Summary
I thought it would be fun to publish my 2022 REIT Resolutions.
Please let me know if any of these are included on your list!
Most importantly, always remember rule #1.
Happy REIT investing!
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Cn0ra/iStock via Getty Images I can’t remember if I wrote about this last year or not – or perhaps the year before – but it doesn’t really matter one way or the other. This is one of those things all of us need a reminder or two about every so often.
Especially when this time of year rolls around.
I’m talking about not being so hard on yourself. Also known as understanding that you’re human and therefore won’t always get it right.
Also known as being realistic.
I know we’d love to always get it right. That’s the goal for most of us, I imagine, both on a small scale and a larger one.
For easy example, we don’t want to fail in our relationships. Taking out frustrations or insecurities on our significant others or kids or friends isn’t something we typically strive for. Neither is letting them down entirely, causing much more permanent rifts between us.
It happens, but not because that’s our long-term plan.
Then there’s our to-do lists. Lounging around and doing nothing for yet another weekend in a row – when we’re distinctly not on vacation – isn’t something we typically strive for either. Neither is buying up stuff we say we’re going to get to (really), whether books to read or hobbies to explore or passions to pursue.
And, of course, we don’t want to fail at work or in our investments. Finding ourselves turning in botched assignments or missing deadlines or wasting our money is another thing we usually want to avoid.
Obviously. Stop Making Excuses. Start Living and Actually Learning.
Like it or not though, we do fail sometimes. As I said before, we’re human and therefore outright incapable of being perfect.
Those who attempt perfection end up developing hypertension, anxiety, and other undesirable conditions. So it’s much better to acknowledge and learn from the mistakes we do make.
Did we snap at someone we care about instead of talking the issue out like mature adults? In that case, maybe we need to install a 10-second rule – to recognize when we’re cranky and pause before we respond. (This also works when commenting on Seeking Alpha posts.) Did we put off a personal project again? Then maybe we need to get someone else involved to make the task less daunting.And if we keep messing up at work? Then Katherine Ellison’s piece published in April on mindful.org makes for a very interesting read: “When I was 23 and just starting out in journalism, I made an awful mistake. While covering a high-profile trial in San Jose, California, I wrote that a woman who hadn’t been charged with any crime had plotted a murder. “The woman I’d wrongly incriminated sued me and my newspaper for libel, demanding $11 million. Had she won, it would have killed my career and financially damaged my employers. “Alas, this wasn’t my first reporting error.” It was, however, the one her managing editor said was her last screwup. One more, and she was out.Before that point, Ellison wrote, she “couldn’t seem to slow down and take the time to check my work. Instead, whenever possible, I blamed the flubs on others.”A source had mumbled. A copy editor had missed something. Her workload was unmanageable.There was always some excuse. Which is why she kept failing. Don’t Put Your New Year’s Resolutions at Risk With Foolish Expectations That was decades ago during a different era. So Ellison knew she had to either shape up or get fired. But to a large degree, we now live in a society that celebrates failure.Literally.As her article goes on to state, it’s interesting to observe the effort “to destigmatize failure in a hurry.” Like how: “‘Fail fast; fail often!’ and ‘Move fast, and break things!’ are the relentlessly cheery slogans of Silicon Valley, a place in which three-fourths of startups go bust. The archives of the TED Talks – the Valley’s influential e-sermons – include more than a dozen presentations about failure, many of which tout its ‘surprising’ benefits.” And, yes, we shouldn’t be so afraid of failure that we never try or never acknowledge that we’re human. But we also […]
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