, watching events flow past. Plunge into the events yourself.

The Axioms are about speculation, not psychological self-help, and therefore they have no advice to offer on how you overcome these obstacles. That is an internal and individual process; the how is probably different for each of us.

No matter how you define success, risk is a necessary ingredient of every successful life. Risk puts you in position to win.

Never take long-range plans seriously. Use them for general guidance as long as they seem to be taking you where you want to go, but whatever you do, don't get stuck with them. Throw them in the trash heap as soon as something better comes along.

Never be afraid to zigzag. Avoid wailing yourself into a category: "I'm a secretary...I'm in the computer business...I'm a Detroiter." You never know which direction your lucky breaks may come from. When they drift into reach, grab them.