Part 3:
#3 Excuse: “I don’t need to learn all that, I’ll just hire an expert. I don’t cut my own hair, I hire a professional.”

My argument: If your hair stylist screws up your color, it will fade. If she cuts your hair wrong, it will grow back. The downside consequences are, at worst, 6 months if your hair grows slowly. Run the same scenario for any expert, and the long term consequences are nothing compared to what will happen if you hire the wrong financial expert.

If the expert you hire to manage your investments screws up, it could mean practicing “Hi, Welcome to Walmart” at the age of 70 for a job interview in competition with spritely 50 and 60 year olds.

To quote Warren Buffett, “You don’t find out who’s swimming naked until the tide goes out.” And I would add, if you’re swimming naked as a fit 20 or 30 year old - bring it on. There’s really nothing embarrassing about that. At 40 and 50, you could still turn a few heads in a good way, but odds are good it will take some discipline in the diet and exercise category. If you’re in the “golden” years and gravity has worked it’s “magic” - well, odds are good you’ll have had to be a serious diet and fitness fanatic and gone under the knife at least twice at the plastic surgeon’s office for most women to endure “baring all” with confidence.

Never assume money managers, brokers and financial advisors have your best interest at heart. Their business is to make money off managing your money. The catch is, they get paid whether they make you a profit or not. You will hear all of them recite the mantra “Past performance is no guarantee of future returns”. You lose, they get paid. You win, they get paid. They have a bias to buy and hold.

There is power in knowledge. You will be a better investor and a better client if you are well informed. There are some great money managers who realize this, and are more than willing to help and educate. And then there are the horror stories. Some of my friends have asked their financial advisors for help in gaining a better understanding with really dismal results. You must know enough to know if they are doing a good job. Wall Street is in business to sell stuff to you at a profit. It’s called capitalism, and as broken and amalgamated with socialism as it has become, there is still a profit motive. You need to know enough about the rules of the game to even have a hope of playing it successfully.

Money Manager Arrogance

My dear friend and step-mother-in-law (don’t try to figure it all out, you know the drill with divorce and families) works for a company offering a 401k with a matching program. This means that if she decides to take a part of her paycheck and set it aside in a savings plan for retirement, her company will add a little extra as an incentive. It requires the company to take that amount out of her paycheck directly and send it to a “qualified plan”. This means it meets all the IRS rules to allow her to delay paying income taxes on this money, and allows her company to add to the savings plan on her behalf.

Enough jargon, she met with the company financial advisor who grilled her about how much money she had, did her husband have any money, and when he decided it wasn’t enough to worry about, shoved a brochure at her and told her to pick a fund, any fund. He opened a chart depicting the stock market over the last 90 years and told her it always goes up - just buy and hold. Well, my step mom doesn’t have 90 years until retirement. She had no way to respond. No vocabulary, and felt absolutely violated. She got up and left the office, got to her car and broke into tears. She was then able to bring the paperwork to me, and relayed the story with tears welling up in her eyes a week later. I was horrified and wanted to call this idiot right there and then. I calmed myself, and we took an hour to talk it through, get a plan, and help her come to the right decision for her. Why should it matter if it was only a small amount. It matters. You have to start somewhere.

This isn’t an isolated case. Not by a long shot. I have a ton of them, and will trot them out every chance I get, but this is lengthy already. I don’t want you to “blue screen” on me. You know, when your Windows computer goes blank with the Blue Screen of Death? (switch to Mac already!) Or for those less techie, when your teenager’s eyes glaze over and you know that not a word is landing where you want it to - in the action part of the brain?!

RED FLAG TEST:

“The degree of stress you feel about finances is directly proportional to the amount of confidence you have in your system.“ Dan McMahon - (my trading coach)

Whenever I feel stress or worry about money, investments or trading, I know I have a flaw in my system or in my knowledge. Stress is a fabulous red flag to look for the flaw before it inflicts severe damage. Don’t bleach the flag! It’s red for a reason. You bleach it by ignoring the problem, denying the stress, avoiding the stress, handing over your choice to someone else. Bleach the flag long enough, and it becomes the white flag of surrender. You have lost your power. Don’t do it! Take back control and start the journey through the Labyrinth maze of financial self reliance today. And if you have a ”bad $ advisor story“ please share in the comments.

That’s too much about Lisa for today. Bye for now.

Talked with my best friend from childhood today. Lisa and I have been friends since the age of 4. We both have a milestone birthday coming in May, and I asked how she was coping. (I wasn’t coping well - AT ALL) She told me that she hadn’t really thought about it. Her life was full, and she was thankful. I was a impressed, to say the least. She continued, “I haven’t had a chance to tell you, but our family has experienced a terrible tragedy.”

Killed by a Drunk Driver at the age of 41

Her brother in law was killed by a drunk driver at the age of 41 two months back, and the family has been spending their time grieving, funeral arrangements, managing insurance claims, and paperwork galore. Her sister in law is now a widowed mother of three children, 3, 8 and 10. Her husband was an amazing father, provider and husband. My friend told me, “He did everything for the family, and made all the decisions. She took care of the kids, but she is lost without him.”

Wake up call for me and my petty whining about getting older. Superficial updates were out the window, and we had an amazing discussion about meaning and self reliance.

Can a husband be too good?

This widow now finds herself alone and in charge of everything. She has no idea what to do. She is grieving and now must face all the financial decisions of carrying on in the face of great loss. There is power to be gained from tackling a new task. She can be so proud to know that her husband loved her and their life together had an order and division of labor that worked for them. But my question is, did her husband do too much for her to her detriment?

Delegating the duties in a marriage or partnership relationship makes sense. We can’t do it all. I don’t take out the trash or touch ANYTHING in the yard. The activity of dragging the trash cans to the curb is within my ability, I could do it, but don’t. Forced to do so, I wouldn’t experience any fear or stress about the task. Perhaps some annoyance, but not fear.

Fear or stress ensue from a lack of experience or confidence in your ability to handle a situation.

Could you handle your finances without stress at a moments notice?

Do you have the skill to handle all of your personal finances? Can you choose an investment you feel confident will produce a good rate of return? Do you know how to calculate a rate of return? Do you know what a rate of return is? Can you pick up at a moments notice and take over if forced? If you can’t answer yes, then you have work to do, darling.

Well that’s too much about Lisa for now. Stay tuned for Part 2

Haven’t you just dreamed of a chance to have Eternity in the palm of your hand?  I’ve done it, and I’ve done it for 3 weeks now.  Of course, if it’s a finite 3 weeks than obviously it isn’t the forever Utopian-Heaven that one thinks of as “Eternity”.  My “Eternity” is the new iPhone/iTouch application Eternity Time Log.

Practical Utopia

I am forever looking for ways to achieve Utopia.  You know, the Utopia that comes from the greek word for “not” and “place”.  Yes, dear friends, Utopia, in fact, means noplace.  As such can only be achieved in the mind.  So let’s get practical.  We have a lot of crap to do that makes me feel less than Utopian in my mind.  I like to find ways of achieving my ideal with the least amount of effort.  I have found the number of hours in my day to be insufficient for accomplishing all the things I want to do, have to do, and am forced to do (taxes).   Thus I find myself on the quest of “time management”.  Oh, BORING! But practical. One great little find on my trek through the “labyrinth of life” is this little iPhone app, Eternity Time Log. 

What does it do?  

It simply logs your time by activity.  You create the labels, and start the timer.  When you switch to another category, it stops the timer on the old activity and starts the activity for the new one.  I keep my activity log going 24/7.  

Simple Behavior Modification

Have you ever wondered if you’re getting the recommended amount of sleep?  Did I live up to my exercise goals?  How many hours of TV do I actually watch?  All these questions had an effortless answer in the first week.  Some of my activities changed just in the conscious act of having to label it before I did it. Instant behavior modification without having to snap myself with a rubberband, not get to talk to my sister until a task was done, complete a very distasteful task as punishment if I missed a deadline or any of the other myriad of things I have tried in the past.  

In the first 24 hours I saw a difference in how I spent my time.  It became difficult to sit down and “zone out” in front of the TV when you have label it in Eternity.  I would see the list of activities, and find something else I that would be a better use of my time.  

Exercise accountability went off the chart - 22 days of exercise in 24 days where before I had never exercised regularly, and I do mean NEVER! But that’s another topic all together.

The Mirror:

I have an activity called “What Next?” for the time I spend sitting in my office wondering what I should do next.  When I saw that time piling up in the log, I worked out a more efficient to do list to make “What Next?” less prevalent.  I mean, who wants to see that on your report at the end of the week?  

Warning: Friends May Think You’re Crazy

My friends are a bit annoyed when I tell them that they are now an activity in my time log.  They ask, “Am I on the clock?” with a smirk of sarcasm.  And one friend said, “Well, you can just lie.”  My response, “Lie to myself?  What’s the point of that?  I’ll know I’m lying!  That would ruin my beautiful log!”  And in fact, I don’t lie to Eternity.  It’s become quite sacred.  In the end results don’t lie, so why do it in the process? I want to know.  It’s brutal at times, but when you look in the mirror you know who is looking back at you.  There is no lying to the mirror.  There is power in that reflection.

Week 1

Trends began to emerge.  Take dinner for instance.  I never realized how much time it takes me to prepare dinner.  It’s a stunning amount for food prep, eating and clean up.  It usually runs about an hour and a half.  My children were asking my husband the other morning why I wasn’t helping to make breakfast and my husband answered saying, “She makes plenty of meals.”  SCORE! I immediately agreed and explained just how much time I spent on dinner and food prep.  Sound irritating? Well maybe, but for me, I was able to offer in concrete terms what my culinary ability was contributing.

Another week 1 difference, I could no longer end my day without my 30 minutes of exercise.  It was a goal I made with myself, and now I couldn’t bear to look in the mirror of Eternity and see myself lacking.  At the least I would get on the treadmill (tread to no where).  I got out of bed 2 times in order to keep my streak going.  It became a game and I didn’t want to break the streak.  Insane.  My sister was amazed.  My friends don’t understand.  They think it will pass.  It won’t.  I’m still going and make exceptions only for migraines or illness.  It can be 10:30 pm (my latest tread to no where to date) and I will just have to drag myself through it, but I see it on Eternity.  It gives me great satisfaction to keep this contract with myself.

Week 2

Realization came of using Eternity Time Log as the fabulous tool for strategic planning.  As someone who is self employed with no boss, time had become a bit irrelevant.  As long as things got done by the deadline, it didn’t seem to matter when or how long I spent on the project.  ”It will get done, Someday” had crept into my thinking.  

Accountability Court of Characters:

Now at the end of the week, I can play “Accountability Manager/Countess” and decide if Lisa, as “Creative Director/Lady of the Labyrinth”, got enough work done to achieve my goals.  Then monthly I can play “CEO” (or Queen as I prefer and my highest potential) and see if the vision and long range goals of my finite life are being achieved by the daily activities.  Yes, in fact, my mid life crisis is right on schedule.  Oh, and I see my goal to speak Spanish one day needs some serious work.  I then send the order down the ranks and this week will look for a time block to start building the vocabulary.

Week 3

Realization dawned that my inner Princess had gotten control of all of our new found productivity and had to make up for the fun she missed.  Time blocks went to her in huge measure.  In the prior 2 weeks of fanatical time logging, she had none and came back with a vengeance.  The CEO/Queen and Manager/Countess agreed that time must be allotted to her in a reasonable amount and she agreed to stop sabotaging the whole process.  After all, her idea of fun takes money, and money is best acquired by the practical side of life, NOT Utopia.

More on the Practical side of Utopia:

I am toying with the idea of making it an absolute must purchase for all of my clients before they embark on financial coaching.  Now of course they too could reset the timers and lie about their choices, but you’ll be looking into a funhouse mirror with a distorted image.  I’ve done denial.  I’m just not there anymore.

48 Minutes

I’m off as this post has taken me exactly 48 minutes to write, and it’ll be an hour by the time I get the proofing, editing and fonts fixed.  I still don’t have screenshots of the app or a link, but I’m still learning how to post a blog in the first place.  Actually, forget it.  It’s not worth the time. It’s good enough for what this rant is.

Alter Call:

The only thing you can never get back is your time.  It’s your most precious asset, a LIMITED asset with unknown quantity. Make it count, and become the Queen of your own life!  #mce_temp_url#

Lisa

I have a love/hate relationship with Mr. Market for…..well, far too long. He had a panic attack and loss of power this this month. He chose to “shoot first and ask questions later”. Some of my favorite flirtations have been exposed as having been financially unfaithful by hiding their debts “off balance sheet”.

Financially Unfaithful
Some guys, like Mr. AIG and Mr. WaMu were constantly telling me what I wanted to hear. Their agents (brokers, analysts, experts) told me how solid and secure they were, but behind the scenes were getting their kicks with low end borrowers, lots of borrowed money, and huge parties. They’ve now caught some nasty diseases, and have spread it to those who didn’t think to protect themselves.

Trading as Life
Traders often talk about the market in metaphor. Some say the market is a game, poker or a casino. I tried all of those, but didn’t find them helpful. Games operate under known rules that can be learned easily. There might still be strategy to master, as in chess, but the rules don’t change.

Nassim Taleb broke my affinity for the casino/game metaphor in his book “The Black Swan”. He explained that Las Vegas sets up games with a finite number of known possibilities so they always win. But then a tiger attacks the one person they never expected, his trainer (nor were they insured for as an event) it put the casino at risk of a catastrophic loss.

Events can happen outside the imagination of the participants in real markets – games can be controlled.

All participants contribute to the events whether they work on Wall Street or Main Street. Since I don’t have inside information about when the Federal Reserve will change the rules by deciding that one company is “too big to fail” (AIG, Fannie, Freddie) and another would create “moral hazard” if it were bailed out (Lehman Brothers), I can never know the full nature of the “rules”. It’s dynamic.

Some rules will be in force for years, and then one day the SEC can ban selling a company short (selling the stock you borrow from someone else, buy it from the market later at what is hopefully a lower price. You then replace the shares you borrowed from someone else’s account – sell high – buy low).

By observing reality, I see that nothing is forbidden and there are no rules.

The market is unpredictable, volatile, competitive, and powerful. Sun Tzu’s bestseller, “The Art of War” has an adapted version for traders and investors. I adopted this one fully for a while. War analogies abound on Wall Street. Common phrases include “I’m getting killed”, “pulling the trigger”, “hired guns”, “body rain”, “churn burn and bury”, and “blowing up” to name but a few. The world of Wall Street is littered with masculine metaphors about war, sex and dominance.

I have never found it successful to try to act like a man. Not only is it impossible, it isn’t fun. I don’t want to “blow up”.

Warren Buffett was the first person that I heard refer to the market as Mr. Market. It just hit me one day while talking with my sister. She has listened to countless hours of my trials with Mr. Market (which in my book should qualify her for sainthood).

One day she told me, “It’s like you’re in a bad relationship with the market. He’s treating you like crap, doesn’t really care if you exist, does his own thing, lies to you, but you just won’t break up and take your losses. Why don’t you just break up with him, and find someone who will really love you?”

Golden rule in trading is “Cut your losses short.”
You can’t sit around and suffer bad behavior from Mr. Market that is opposite to your expectations or you will suffer. To quote Dr. Phil, “You teach people how to treat you.” You should never go into a relationship thinking you will reform your man, and Mr. Market is no different. He will show you who he is, and you have only to decide if you are staying or going.

Market is a Man
I was picking the “bad boys” and expected them to act like “prince charming”. After that, the market metaphor as a man stuck. It was so simple, how could the market be anything else but masculine? Attend a seminar about trading/investing or better yet walk the floor of the New York Stock Exchange and you will see that the vast majority of traders are male.

Tenacity in Investing
Most of us suffer a loss in the market and give up. Some give up before they ever start by telling me they aren’t good with numbers, just let someone else take care of investing, or don’t have any money to invest anyway.

But like most women, I have spent a great deal of time trying to figure out the mind of a man. This is one area where women are loathe to give up. That is why it makes for such an amazing metaphor. You have to have that tenacity and persistence in business and investing in order to succeed.

It’s a lot like our relationships. They take work, and both sides have to perform or it can be a loveless, energy draining situation. If that’s the case, Break UP! And in the case of the market, SELL! Give up or ignore your relationships in life, and you die alone or in the company of misery. Give up or ignore your relationship with Mr. Market, and the end is poverty.

Money has just as much potential to bring us opportunity for joy or torment as the men in our lives.

More Than One Man
There is more than one man in the world and there is more than one market. All I have to do is find the good ones. It was the Sweet Potato Queen, Jill Conner Brown who said we all need 5 men in our lives to cover the necessities: one who can fix things, one to have sex with, one to dance with, one to talk to, and one to pay for things (lucky are those who find one man who possesses at least 3 of the qualities. Hated is the one who has found one man who can do all five!)

Well, it’s no different with Mr. Market. I’m looking for qualities in a business that I LOVE. If they can fix things, dance and pay for things, it’s a keeper. If they do what they say they are going to do, and I like the people who run the business. It is date worthy. If they keep themselves out of debt, and generate profit to pay for things, I’m very attracted.

What girl wouldn’t want true love and a healthy balance sheet?

Oh, Audible. How do I love thee, let me count the ways.

Not as judgmental: If the book sucks, no bother. I listened to it while cleaning, driving, exercising, or other mundane tasks that had to be done. I accomplished exactly what I needed to in that moment. I didn’t devote precious reading time alone to a crappy book. It makes me less judgmental and more willing to risk listening to something outside my usual interests. Knowing I will be able to multitask while listening to E=MC2 is the only reason I downloaded this history of the science equation. Made my family irritated for a week while I recounted all the facts I found fascinating.  Great fun. 

Excuses Limited: Who has the time? Friends in my book club find it difficult to read our one book a month, while I can usually find the extra time to “read”/listen to as many as 5 books a month. This volume of reading makes me an insufferable nightmare of useless knowledge that changes constantly, but it hasn’t stopped me.

More for the $:  I am a legacy member of Audible from September of 2001 and as such have a plan that allows me 5 books per month. I went to cancel it once, and the customer rep told me I was crazy. “No one can get this plan anymore, and if you cancel you’ll lose it.” He offered a 3 month break at which time it would restart, and I have been loving the resource ever since.

Parents: - Are you trying to get your kids to read more? Audible on their ipod is fabulous. My son listens to books while he does his math homework, and so far this year has read Inkheart, Inkspell, 3 Cups of Tea and Freakonomics. What 13 year old reads a book about economics? And that is 4 books in addition to his reading assignment for school (I don’t let him listen to the book for the Accelerated Reading Goal. There is a difference to listening and reading the words from the teacher’s standpoint). I haven’t hooked my 8 year old yet, but give me time. I’m quite the influencer, and a benevolent dictator. I see book reports in her future. HooHAHAHa

Discreet: Have you ever wanted to read a book that seems a bit embarrassing? You know, like “He dumped me, now what.” or “How to talk to your pets”. Who wants to advertise to everyone on the plane what you’re reading. With Audible I can listen to that book on the plane with my Bose Quiet Comfort 3’s and no one is the wiser.

Vocabulary and Pronunciation: When listening to a complex book with foreign phrases, all the pronunciation is done for you. You learn the way it’s supposed to be pronounced and at the end of the book I feel much more educated.

Sexy Voice: Listening to Scott Brick read anything is like eating a Cold Stone MudPie Mojo in the Love It size. Heavenly! His voice is absolutely made for thrillers, and even better when he’s telling me the piles in my office are actually a sign of intelligence in “A Perfect Mess: The Hidden Benefits of Disorder”

Author’s own voice:  This one is a two edged sword. I loved the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Trilogy that was 5 books read by Douglas Adams. There’s something magical about his British accent, and deadpan, sarcastic delivery of some of the adventures that just makes the whole experience a joy. The other side of this is something like “Stones From The River” by Ursula Hegi. I couldn’t finish it. It was for book club, and her monotone delivery was just too depressing. There are times when the author should step aside and let Scott Brick do the reading.

Money Again: The stock got crushed when it was publicly traded. I saw it down at $9.00 and figured that since I was such a fan, I just had to buy a little. It went down immediately, but not to my stop price. Then about 3 months later, Amazon.com bought them out at $13.00. Cool. Made enough for a few more years of service! Love them.

Knowledge is Key:  Friends are amazed that I am so well read.  I tell them my secret and I’m telling you.  The only reason I have read as many books as I have is because of Audible.  There are so many amazing things to learn, and there is no excuse for not reading anymore.

It has always been my policy to try and find the easiest way to accomplish anything.  Audible.com is the perfect way to ditch your excuse about not having any time to read.  Huge cop out if your have internet and an ipod (or one of the many devices that are compatible).  You don’t have to succumb to the level of addiction that I regularly maintain, but the one per month could be a reasonable start!  Get going.

Watched X-Men 2 the other day.  It’s been out a long time so if you haven’t watched it yet I’m going to assume you don’t plan to.   And yet, let me warn you now about the spoiler nature of this entry.

So here is my quick rant:

 Logan’s love interest, Jean, was not killed in the massive water that engulfed her in the first X-Men movie.  Her powers shielded her from the weight of the water.  She comes out from under the water with her powers restored.  Immediately she encounters her grieving husband, Scott.  They embrace and she proceeds to, by accident, disintegrate Scott into individual atoms.  Not good for Scott.  She’s pretty upset by the outcome as well.   

The Problem:

It turns out that she is the most powerful mutant of all of them.  Magnito is able to move metal, Logan can heal himself and cut anything with his claws, and Xavier has psychic ability, but Jean can do anything she chooses.  She stops bullets of “The Cure” from barraging her.  She directs the wind and water.  She is telepathic, and can disintegrate matter.  With control and respect for life, this is a great deal for Jean.  Big problem though, she can’t control it.  So when she loses control there is only one left who can get near her.  We’ll get to that.

Jean has a split personality.  One personality, Jean, is good and loving and follows the social convention.  The other is named Phoenix.  Phoenix is ruled by emotion, and is royally pissed off that she was relegated to the dark recesses of Jean’s mind instead of the light of day.  Phoenix kills Xavier for having subordinated her alter ego for so long.   Xavier pleads with her to come back to the safety of the mansion, and tells her they can work on her “control issues”.  Well, not in so many words, but I’m paraphrasing drastically here.  It’s not a literary discourse, after all, just a rant.

Xavier was like a father figure to her, and was completely well meaning in helping Jean suppress her great ability.  It was his belief that suppressing her ability was the only way to control it’s vast potential.  Magnito, the other father figure, doesn’t agree.  He looks at mutant powers as a chance to control others for his own ultimate goals.  But by this time, Phoenix is out, and she is not going to go back into hiding.  Xavier’s pleadings for Jean to suppress Phoenix again are useless.   Phoenix is in full rage mode and decides to disintegrate him with her thoughts. 

Is it just me, or have we all dreamed of being able to do that to a man at some point in our lives?  But I digress.  With the Phoenix side of her personality fully in control after offing Xavier she decides to go with the evil father figure, power hungry Magnito.  But she is also aware of his desire to use her.  She resists being under his control as well.  It’s a great deal when you finally unleash to power.  Once expanded, you just can’t get back into the small cage.

Then there is Logan.  The man she loves.  He is the only one who can get near her when her wrath is unleashed due to his quick healing ability and her feelings of attraction to him.  He battles toward her in the middle of the chaos she is creating.  He has to get to her in order to stop her from disintegrating the whole world around her.  He finally reaches her. He tells her he loves her.  She cries out to him, “save me” and he buries his claws into her body killing her.

The Solution:

Really Logan, did you have to kill her?  Couldn’t you talk her off the ledge?  Draw out Jean as the woman you love to make peace with Phoenix?  So great a power, and yet the only solution for this dualistic goddess is to kill her?   Well screw that.  Don’t kill the “dark” side.  You have to embrace it and join it to the princess.  Together they are capable of untold greatness.  Suppress her, and eventually it will destroy your fairy tale in a blaze of glory.

You’ve heard the saying “Well behaved women rarely make history.”  Awe, more of the same.  Suppress and deny.  Misbehaving is a way to challenge mediocrity.  It is our nature, and I can’t suppress it, and still live my best life.  Have you chatted with your Phoenix lately? Dig deep to find your alter ego before she explodes your life and gets taken out.  We need both.  And don’t hand that power to anyone else.  

Bring on the Chaos!