What Is the World all About

Feb 26th 2004  

I have often wondered what the true meaning of the word "delusional" was all about. Over the years I have been called delusional several times, in the end one comes to suspect that it may indeed be the case. I have found though that being "delusional" tends to bring me to the heart of the matter faster, the word is used by the opposing person to cover for their own denial.

I always thought of myself as being "Joe Average", with no more skills than the next person. What the real problem was is that my education in the English language was never started, let alone completed. My confidence in my abilities was always linked to my ability to communicate, and in that I was very poor. So the fact that I was good at mathematics was clouded by my ability to communicate. However I was always able to think and research.

I have over the years been in much hot water for stating that which I believed to be my truth. If I was ever in doubt I would scour the information that was available to me, and if the patterns were consistent with what I had seen then that was good enough for me. Where I was delusional was in thinking that everyone else did the same as me, what a mistake. I soon learned that stating what I though was not a good thing, as the other party had not done the equivalent thinking and was just 'spouting off" or was in denial themselves.

Self interest is in all of us, it is there in order for us to survive in this hair-brained world. Just make a study of the 7 deadly sins, goggle is a good place to start. If you do that you will notice one thing if you are honest with yourself, and that is that you want the maximum benefit for the least possible input. It comes from only using that part of the brain that we were conditioned to use, the other 90% of the brain is left redundant. We actually teach it not to work. We then delude ourselves that we know it all.

I have some news, we cannot know everything. I have some good news, intelligence can be improved. What needs to happen is turn off the TV, you use more brain cells eating an ice-cream than watching the telly. The TV conditions the brain into accepting the information without question. We are indoctrinated with a bias not of our own making, what a tool for the propoganderist. I have used the words "incentive trap" before. It is an "incentive trap" that gives us the governments we get. They tend to be the party promising the most benefits, the party that panders to our greed, our laziness, our fears. To think otherwise is delusional.

How do I know I am not being delusional stating all this? Well I have monitored myself over the last year with proper scientific testing. I now have more brain cells in working order, 8% more. If you really want to win in the markets the best person to do it is yourself. Study every mistake, every win. Find the common link between problems. Take a good hard look at who you are taking advice from, are you making money from their advice or are they making money from you in excess of the rewards. Question everything, question yourself. The ability to communicate is essential to understanding, we cannot communicate effectively if we are angry or highly emotional, indeed being emotional is your biggest enemy in the market. The best writers about the market get read unconditionally, and sadly there is very few worth following. I have my own list of about 10 people and they range from bullish to bearish so that I get a balanced diet of facts as they see them. We can trick ourselves into being a bull at the wrong time or likewise a bear, the effect of that delusion is we get cleaned out of our money. Just what the big boys want.

Happy investing everyone.

Alan Lunt