Safal Niveshak

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Mental Models, Investing, and You (Special E-Book)

The world around us is changing pretty fast. Modern computers are becoming cheaper, faster and more intelligent than ever, which means they are ready to replace a large part of human workforce.

The day is not far when your work and skills will be threatened by artificial intelligence. To stay relevant, you need to ensure that you remain valuable to the society in a way which can’t be substituted by a robot.

And your only chance to remain valuable is by being a constant learner…a learning machine, as Charlie Munger says. In fact, he has been saying this for years –

I constantly see people rise in life who are not the smartest, sometimes not even the most diligent, but they are learning machines. They go to bed every night a little wiser than they were when they got up and boy does that help, particularly when you have a long run ahead of you.

The question is where do you begin? There is so much to learn all around, and so little time.

This is seemingly the reason most of us would go through each day without questioning our perception of the world. We seldom stop to wonder whether the world we perceive matches the real world outside. Most of the time, that’s fine…because our perceptions serve us quite well.

In fact, our perception is good enough to guide us through a very complex world with few problems. But because it serves us so well, it’s easy to forget how limited perception really is. And one reason for inadequacy of human perception is that it has to deal with an enormously complex real world.

We live in a world that is not only complex but vastly older and bigger than we are. To think we can fit it all into our heads is a logical absurdity.

At same time, our world and life is full of opportunities, disguised as problems and challenges, which need to be either pursued or avoided. You don’t want to spend a disproportionate amount of time analysing a single problem. Instead the strategy should be to race through numerous problems and quickly identify the solvable ones.

How do you do that? By learning the mental models.

What’s A Mental Model?
If you are new to Safal Niveshak, let me explain. A mental model is a representation, inside your head, of an external reality. Mental models are the basic units which construct a person’s world view. It is the representation that a person has in his mind about the object he is interacting with.

It is the way people think about what it is they are doing or dealing with. Mental models shape our actions as to how we act or behave in a particular situation. They define what people will pay attention to and how they approach and solve problems.

Mental models are tools for the mind. The more models you have from outside your discipline and the more you iterate through them when faced with a challenge in a checklist sort of fashion, the better you’ll be able to solve problems.

While thinking about a problem, mental models provide you a map with which you can quickly course correct your line of inquiry.

These models are additive. Like LEGO. The more you have the more things you can build, the more connections you can make between them and the more likely you are to be able to determine the relevant variables that govern the situation.

And when you learn these models you need to ask yourself under what conditions will this tool fail? That way you’re not only looking for situations where the tool is useful but also situations where something interesting is happening that might warrant further attention.

It won’t be an overstatement if we call these list of mental models as a cheat sheet which allows us to better understand when to follow and when to reject the conventional wisdom. So it’s very important to have the right models in your head.

And how do you build these models? You don’t have to build them all on your own.

According to Munger, the most efficient way to learn is vicarious learning. He says –

I believe in the discipline of mastering the best that other people have ever figured out. I don’t believe in just sitting down and trying to dream it all up yourself. Nobody’s that smart.

Presenting: Mental Models, Investing, and You (Special E-Book)
According to Mr. Munger, there are about 100 or so models across the disciplines of microeconomics, physiology, psychology, elementary mathematics, hard science and engineering that carry about 90% of the freight in making you a worldly-wise person.

And, of course, it’s not possible to learn all of them in day or a week or even in a single year. It’s a long term proposition and will require serious efforts. But when you’ve committed yourself to a lifelong journey for seeking worldly wisdom, it’s a small price to pay.

Mental Models, Investing, and You is a 430+ page e-book (and this is just the first volume) where we have compiled 50 mental models arranged by fields of study. It covers ideas from the various disciplines including psychology, economics, business, mathematics, engineering, physics, social science, literature, statistics and decision making.

We have spent last 18 months researching and writing this e-book, and the efforts were worth it given that we ourselves learned so much in the process.

After reading this e-book, you would have learned –

  • Why people trade in and out of stocks, despite proof that buy and hold is a much profitable and low stress strategy (Page 29)
  • How small accounting frauds get bigger over time, and why investors often fail to notice them (Page 47)
  • Why we fall prey to marketing gimmicks of sales people selling toxic financial products and how can we save ourselves from their persuasion tactics (Page 115)
  • How to develop a strong bullshit filter that can help you quickly sift through mountain of information to discover useful ideas and discard the bad ones (Page 165)
  • Why investors often sell their winning stocks and hold on to their losers (Page 240)
  • How certain business insights can give you tremendous edge in evaluating strong businesses and staying away from the duds (Page 294)
  • How to become a smarter investor by using the principle of inversion which focuses on “what to avoid” (Page 364)
  • How ideas from the supposedly unrelated fields like Literature can make us effective thinkers and better decision makers (Page 399)

Apart from this, you would also end up learning the thinking strategies used by world’s best investors like Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett, Peter Lynch and wildly successful entrepreneurs like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Bill Gates.

And this is not all! There are more than forty other thinking tactics and mental models you will learn from this e-book.

Now what’s unique about this e-book is it doesn’t just talk about the mental models in an abstract way. For every model, you will find discussion on how it can be used to gain unique insights in investing, business, and life in general.

This is, what we believe, one of the biggest reasons a lot of our tribe members who have got the e-book have sent us their appreciation. Like some of these…

What Readers Say

Your devotion & dedication to mental models & value investing is worth emulating. ~ Vinayak G

Great work…I wonder how did you get the focus to put all the jam in 1 bottle… GREAT work. ~ Abdul GC

Love reading your post about mental models. I am sure this book will be great too. Thanks Anshul and Vishal. ~ Rashida

Wow. this is amazing work…I would have been very proud of myself if I did this. Awesome work Vishal and Anshul. ~ Sathyaraj

Anyways, Mental Models, Investing, and You can serve as a good starting point for you to create your own “latticework of mental models.” The insights you’ll discover here will become the springboard for further useful discovery.

How to Get This E-Book?
Just as a small measure of the tremendous effort that has gone into writing and compiling this e-book, we have put a small price to it – Rs 499 (we will give away 50% of this money for the betterment of underprivileged). You can treat this price as your show of love for our work at Safal Niveshak. 🙂

Before we end, one final warning. Anything you read “rewires” a part of your brain. The brain you have now; you don’t get that brain back after learning the mental models. We are sincerely hoping that the trade-off is worth it.

With respect,
Vishal & Anshul

P.S. After you pay, please give us 24-48 hours to email it to you. For any queries, please email to vishal[at]safalniveshak[dot]com or anshul[at]safalniveshak[dot]com.

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Kanagu says

    I always enjoyed Anshul’s posts on Mental Models. I was thinking when this will come out as a book. Glad it came soon. Hope I add at least few of this to my mental toolkit. Great work from both of you!! thank you!!

    Reply

  2. Venkatesh Jayaraman says

    Dear Vishal/Anshul,

    Thanks for the good work and looking to receive it.

    I would request that you remove the free option. As any one would be tempted to use the free option, when both free and pay option is thrown in their plates 🙂

    Thanks
    Venkatesh

    Reply

  3. Jan says

    Hi Safal

    Your mental modell series is the best of all the investing subscription i get in my inbox. Well written, examples in daily life and investing. I feel I get smarter after each post from you. You ate truly giving value to your audience.

    Reply

  7. Deepak says

    I was feeling guilt from inside for receiving the teaching of Guru without paying any Guru Dakshina. I am a bit relaxed now :). Thanks a lot for sharing your valuable knowledge through your blog.

    Reply

  8. Kanwalpreet Singh says

    I was tempted to get the e-book for free, but then I realised that I did not mind paying for good value. Just purchased the e-book. Can’t wait to read it now. Keep up the good work guys. You’re an inspiration to me and many investors out there.

    Reply

  9. Manish says

    Hi Vishal,

    I couldn’t wait for the book, so I applied it for free now. I ensure you that I will pay for it ASAP.

    Thank you

    Reply

  11. Jitesh Agarwal says

    Hi Vishal,

    I have paid and registered for the book 12 hours back. Have not yet received the e-book. Can you pls let me know the process and when can I expect to receive the book.

    Regards,
    Jitesh Agarwal

    Reply

  12. Yogesh Tiwari says

    Not sure, which mental model/psychology phenomenon describes pricing method you guys used. For anyone like me, who is a regular follower of your blog, feels obligated to buy this ebook. Honestly, I felt bad when I thought of clicking on free link, and deliberately(with a smile on face) decided to pay for it.
    I think, Guy Spier and Warren Buffett both have talked about it. Keep building goodwill(offer quality stuff for long time), and then, suddenly, the curve starts to move up and it starts paying off(in a big way).

    Thanks for creating this though. I, anyway, wanted all of it collated in 1 ebook, that I can keep for life. 🙂
    -Yogi

    Reply

  14. Ankitkumar Trivedi says

    Hi Vishal,

    I have paid for the book via NEFT around 30 hours back. Can you please tell me when will i be able to put my hand on the master piece. Sorry for the impatience.

    Regards,
    Ankitkumar

    Reply

  16. Manish says

    Dear Vishal,

    I have applied for the free E-book 2 days back but not received the book till now. can you please arrange the same for me.

    Regards
    Manish

    Reply

  17. Yogesh Tiwari says

    Vishal,

    I haven’t received ebook yet. Please check, and send me the ebook. I paid through credit card.

    Thanks
    -Yogesh Tiwari

    Reply

  18. aadhar says

    Hi Vishal,

    I had registered for free ebook 2 days back. Can you pls let me know when will i receive the ebook.
    also can you publish book in epub or mobi format for kindle.

    Regards,
    aadhar

    Reply

  19. vinay says

    Hi Vishal/Anshul,
    Thank you both for sharing your wisdom through this e-book as well. I have registered for free copy but till now i didn’t receive any email. Is it that we need to pay in order to get the copy?

    Thanks,
    Vinay

    Reply

  21. Parag says

    Got my copy yesterday. Completed 2 chapters and I cannot keep the book down. Awesome effort by you guys to keep it simple (it takes a lot to keep things simple).
    Great work !! Kudos.

    Reply

  22. Karthikeya says

    Very well articulated book. Really appreciate your offer for sale at Rs.0 !!! Your hard work and passion is palpable. But how can I trivialize your efforts by accepting it free of cost? My best wishes for Volume-2 in advance

    Reply

  23. Subrata Bera says

    Thank you very much Vishal and Anshul for coming up with this excellent piece of work. I have booked my copy via Explara on Monday and quite eager to get my hands on it (preferably Kindle format). Hoping to receive it soon.

    Regards,
    Subrata

    Reply

  24. Aksh says

    Hi Vishal/Anshul,

    Thanks and Kudos to you guys for this great work of putting this worldly wisdom in a handy e-book.

    I’ve registered the ebook on 26th Sep but yet to receive it.

    Could you pls look into the same?

    Thanks,
    Aksh

    Reply

        • Aksh says

          Hi Vishal/Anshul,

          After so many days and repetitive reminders on both email and here through comments, I’m yet to receive even the link let alone the e-book.

          Can’t help but being a practitioner of mental models myself makes me think – are you guys really serious about this or its part of some sort of gimmick?

          Regards,
          Aksh

          Reply

          • Vishal Khandelwal says

            Hi Aksh. We haven’t received any reminders from you. And then, we’ve already sent the book to you on 27th September. Check you spam please.

            Given that 2000+ people have already received the book, and that we are giving it away for free – like you have claimed the book – it isn’t a gimmick for sure. Thanks!

            Reply

            • Aksh says

              Hi Vishal,

              I’ve already checked everything on my side not once but many times before expressing my concerns but even after your this very recent assurance I’m yet to receive the same.

              And when I’m receiving all your posts in my mailbox regularly, not getting this “free as advertised” e-book is quite strange! Isn’t it? and that’s why my concerns of it probably being some sort of gimmick.

              Regarding reminders, I’ve sent an email to you and Anshul on 28th so kindly do check the same and my reminder comments are already visible here.

              Rest, We are all mature enough to understand stuffs, so won’t be reminding/writing you any more.

              I hope, as you claim, it’s not a gimmick for sure…

              Regards,
              Aksh

              Reply

  25. Vaibhav says

    This is simply superb Vishal & Anshul! I am greatly moved by this completely different approach of offering the same thing for free as well as paid. People willing to pay for valuable resources when they know they can get it for a bargain is symbol of true value investors paying for quality. Thank you for sharing great knowledge and doing a good deed in parallel by donating the money to underprivileged. Thank you for increasing our inner scorecard! You Rock!!!!

    Regards,
    Vaibhav

    Reply

  26. pradip beriwal says

    HI,

    I purchased the book online and received a link to download the ebook. However getting the following error after clicking on the link. Please help.

    Error (429)
    This account’s links are generating too much traffic and have been temporarily disabled!

    Reply

  27. Ananth says

    Hi Vishal,

    Looks like Dropbox account got suspended due to high traffic 🙂

    Error (429)
    This account’s links are generating too much traffic and have been temporarily disabled!

    Please check on this..

    Reply

  28. Abhishek says

    Hello,
    Same drop box issue with me.

    Error (429)
    This account’s links are generating too much traffic and have been temporarily disabled!

    Reply

  30. Harish says

    Vishal…
    Great work, last night I downloaded..
    One of the master piece from both of you
    … this e-book become milestone in safal niveshak history… thanks for sharing… as I learn a lot from you. thanks Harish

    Reply

  34. Deepak says

    The ebook is awesome especially the “Business” section. Thanks a lot for that.

    Inside, in surfing the wave section, you have mentioned that Warren Buffet was not investing in the tech companies. Because he could not understand the it’s business. Could please elaborate on this. I am religiously following your advice to read annual report and understand the business. But still I cannot figure out what is exactly knowing the business. Please help me on this.

    Reply

  35. Aniket K says

    Hey Vishal email me the link to download your e-book on mental models.Very much interested in reading your work. Have mailed you the details of the NEFT done to your mentioned account.

    Reply

    • Anshul Khare says

      The book is available in the kindle format also. If you have registered for the book, you would have received the link to download the book in all three formats, i.e. pdf, epub and mobi (kindle).

      Reply

  37. Abrar says

    Hi Vishal, Anshul,

    Have you removed the free option for the E-Book? I have suggested it to so many of my friends to convince them about you guys and your voluminous work in the form of Ebook.

    They came back to me disappointed saying there is no such free offer.
    Let me know if you intend to open up the free offer again. Lot of fence sitters will become converts, so to say.

    Reply

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