Tough Times

How do we handle tough times? Why do we avoid them? Wouldn't life be easier if we could run downhill all the time? Why do hills exist anyway?

My career is volatile. I'm in the markets. Markets are naturally driven by greed or fear. It is really quite manic. The glass is either 1/2 full or 1/2 empty day to day. I'm changing the way I run my business and moving away from being glued to the minute by minute fluctuations of a ticker. Long-term investing, buying very high quality companies with strong fundamentals has the effect of killing the beast of greed/fear. I really don't care what the market does day in day out. If I have a bad day/month/quarter -- it really doesn't matter. I'm focused on the long-term. My eyes are on the prize - the long-term prize not the short-term gratification. We all "run the race" but only one will collect the prize. The goal is the prize.

There is an analogy to our faith. Our eyes should be on the prize not the day to day trials of life. "Life" is broken. It will lift you up one day and slap you down the next. There is an enemy. He is at work. His demons are real and they do pursue us. Life was broken in Eden. It isn't as God intended it. He came that we might have life and have it to the full. The only way I've found to have life to the full is to keep my eyes focused on the prize. The long-run. Not the short-term victories or painful defeats. They are all apart of the race I run.

I read a quote the other day from Abigail Adams that struck me. She was writing to her son about his second trip to France. The first trip nearly killed him and he didn't want to return. She writes....

"It is not the still calm of life that great characters are formed. Formation of character and the habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with great difficulties. Great necessities call out great virtues. When a mind is raised and animated by scenes that engage the heart then those qualities that otherwise lay dormant waken to life and form the character that define the hero and statesman."

God shakes us from time to time for a reason. At times we have to run up some hills. Yet it is the hills that strengthen our legs far more than the flat plains. As I look back on my life, the times my character has been strengthened has always been during the times of greatest stress and strain. We strain forward and run the race for the prize.

Soar!