MWB #2 - Investing, Growth and Optimism
Lessons on investing, how to grow and the place of optimism and pessimism
Hello,
How are you really? I know “fine” is our default answer to this question. But I am sincerely asking if you are fine. I really want you to be fine so please be.
As the year 2020 was coming to an end, I asked myself what one thing can I focus on for the 365 days in 2021. After much thought, I settled on one thing, I will write every day. I knew it won’t be easy and I still think I underestimated how difficult that might seeing I have never even written every week before.
Well, I have not missed a day since the beginning of the year. It’s a tough one, but I am resilient. That’s the summary of what I’ve been up to and I am working to ensure I don’t miss a day at all.
What have you been up to this year?
Best of What I Wrote
How To Start Investing - In this article, I answered one of the most common questions in the mind of beginner investors. How should I start and what should I buy? It’s been and shared by about 1,000 people, you should read it as well.
In it, I said this, “However, up until now, this prosperity has only been enjoyed by Americans alone who invested their savings in the stock market and watched its value grow tremendously and even predictably. While other countries also have their stock market, not one of them has delivered the kind of prosperity that the US stock market has delivered since it was founded in 1792. Hence, we’ve been left out.
I am fond of saying my generation has an unequal advantage to build wealth that any generation before us did not have. I still stand by those words and this sentiment applies to all countries where once the ability to invest in the US stock market wasn’t available but now is.” Read How To Start Investing
My 3 Steps Growth Process - I have not always been a good writer and I’m not even a great one yet by my standard. Despite that, I’ve been greatly rewarded for writing. I have been writing for 6 years and in this article, I broke down the process that I took to get here. It’s a process that I know employ for a lot of other things in my life as well.
Start no matter what
“Not stopping”
Consistency
Those are the 3 steps that my growth involves. Click to read to learn how that works and if it can help you on your own journey as well.
Human Nature Is The Same - It is easy to assume because some people are in an advantaged situation, they are fundamentally different from others. But the event that led up to the attack on the US Capitol shows that we are all the same and only our level restraints separate us.
Best of What I Read From Others
Determinate Optimism - Breaking down a talk by Peter Thiel about luck, fear and promise — and how our perception of the future impacts how we act today.
“Determinate optimism is a state where individuals have a pretty definite view of how the future will be better than the present. On the other hand, indeterminate optimism is a state where individuals generally believe the future will be better than the present, but are not very sure how that will actually happen.
Determinate pessimism is a state where individuals believe the future is worse than the present but have a clear plan to counter it or at least understand the forces underpinning the bleak outlook. On the other hand, indeterminate pessimism is a state where individuals fear a worse future and are unsure of how things will play out.”
Why Your Present Self Doesn’t Give a Damn About Your Future Self - This article explores why we act in a manner today that would hurt us tomorrow. It did that from the lens of our attitude to saving for retirement or long term.
“Across the board, people are living longer. Logically, they’ll need more money to live comfortably in their post-work years. And yet, savings rates in the US have gone down in recent decades, not up. The average American within 15 years of retirement age saves at only one-third of the rate required to maintain their current standard of living. Why do people spend today at the expense of their future wellbeing?”
Cheers that’s it for this week
See you next week!