# 280: The Philosophy of Brokerage
Story behind the Passage
Somehow, money is playing a huge role in my conversations these days. I do not mean my money or me making money. It is the topic. Today, for example, we discussed Bitcoin in my class and I was pretty proud of my students who did a fine job explaining the topic. I am still not very knowledgeable about the whole issue and the IT behind it but I am definitely fascinated by the vision behind a currency that does not rely on the international banking system.
And, of course, I always think about investing.
Yes, I like stocks and brokerage since I was a teenager. I did gamble on the stockmarket. With limited means, of course, but I loved it. And the secret in the end was to forget about it altogether. This is really how it happened that some stocks made some money. I simply let it sit there, doing nothing. At the beginning when I was still a semi-teeneger, I was crazy about checking the market every day. Later, I did not. I had other stuff to do. Of course, that is quite an irresponsible way of doing it if you really invest millions. That was not the case for me. Still, it worked.
All this and my increasing interest in the stockmarket and crypto currency made me pull out this book about Soros today. I have many books by and about him in my financial book section in the shelf. Some of them I really read all the way through back then when I was so much into the topic. Some of them I just skimmed or marked something in particular. This one here, I cannot remember much about but what immediately attracted me today was this short chapter about “Taking a Break.” The passage above is really striking when you think about my “accidental” success strategy and what Soros seems to be practicing as well.
My Learnings
“Um Erfolg zu haben, braucht man Muße.“ / “In order to be successful, you need leisure.“ Is that not so counter-intuitive in today’s hectic and ambitious world? And guess what, it is exactly what makes the difference. Yes, you need to be fast in performing and delivering results. But with investment stuff, I do think that leisure is key. That is because every tiny move you make has such a huge impact on your portfolio and ultimately on your losses and wins. You have to remember that “leisure” is such a special term. It is not the same as “patience” or “endurance.” Leisure means a combination, at least for me, of taking your time and being creative and proactive in some way.
That is such a powerful combination of merits.
“Die restliche Zeit liest er, überlegt und denkt nach.“ / “The rest of the time, he reads, ponders, and thinks about things.“ Well, I just had to quote this, right? The reading makes all the difference. Without reading, there is no deep thinking. And without deep thinking, the world will go stupid altogether. Yes, you can overthink. But no overthinking can be as bad as no thinking at all or bad thinking. Hence, it is little wonder that this is part of Soros’ success recipe.
“Er sucht Menschen mit Gespür für philosophische Fragen.“ / “He looks for people with a sense of philosophical questions.” The key word is not (only) philosophy here which can also be replaced by “big picture” questions. The key word to me is “sense.” Sensing goes beyond mere thinking and logic. This is exactly what successful people — I mean successful in the sense of intelligent and wealthy — have in their DNA. They are sensitive and receptive to anyhithing going on around them. That does not mean that they do not make any mistakes. But they make different sense of them and make decisions based on different people and criteria than the mainstream “analysts.”
And they stick to their decisions.
For a long time.
Until success just happens without too much pushing.
Reflection Questions
1) How do you define “leisure”?
2) If you had one million dollar on your bank account, what would you invest in?
3) Who are the three people you trust most?