Investing In Something That Matters

Sometimes the TV is on in the background while I prepare dinner or am just milling about the house doing little chores. And often times I hear things like:
– The Dow Jones Industrial is up 2 points
– The NYSE is in the red by 4 today
– Tech giant Apple is expected to announce the next Iphone and investors are reacting
– ExxonMobil CEO talks with shareholders about their next big move
Most of the time this is just background noise for me. If something catches my attention, like I stock I have invested in being named, then I stop what I am doing and listen closely.
That last sentence holds the key to life. I know, I know.
That’s a big statement. But you get the point, right?
When we are invested in something… we take a higher interest in its success. We pay more attention to it. We learn about it. We care about it.
It doesn’t matter if it’s an actual intangible stock trade or our actual health.
For example, if you get a call from the doctor and they tell you that your test results came back and you are diabetic… you’d suddenly want to learn about diabetes, right?
Why?
Because like it or not, it’s now part of your life and you have a vested interest in learning as much as you can about it and how you can minimize or get rid of its effects on you.
The general idea with investing is to guess on the future of something and hope it turns out in your favor.
You pick a stock today in hopes that in the future it will rise in value.
You enroll your kid in that high-priced baseball camp in hopes that it will allow him to have a college and professional career later on.
You buy a house in an up-and-coming neighborhood in hopes that when you sell it the asking price will be much higher than it would be on the market today.
Now, equity and stocks are an important part of any retirement plan… but so are you.
Yes, you.
I often see a lightbulb go off when new clients join up at our facility. They make the connection that investing in themselves pays immediate dividends.
There’s no reason to wait 5, 10, or 35 years to see if an investment paid off.
Once you start taking care of yourself you immediately feel better. You get more energy. You’re less tired. You’re happier. You’re healthier. And your self-confidence soars.
And the best part… you have almost total control over the investment in you. You can decide what to eat. You can decide how active to be. You can decide how to take care of yourself.
A stock? Well, you’re at the mercy of the CEO’s and the markets.
The desirability of a neighborhood? You can help to make your community better – but in the end what will be needed is a large group of committed folks to take risks and start new businesses. A group of people that have the ability to buy less than desirable homes AND fix them up AND live in them for a bit of time to establish continuity of community.
But your investment in you?
Well that’s almost entirely in your court. The question becomes what are you going to do about it?
Are you going to invest?

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