You’ve all heard that your habits will determine your success.
The same goes with investing.
If you are seriously doing it to “get rich quick” – you will fail at investing, only because you lack patience.
Investing incrementally, strategically, methodically will not guarantee you success, however, it offers more success than throwing your money into something and waiting for the big jackpot payout! (Been there, done that – still waiting – 15 years later!)
The truth is you need to “go in slow” – meaning take your time to plan out what you are investing in, how this fits with your goals and lifestyle (do you need to be up at 6:30am to be doing trading?!)
Going in slow also means doing your research and knowing your end game.
Like I’ve mentioned in the past few weeks, you have to know your why – if you don’t know that, you don’t know what you are doing. (This goes for all of your LIFE too!)
Getting out when you’ve decided you should instead of just letting it ride a little longer, a little longer, a little longer. The greed will be the end of you only because virtually no one can time the top or the bottom of the market – better to get 80% of the gains than lose it all.
Investing is one of those things where you have to realize you’ll never truly win in the sense of looking back and timing it to get in at the right time and get out at the right time. NO ONE CAN DO THAT!
Yet, we judge ourselves and our adviors or portfolio management team on that, when it’s a fallacy.
Is there money to be made in investing – OH HECK YA!
Are the trades ever perfect – OH HECK NO!
But money can be made and will be made, from those who know how to take their gains and move on.
Important habits to create around investing:
- know what you are wanting your specific outcome to be (obviously, this doesn’t always happen the way we want it to, but it keeps your eye on the prize and helps when you have a set back.)
- research, research, research – intimacy with your investments isn’t a bad thing, otherwise you can just chalk up your investment game to doubling down on red. (or get your advisor or trusted financial guru to do the research and explain to you in simple terms – trust me, that’s better if you don’t have time to take this step!)
- plan your in and your out
- always check on any tax implications of your investments (this is where you need a great CFP or CPA to work with if you aren’t intimate with the tax code!)
- saving/investing at the same time each week, month or year really helps to keep your plan on track and builds that habit so you don’t end up spending the money allocated to your future!
- have a set amount of money allocated to your future – decide and stick with it. Even if you are starting at 1% and increasing it from there!
- try to automate payments if you haven’t – I know it’s so hard if you are self-employed or get paid random commission or starting a business
- know what type of return you are looking for – is it yield, dividend type growth, or is it capital appreciation, capital gain type of growth, or maybe just interest? (In other words, are you investing in equities or maybe some debt instruments? How does your portfolio mix fit in with your risk tolerance?)
- Try to take the emotion out when investing, but don’t take the emotion out of the dreams you are working to fund
That is not an extensive list, but it’s a great start!
The key is to get started – period.
The biggest hindrance to growing your wealth is not deciding to grow your wealth.
The next is not taking action.
Here’s the real deal.
You WILL lose some.
Listen up – hear me on this –
“LOSS” in investing means you are trying!
Ask any great investor what they learned by taking a loss or a big hit.
Loss is the tuition of investing.
It will be your greatest teacher!
You won’t always lose, but let me tell you that if you haven’t failed even once when it comes to investing, it just means you probably aren’t trying hard enough or playing it too safe to really get the growth you are looking for.
Obviously, I’m not talking to a retired or senior here, I’m talking to my younger folk.
There are always times you need to play it safer and preserve capital and cash flow.
But for you starting out, chances are you can afford in your timeline a bit of “live and learn”.
And so that’s exactly what you do.
You live and learn and…
Live Your Legacy!
xx Lisa
PS. If you want to join me for my Investment Planning Livestream then make sure you sign up at financialbliss.ca to get the Investment Planner {a beautiful investment workbook I created just for you!} and join the Money Makeover Facebook Group where I will walk you through how to plan your investments LIVE on Friday February 7th at 10am MST, 9am PST, 12pm EST!
Looking forward to seeing you there!
