Author name: Steve Burns

After a lifelong fascination with financial markets, Steve began investing in 1993 and trading his accounts in 1995. It was love at first trade. After more than 30 successful years in the markets, Steve now dedicates his time to helping traders improve their psychology and profitability. New Trader U offers an extensive blog resource with more than 4,000 original articles, online courses, and best-selling books covering various topics.

5 Thinking Habits Charlie Munger Said Separate Successful People From Everyone Else

5 Thinking Habits Charlie Munger Said Separate Successful People From Everyone Else

Charlie Munger built a multi-billion-dollar fortune alongside Warren Buffett at Berkshire Hathaway, but he always insisted his success had nothing to do with genius. It came from thinking clearly while everyone else let emotions, ego, and mental shortcuts lead them astray. Throughout decades of speeches and interviews, Munger returned to the same core message: success […]

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Top 10 Books That Teach Middle Class People How Wealthy People Really Think

Top 10 Books That Teach Middle Class People How Wealthy People Really Think

The most significant gap between the middle class and the wealthy isn’t income or inheritance. It’s how they think about money. The wealthy operate under a different mental framework when it comes to risk, time, and asset building. These thought patterns can be learned. The following ten books reveal the mindset shifts that separate those

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Marcus Aurelius: Why Most People Suffer Twice (And Stoics Don’t)

Marcus Aurelius: Why Most People Suffer Twice (And Stoics Don’t)

Marcus Aurelius ruled the Roman Empire during one of its most turbulent periods. He faced wars, plagues, betrayals, and personal loss on a scale most of us will never experience. Yet his private journal, known today as “Meditations,” reveals a man who refused to multiply his own pain through mental habits most people fall into

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10 Books That Train Your Brain to Think in Numbers (While Most People Avoid Math)

10 Books That Train Your Brain to Think in Numbers (While Most People Avoid Math)

Most people quietly avoid math whenever they can. They skip past the numbers in articles, let someone else handle the budget, and trust their gut over data. The problem is that numerical thinking isn’t just an academic skill. It’s the foundation of every good financial decision and risk assessment you’ll ever make. The good news

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Charlie Munger: 10 Psychological Flaws That Cause People to Make Bad Decisions

Charlie Munger: 10 Psychological Flaws That Cause People to Make Bad Decisions

Charlie Munger spent decades studying why intelligent people consistently make terrible decisions. As Warren Buffett’s legendary business partner, Munger became one of the most respected thinkers on human psychology and its impact on financial outcomes. What makes Munger’s insights so powerful is that these psychological flaws operate beneath conscious awareness. Most people don’t realize they’re

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Middle Class Wealth vs. Retirement Reality: 5 Mistakes That Can Cost You $100,000+

Middle Class Wealth vs. Retirement Reality: 5 Mistakes That Can Cost You $100,000+

The biggest threat to middle-class retirement isn’t a market crash or a bad stock pick. It’s the quiet accumulation of small financial mistakes repeated over decades. These aren’t dramatic errors. They’re subtle inefficiencies that most people never notice until the damage is already done. Each of the following five mistakes has the potential to cost

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Charlie Munger’s Darkest Lesson: How Envy and Ego Quietly Destroy Wealth

Charlie Munger’s Darkest Psychology Lesson: How Envy and Ego Quietly Destroy Wealth

Charlie Munger spent over six decades studying why smart people fail with money. His conclusion had nothing to do with bad stock picks or poor timing. The real destroyers of wealth, according to Munger, were two psychological forces hiding in plain sight: envy and ego. These forces don’t announce themselves. They operate beneath the surface,

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10 Books That Teach You More About Money Than Most Finance Classes

10 Books That Teach You More About Money Than Most Finance Classes

Most finance classes teach you how to read a balance sheet and memorize economic theories. What they rarely teach is how real wealth is built, maintained, and grown over a lifetime. The books on this list fill that gap. They focus on behavior, psychology, and real-world strategy rather than textbook formulas. If you want to

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Warren Buffett: 5 Mental Traps That Keep the Middle Class Broke

Warren Buffett: 5 Mental Traps That Keep the Middle Class Broke

Warren Buffett built one of the greatest fortunes in history, yet he still lives in the Omaha house he bought in 1958. He still drives a modest car. He still eats the same breakfast from McDonald’s most mornings. The gap between Buffett’s net worth and his lifestyle reveals something powerful about the psychology of wealth.

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Charlie Munger: 10 Differences Between the Middle Class Mindset and the Wealthy Mindset

Charlie Munger: 10 Differences Between the Middle Class Mindset and the Wealthy Mindset

Charlie Munger spent decades as Warren Buffett’s partner at Berkshire Hathaway, but his most significant contributions went beyond investing. Munger understood why most people stay stuck financially while a few quietly build extraordinary wealth. The difference was never about income. It was about how people think. Let’s explore 10 contrasting mindsets between middle-class people and

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The 10 Rules of Self-Discipline That Warren Buffett Lives By

The 10 Rules of Self-Discipline That Warren Buffett Lives By

Warren Buffett built one of the greatest fortunes in history not through genius alone but through decades of unwavering self-discipline. While most people associate discipline with willpower, Buffett treats it as a decision-making system. He designs his life to minimize temptation rather than constantly fighting it. His daily habits, investment philosophy, and personal conduct all

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Top 10 Books That Explain Human Behavior Better Than Most Psychology Classes

Top 10 Books That Explain Human Behavior Better Than Most Psychology Classes

Most psychology classes teach theories, terminology, and research methods. They rarely show you how human behavior actually plays out in daily life. The best books on the subject go further than any lecture hall by connecting behavioral science to lived experience. These ten books reveal the hidden patterns behind every decision, conversation, and relationship. If

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Warren Buffett’s Inner Scorecard Strategy That Built Generational Wealth

Warren Buffett’s Inner Scorecard Strategy That Built Generational Wealth

Most people spend their lives chasing approval from others. They buy houses they can’t afford, drive cars meant to impress coworkers, and make investment decisions based on what everyone else is doing. Warren Buffett built one of the greatest fortunes in history by doing the opposite. He followed what he calls the “inner scorecard,” a

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Charlie Munger: The 5 Psychological Traps That Keeps the Middle Class Stuck

Charlie Munger: The 5 Psychological Traps That Keeps the Middle Class Stuck

Charlie Munger spent decades studying why intelligent people make terrible financial decisions. As Warren Buffett’s longtime business partner and vice chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, Munger built a framework of mental models rooted in psychology and human behavior. The middle class isn’t stuck because of a lack of intelligence or effort. They’re stuck because of deeply

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10 Books That Will Make You Financially Smarter Than Your Friends

10 Books That Will Make You Financially Smarter Than Your Friends

Most people learn about money the hard way, through trial and error and years of costly mistakes. The right books can compress decades of financial wisdom into a few hundred pages, offering mental and financial frameworks most people never encounter. The ten books below cover everything from behavioral psychology and investing principles to debt elimination

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From Middle Class to Real Wealth: The Blueprint That Works

From Middle Class to Building Real Wealth: The Blueprint That Works

The gap between middle-class income and real wealth has less to do with how much money you earn and more to do with what you do with every dollar that passes through your hands. Most people who earn a solid paycheck still end up financially stuck because they follow the same playbook their parents used.

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The 10 Rules of Self-Discipline That Charlie Munger Lived By

The 10 Rules of Self-Discipline That Charlie Munger Lived By

Charlie Munger built a multi-billion-dollar fortune not through brilliant speculation or complex strategies but through decades of disciplined thinking, rational behavior, and the relentless avoidance of mistakes. His wisdom, shared across Berkshire Hathaway annual meetings, Daily Journal shareholder sessions, and countless interviews, reveals a man who treated self-discipline as the foundation of everything worth achieving.

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10 Financial Lessons Men Learn Too Late in Life, According to Warren Buffett

10 Financial Lessons Men Learn Too Late in Life, According to Warren Buffett

Warren Buffett spent over six decades sharing wisdom that reaches far beyond stock picking. Through Berkshire Hathaway shareholder letters, annual meeting Q&A sessions, and interviews, he developed a philosophy of money, time management, and success in life that most men appreciate only after years of costly mistakes. 1. The Best Investment You Can Make Is

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Charlie Munger’s Favorite 10 Authors: The Thinkers Who Shaped His Mind

Charlie Munger’s Favorite 10 Authors: The Thinkers Who Shaped His Mind

Charlie Munger spent a lifetime reading across every discipline he could find. He built what he called a “latticework of mental models” by pulling ideas from biology, psychology, economics, physics, and history. The authors who shaped that framework weren’t limited to finance. They were scientists, philosophers, and historians whose ideas he carried into every decision

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Warren Buffett: 5 Middle Class Wealth Mistakes Quietly Costing Millions

Warren Buffett: 5 Middle Class Wealth Mistakes Quietly Costing Millions

Warren Buffett built one of the greatest fortunes in history not through secret formulas or insider access, but through a set of principles he openly shared for six decades in Berkshire Hathaway shareholder letters and annual meeting Q&A sessions. His teachings consistently reveal the behavioral patterns that keep the middle class trapped in a cycle

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