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​Somewhere around 2003 was the first time in my life I had disposable money to invest. Sometime that year, my father sat me in front of the computer and said, "You now have money, you need to invest in the stock market."

 

He certainly deserves all the credit for introducing me to this world. On the other hand, what he told me was pretty much the only guidance I got. There were no explanations, clarifications, or additional information.

 

I hit the road with a tank full of gas, but no experience and no directions.

 

So I invested in a mutual fund based on the Tel Aviv 100 index (RIP, which has since become Tel Aviv 125), without knowing what the Tel Aviv 100 index was. I didn't know exactly which stocks the fund was investing in, what management fees I was paying, or how much the bank was charging me for my investment portfolio.

 

But most importantly - I didn't know what my investment goal was, how long I wanted to invest for, or what to expect.

 

After a few days, I checked my fancy investment portfolio and saw that it went up. I didn't understand how or why, but of course, I understood that it was good. More money is better than less money. I think I even invested an additional amount.

 

Soon after, shockingly, the index dropped a bit. And then I did what every seasoned investor with months of experience would do: I sold everything!

 

Later, I made my comeback, this time armed with the knowledge, experience, and wisdom of big and sophisticated investment managers: I opened a managed investment portfolio at a prestigious investment house. I'll never forget how the investment advisor looked at me and with a serious face asked me "Are you ready to lose 50% of your money?!?!" and thus made me invest most of my portfolio in bonds. I was 21 or 22 (🤦).

 

Fortunately, my strategy remained incredibly short-term (if it even deserves to be called "strategy", probably not), and it wasn't long before I had much better ideas of what to do with my money; travel abroad, buy a car, buy a motorcycle, and go study in university. So I eventually closed that portfolio.

 

Meanwhile, I also invested independently based on a mix of hope, impatience, over-motivation and impulse.

 

The peak of my achievements came a few years later when I had to call my online broker and ask them what the hell I was supposed to do with some stocks of an oil and gas company, whose value had dropped to almost 0 but not exactly 0, and now I had a few cents worth of stocks, which no one wanted to buy. The oil and gas company (...wait for it) had found neither oil nor gas, and my dream of getting rich quickly ended abruptly.

 

Further down the winding path of my investment journey, I made several rather exotic mistakes, such as;

• Invested directly into a few startup companies (spoiler: no exit)

• Chased hot trends like hydrogen stocks, some of which increased tenfold (!) but I, like every wise investor, did not take out any profits, but rather waited for them to crash back to their original value and only then sold them.

• And of course, the good old strategy of frequent buying and selling based on the phases of the moon or signs in the stars

 

Those few paragraphs above cost me a lot. I literally lost a lot of money, but the real loss is actually the gains I didn't get, but could have. If only I knew then what I know today, I could:

• spend less time, money and energy

• Have much less stress

• Gain much (much!) more in profits

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And this, for better or worse, I learned the hard way. Because alongside this chain of events, there were also some successes, and a lot of independent learning and research. And the more I learned, the more confident I became in ignoring some of the advice that various advisors, experts, and bankers tend to give.

 

I was back on the same road, but this time with a clear map and a clear plan. I knew where I wanted to get, and I realized it's not going to be a short and smooth ride. But that was finally ok for me.

 

With time and experience, I fine-tuned my strategy so that it became clearer and simpler. But even more importantly, the more I spoke to people about it (whether they asked me to or not is something else), the more I realized something else:

It's not just about knowledge, statistics and technical details.

Investments, personal finance, financial goals - all of this has much more to do with how we feel towards money, what past experiences we have around money and how they shaped our views.

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In my work today, I find myself saying the same thing again and again: our main goal is to live a good life, and be able to sleep well at night. Having money is just a tool to help us achieve that goal.