Weekend Reading – #RemembranceDay edition, mindful budgeting, #money realities and more

Today is a day of Remembrance. My grandfather Harry Johnson a firefighter for the City of Winnipeg, who fought in WWI. I have no clue where or what he did in the war. Two of my uncles, Private Albert Gosselin of the PPCLI who gave his life in Italy July 22, 1943 and Anton Jensen with the Essex Scottish Regiment as well as the Royal Winnipeg Rifles (1944-1946), wounded in Europe but survived the war and recently passed away. My father, Lauritz Jensen with the 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion (1942-1945) participating in Operation Overlord in the invasion of Normandy, France returning to Canada in 1945. My neighbour, Douglas McIntyre serving in WWI who sold me his farm in 1979 and passed shortly afterward. They ask for nothing but to be remembered, how can we not.

#LestWeForget: my grandfather was in WWII for five years; tank division starting in Africa and moving all the way up to Germany. He never mentioned a single word about the experience — ever — but I’ve seen pictures of him pre/post war…like day and night. His carefreeness was stripped away, I suspect, replaced by a deep understanding and appreciation for basic life itself. He definitely was not weighed down or bothered by the myriad of trivial/’little things’ in life. Veterans have a unique wisdom which is borne from a unique experience, that being war/combat. Fortunately, most of us will not have to live through the same, so the best we can do is let them share and value their experience.

Bridget Eastgaard/Tangerine Bank: I’ve said this many times before, and it’s always befuddled me, most of us work hard (many at tasks we don’t overly enjoy) to gain our money…but then our joyless effort stops, we don’t make our money work hard for us — “using money to make money”. Perhaps most people view their paycheque as a reward for slugging through hours of low job satisfaction and unfulfilling work and thus allocate said monies to pleasurable (numbing?) endeavours instead of taking off the employee-for-money hat and donning the boss-OF-money hat.

Ben Carlson/Bad habits: “Learning the wrong things from the wrong people…” an addendum to my comments on the previous ‘Weekend Reading’ edition re: the ever-rising flood of personal finance books and blogs. Everyone thinks their opinion is not only right for them but correct for all others also. And people fall for it time and time again — “It worked for him, so it’s gotta work for me!/It worked for me, it can work for you!” It’s a case of information over-load, with most of it being rubbish — learning the wrong things from the wrong people.

From the same article:
“The human brain is like any muscle in the body — it can get fatigued and can’t always operate at full speed.” A good a reason as any why so many people don’t pursue the act of “using money to make money”. At the end of a long work week, it’s far easier to either spend your money on fun stuff or just hand it over to a financial advisor and let them make all the “difficult” decisions. Neither will get you very far.

“Willpower can be fleeting once decision fatigue sets in.” This is scientific and a great reason why people like Michael James have set up an automatic investment spreadsheet. As above, in an environment of information overload, decision fatigue can set in quickly. It’s also why Obama only wears two colours of suits, it saves his brain from wasting decision power. 😉

“Just because something worked doesn’t alway make it a great decision. Sometimes the worst thing that can happen to an investor is they make money on their investments but for the wrong reasons.” It’s the old adage, don’t confuse genius with a bull market. People see their accounts growing and they don’t really care why and then if/when the investments go wrong…the investor also goes wrong. The US housing bubble was a perfect example.

Tawcan/Frugality: I was going to post a separate comment because there’s lots to comment about, but upon second thought…forget it. I’m learning to be frugal with my personal energy expenditure — I’m saving the planet by saving myself. Ha! People will hold populist views simply because they are easy, accessible, and simple. There’s no will to suss out ALL the FACTS (i.e. the aforementioned ‘brain fatigue’), thus we get things like vegans and Prez Trump. Sigh.