I used to be enticed by investing tips. Admittedly, I still am, but less so than I was in my 20’s.
What I have come to learn is by the time I am reading someone’s “tip” or hearing about the next big thing, it has already happened. I am only feeding their narrative.
What I have come to learn is humans have the desire to be seen as right. This stims from the desire to be liked, because being liked keeps you from being kicked out of the tribe.
No one likes to be kicked out of the tribe.
There are few people in the world, including myself, who will put their opinion out there before they are proven as “right.”
I have witnessed this in myself. I only talk about my losses with people I feel comfortable won’t kick me out of the tribe. And I share my wins as tips once the move has been made.
For me it is almost a superstition. That if I speak up about something before it happens it never pans out.
But what am I doing with this thought? A simple 3 step process:
- All “tips” need to be ignored and reviewed as a “post-mortem”. Try and understand how someone got to this decision, and use it in your own skill set to create your own ‘tips’.
- 1.5. Put all “tips” that seem enticing into a pile to come back to.
- 1.5.5. If you have never heard of the company, there is probably a reason, and you shouldn’t think you are going to learn it now.
- Continue to invest in the optimistic basket of investments (like the S&P 500). Over the long run, go with the money. No one likes to lose it, so eventually the masses will figure it out.
- Develop your own opinions about the things that have not moved yet. Lean towards optimism, but be practical. Most pessimists die, and moon shots rarely happen overnight.
All of this to say, be patient, do your own work, and generally invest in a basket of positive investments.