Blog

Here's an investment lesson I learned from basketball:

Sometimes the best thing to do, is nothing.

I remember spraining my ankle at basketball practice in high school.

I so badly wanted to get back on the court that I started doing everything I could.

I knew I would have to ice my ankle to reduce swelling, but I also knew I would need to work on strengthening my ankle to restore function.

So I did what any restless teenager would do. I switched back and forth between ice and strengthening exercises until my coach noticed and asked what I was doing.

He kindly let me know that I was going to make the situation worse by attempting to exercise the ice cold ankle.

That's when I learned that sometimes doing nothing, is the best thing to do.

I've heard others compare investing to a bar of soap. The more you touch it, the less you have.

If you feel like you have to always be doing something in your investment account, you may be triggering unwanted tax consequences and piling up trading fees that could be making your situation worse, not better as intended.

To know when to do something, or to do nothing, is the mark of a professional. You don't have to go at this alone.

This picture is my son and I after my team won the Oak Ridge city league basketball tournament a few weeks ago. They were kind to give a championship t-shirt to my son too as he often found himself on the team bench with us.