Faith in the Future

We operate from "Timeless Principles and Practices for Long-Term Success". These are the philosophical underpinnings of long-term success in the achievement of our goals so we can live our Ideal Lives.  This is a part of the mindset of success in building a financial plan and a portfolio that is a servant of that plan.

This month, I'm focusing on Principle Number One: Faith in the Future.

The motto of this Principle is:

"I can't know exactly HOW it's going to turn our all right; I just know that it's GOING to turn out all right."

This isn't a "Pollyana" attitude or naiveté, although I can understand why one might think so. I'm not trivializing the potential dangers of the extreme measures that have been taken to navigate the pandemic.

I'm a student of history and economics. I recognize the depth and scope of the complexities that we're dealing with in the global economy. We haven't been through these exact circumstances before, but we've seen similar circumstances, and even worse circumstances, and global economic growth has resumed.

In the course of our lifetimes, we've seen the post-World War II economic boom as a global middle class grew out of the destruction and chaos of the decimation of Europe and Asia. We've been through the Cold War, the violent social upheaval of the 1960's, the stagflation of the 1970's, the boom of the 1980's, the crash of 1987, the Asian meltdown of 1997, the dot-com bubble of 2002, the Great Recession of 2007-2009 and the brief bear market of 2020. During each of these times, the magnitude of the headwinds that we had to overcome were significant..

Admittedly, our current situation is different than those challenges. But I believe, as do most Wall Street analysts and the money managers that I interact with, that once we get through the policies that we've inflicted on the global economy to contain the pandemic, that life will get back to normal and economic growth will resume.

I had the privilege of knowing people that were in the ruins of Europe on V-E Day. After experiencing the horrors of that epoch of history, which none of them thought they would survive, they were in a hurry to get back to living their lives and making a better life for their children and grandchildren. It led to the biggest economic boom in the history of mankind. They didn't foresee the technological innovations that were to lead where we are now, although they were a part of it, in their own way. They just got up every morning and went to work. That desire to provide, and continued innovation is going to continue.

People all over the world want to get back to work to provide for their families. This pandemic will end and life will resume. The path to that resumption in prosperity might not be evident to us now, but it will happen. There's always a worst-case scenario and a best-case scenario. Statistically, it generally falls somewhere in the middle.

All we can do is make smart choices and focus on our personal economy. We can't control anything else.