Regularly scheduled spring cleanings/decluttering days are an underrated saving strategy. They accomplish two things at once. They…
(1) …help us understand what we have at home and prevent accidental (repeat) purchases.
(2) …remind us just how little we actually need. When it comes to stuff we own, more is definitely not better.
A leader’s long-term effectiveness is directly proportional to their willingness to have uncomfortable conversations and to do so with grace.
The only difference between productivity and activity is the presence of a goal.
And if said goal doesn’t have a schedule and dates against it, it is just a dream.
The hardest part of getting into a good habit is often the part that involves getting out of a bad one.
It is why patience and kindness are powerful allies in our quest for change.
If it were easy, we’d have done it by now.
A good friend shared a question she was asked by a coach – how often are you listening to learn vs. listening to respond or defend or argue?
She talked about how that question got her reflecting on what she could do better.
It is a profound question. One that nudged me to increase the percentage of time I listen to learn vs. respond.
We watched “Rise” with our kids recently. It is a wonderful movie about the 3 Antetokounmpo brothers who grew up as illegal immigrants in Greece to win NBA championships. It is one of those stories that sparks conversations that give you perspective. It also explain why Giannis Antetokounmpo is such an inspiring person.
There’s adversity and strife behind all that insight.
The movie reminded me of an exchange between Giannis and a reporter at the end of last season that went viral. The reporter asked him whether he considered the season a failure?
The whole response is worth watching in full. Here are the highlights –
Do you get a promotion every year at your job? No, right? So every year, your work is a failure? No. Every year, you work towards something, which is a goal: It’s to get a promotion, to be able to take care of your family, provide a house for them, or take care of your parents. It’s not a failure, it’s steps to success. There’s always steps to it. Michael Jordan played for 15 years and won 6 championships. The other 9 years were a failure? That’s what you’re telling me.
There’s no failure in sports. There’s good days, bad days, some days you are able to be successful, some days you’re not, some days it’s your turn, some days it’s not your turn. That’s what sport’s about. You don’t always win, some other people are gonna win. And this year, someone else is gonna win. Simple as that.
So 50 years from 1971-2021 that we didn’t win a championship, it was 50 years of failure? No it was not, there were steps to it, and we were able to win one, hopefully we can win another one.
True story.. and hard earned insight.
“You know what the happiest animal on earth is? It’s a goldfish. You know why? It’s got a 10-second memory. Be a goldfish.” | Ted Lasso
A lesson I can’t be reminded of enough.
Here’s to more goldfish.
#OurWorldIsAwesome – Edition 2
We’re learning a tremendous amount about our impact on the planet. And it is really easy to get down about what’s happening. The earth is as hot as it has ever been. Arctic ice is melting at a scary pace – the number of animals and humans around the world facing adverse weather is on the up.
My philosophy when it comes to thinking about this is to embrace reality and deal in hope. And one way I become more hopeful is when I think about the many people around the world who get to experience incredible sights. For every 10 who sees something spectacular, I’m hopeful 3 contemplate the challenges ahead, and 1 takes systemic action.
The US National Park system is one of those avenues of hope. They do fantastic work protecting some incredible sights. And perhaps none more incredible or wondrous than Yellowstone National Park.
Yellowstone National Park, established in 1872, was the first national park in the US and (likely) the first in the world. One way to make sense of this fact – it must have taken something wondrous for man to stop plundering nature and think about conservation. Yellowstone National Park is indeed all that.
There are so many incredible facts about Yellowstone National Park. One that sticks with me is that it has more than half the world’s known geysers and geothermal features. It is also the equivalent of the Serengeti in North America with free-roaming herds of bison, elk, bears, and wolves.
There are three things that stayed with me from our visit to Yellowstone National Park.
The geysers are wondrous. This geyser “Grand” erupts up to 200 feet for 9-12 minutes every couple of hours. And, of course, there’s the Old Faithful that faithfully erupts every 45 minutes.
The sights from the geothermal features are incredible – they need to be seen to be believed. The greatest of them all is the Grand Prismatic.
And then the wildlife. The Bison roaming around are majestic and nimble (they possess ridiculous acceleration). And there are few sights more amazing than seeing a North American grizzly bear playing with her cub off the side of a road. We spent a couple of hours just transfixed – watching another mom and son pair playing.
The word that best describes Yellowstone National Park is wondrous. Its uniqueness inspires wonder and appreciation for our world.
I first invested in the market just over a decade ago. I was two years out of school, was fortunate to have savings, and thought it was time to do something with said savings.
I read a few books on investing – by the likes of William J Bernstein and Ramit Sethi – and learnt about index funds. I didn’t live in the US – so I needed to find a place that traded the corresponding ETFs or Exchange Traded Funds. I also didn’t know anything about this and didn’t know anyone in my circle of friends who was doing this.
So I reached out for help to a wiser friend I’d gotten to know and also ended up exchanging notes with the wonderful Derek Sivers. As part of this, I had a memorable exchange with Derek when I asked – how do I know I’m investing at a good time?
He explained that he had debated entering the market in 2009. Someone had told him to wait to see if the market went down further. It never did. His net worth would have been incredibly high if he’d just invested instead of waiting two years. I remembered a quote in William J Bernstein’s book – “Time in the market beats timing the market” – and decided to take the plunge.
I ended up having to sell all my investments just about two years into my first plunge to pay for graduate school. I remember feeling so grateful for these investments – 2013-15 was a good time to be invested in the market. Those investments were one of three things that helped me/us get out of graduate school debt free. The other two were a second-year tuition scholarship and my wife’s income.
It took a couple more years to build some liquidity before investing in the market again. And as I look back over the past 6 years, I realize I’ve had a knack of timing my sales at the worst possible time.
For a brief period in 2019, I thought I’d invest in individual stocks. A few months in, I realized that this wasn’t for me. Funnily, the two stocks I’d decided to invest in were Nvidia and Amazon. I sold them both at a loss as I exited the single stock game.
Both have done more than fine since.
As I was on my way out of the self-managed game, I finally decided to work with Vanguard’s managed services. However, I still held onto the index funds I’d invested in when I was going it alone. And as I was looking back at my history this past weekend, I realized I went on a simplification spree and went all in on the managed services in mid-2020.
Those indexes did phenomenally well in the 18 months since.
I share this because, well, this is a learning blog. And where would the learning be without spectacular failures such as these?
But I also share this because that adage – time in the market beats timing the market – has been true in the past 10 years. The investments I’ve consistently contributed to and then left untouched for long periods of time have done the best. The only requirement with these was to contribute to them regardless of whether the market is up or down. And I’ve managed that.
There is no guarantee a simple index fund approach will work forever – past performance doesn’t guarantee future performance. But we’ll deal with that when it comes.
For now, I’m left to reflect on some of the hard-won lessons the market has taught me – both about the market and myself. Ultimately, all of this comes down to finding an investment approach that works for us. I’ve learnt that playing the market is a game that is best left to others.
Much like writing on this blog, I work best when I work with consistency, equanimity, and time.
The true cost of owning something = cost of purchase + cost of maintenance/insurance.
Too often, we make decisions just based on the cost of purchase. On average, that works out fine because maintenance/insurance costs are often correlated to the cost of purchase.
However, there are items – sometimes in the same category – whose maintenance costs are negative relative to others that are cheaper but cost much more to maintain.
There’s a great quote that says the true cost of owning something is the amount of life we exchange for it. That exchange often shows up in unaccounted ongoing costs.
The lesson – pay as much attention to what happens after we purchase something as we do to the purchase itself.
A Learning a Day 