When Is The Right Time to Panic WIth Your Investments?

I had a conversation recently about our culture and how I think that oftentimes we are pushed and pulled along by the overly sensationalized media.

With things like standing for the National Anthem, Russia scandal, market crashes, wildfires in California, global warming, various sex scandals and so on plastering the TV screens and our phones, is it any wonder that we can easily get caught up in it all?

We use phrases like “falling in love” and “falling out of love” as though love was something that happened to us instead of a conscious choice to display affection, vulnerability, and benevolence towards others. We find ourselves staying up way too late at night in arguments on Facebook or Twitter with people we don’t even know.

There is no shortage of stuff out there that is trying to get our attention, and no shortage of companies spending loads of money to get our eyeballs on their programs.

You may be thinking - yeah… so what does this have to do with my investments?

Well, everything.

This emotional rollercoaster in the media can create fear and panic in us. And when the right story comes out, it can make us get scared and tempt us to do something rash with our portfolio. For example, if US stocks plummet quickly, we may be tempted to sell them to “stop the bleeding.” Or, if gold starts doing well, we may be tempted to add more of it to our portfolio.

In each of these cases, you would be doing the wrong thing at the wrong time. Your instincts are telling you to do one thing, but it is not the prudent thing to do.

So how do you fight these temptations? Part of it is realizing that when it comes to your investments, it is never the right time to panic. Part of it is getting educated on how the markets actually work and in particular, how your portfolio is designed and how it behaves.

What is best is to hire a coach to educate you so you can be empowered to get disciplined and stay disciplined with your portfolio. After all, you have hopes and dreams for your future. You have things you would like to do with your family, for your family, for your place of worship, and the world around you.

In some sense, you could say that hiring a coach and being disciplined makes the difference to whether or not your hopes and dreams will even come true.

If you are reading this and realizing that you need to become more educated and more empowered to realize your hopes and dreams, please contact us or attend one of our upcoming workshops.