Everyday Long Term Thinking

Life is short but short term thinking is not the best way to live life. 

It's a paradox. Tomorrow you could get hit by a bus or a pandemic, but that doesn't mean you should eat all your candy today. You'll feel better about today and tomorrow if you accept transience, eh, permanently. In other words, circumstances will always change but Life (as in human life, humanity, the legacy of loved ones, the essence of why we're all here) will go on and quality of Life matters. And that's why we don't eat all our candy today and we teach our kids to save some for tomorrow, for others, for their bodies' sake. A little long term thinking can help guide us today. 

Recently my family has been thinking about the next few years because opportunities have come up, which, if they come through, would be a major life change in the short term (in this case, short term meaning the next 3-5 years). We had to decide whether or not to even consider these opportunities.

It was hard to know which factors to consider in the decision, and how to weight them. We would need to move. New environment. New school. New friends. New lifestyle in some ways. Some financial considerations -- it would be good financially, especially in the long term. 

The financial part is interesting, I'll say a little more because after all this blog focuses on investing. It's kind of like those hypothetical questions you consider when you are young(er): What would you do in the short term for a big gain later? Would you live in the wilderness for the next 3 years for 1 million dollars in 10 years? 

I just turned 45, so my time to make a significant shift toward early retirement is growing thinner, as is my time to bolster retirement savings. So, financially ... this would be big.

What about the other factors? It's funny, I'm one who skipped my high school prom because I thought it was a transient distraction and I wouldn't care about it when I was 45. That's more or less true today, it turns out. But the first thing I think of when these opportunities come up involve the kids -- what about their schools and teams and such. Won't they need that stability? I don't know and it's very difficult to know. We would be giving them something else -- adventure and perspective. 

And, let's not romanticize growing up in 2020. 

Virtual school. Pressure on sports teams at young ages. Social unrest, some of it confused, in the midst of unprecedented and unappreciated wealth and comfort. Social media literally ruining kids, promising self-expression and acceptance but delivering self-delusion and rejection. Ironic to think of it as stability.

After considering all these factors, we decided to go for it. We should find out in a few weeks if it will move forward. The key for the optimist and the stoic is to be happy with whatever comes next, which is outside our control. 

INVESTMENT CHECK

September was really choppy and I've been listening to my own advice -- don't sell winners. In fact, real winners should be added to during the chop. It's somewhat counterintuitive, because when I look at my portfolio, I see a few big winners, a lot of mediocre picks, and then a few losers. For some reason, the brain wants all of them to be winners; the instinct is to add to the losers in order to make them better. 

This is almost certainly wrong. Losers tend to keep losing -- wrong industry, wrong management, whatever. Winners keep winning. Good industry, good management, good execution. The goal, then, is not to make every investment a winner. There will always be losers. The goal is actually to turn winners into bigger winners.

So, I'm looking at my portfolio and I notice some of my best performing stocks (PINS, LVGO, ATVI, VEEV, SE) are down less than 10% from all time highs. In other words, despite the chop, not much selling pressure. Big shareholders want to keep holding. These are the names to add to. 

So that's what I'm doing. I'm adding. It'll be a choppy fall, but for some reason I continue to be optimistic that good companies and industries will thrive. I don't care too much what the indices do, but I'm fairly constructive there as well.

What I'm reading: The Wall St Journal.

What I'm listening to: Pearl Jam's greatest. Evenflow could be my favorite song of all time.

What I'm watching: The NBA Finals. 

Stoic / Mindful Thought: Uncertainty is the norm; learning to enjoy it can ease a lot of anguish.