A Few Words to Live By

I recently read a blog titled, A Few Beliefs, by Morgan Housel. He wrote the book, The Psychology of Money, that describes views toward wealth that are quite similar to those of us at Moneywatch Advisors. Below are 10 of Housel’s beliefs that I think are spot on and also timely:

1. Spending money to show people how much money you have is the fastest way to have less money;
2. The worst financial decisions happen when people risk what they need in order to gain something they merely want;
3. About once a decade people forget that bubbles form and burst about once a decade;
4. The best way to deal with uncertainty without hiding in a bunker is to save like a pessimist and invest like an optimist;
5. We are extrapolating machines in a world where nothing too good or too bad lasts indefinitely;
6. Being nice to people is the easiest career competitive advantage;
7. The cure to overconfidence is constantly reminding yourself that you’ve experienced maybe 0.00001% of the world;
8. If your expectations grow faster than your money, you’ll never be happy no matter how much you accumulate;
9. Debt removes options, savings add them;
10. People like weekends because it’s when they have the most control over their time; financial goals should keep this in mind.

Steve Byars, CFP®