The Intelligent Investor - 0803

If you investment horizon is long—at least 25 or 30 years—there is

only one sensible approach: Buy every month, automatically, and

whenever else you can spare some money. The single best choice for

this lifelong holding is a total stock-market index fund. Sell only when

you need the cash.

After all, the whole point of investing is not to earn 

more money than average, but to earn enough

money to meet your own needs. 

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The best way to measure your investing success is not by 

whether you’re beating the market but by whether you’ve 

put in place a financial plan and a behavioral discipline

that are likely to get you where you want to go.

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In the end, what matters isn’t crossing the finish line 

before anybody else but just making sure that you do cross it.

Why, then, do investors find Mr. Market so seductive诱人的? 

It turns out that our brains are hardwired to get us into 

investing trouble; humans are pattern-seeking(联想心理表征) animals.

Groundbreaking new research in neuroscience shows 

that our brains are designed to perceive trends 

even where they might not exist.

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if a stock goes up a few times in a row, you reflexively 

expect it to keep going———and your brain chemistry changes

as the stock rises, giving you a “natural high.” You 

effectively become addicted to your own predictions.

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But when stocks drop, that financial loss fires up your amygdala杏仁体———

the part of the brain that processes fear and anxiety and generates the

famous “fight or flight” response that is common to all cornered animals.

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Just as you can’t keep your heart rate from rising if a fire alarm

goes off, just as you can’t avoid flinching畏缩 if a rattlesnake 

slithers onto your hiking path, you can’t help feeling fearful 

when stock prices are plunging大跌.

The pain of financial loss is more than twice as

intense as the pleasure of an equivalent gain. 

Losing money is so painful that many people,terrified at 

the prospect of any further loss, sell out near 

the bottom or refuse to buy more.

Mr. Market’s daily dipsy-doodles simply do not matter. 

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In any case, for anyone who will be investing for years 

to come,falling stock prices are good news, not bad, since 

they enable you to buy more for less money.

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The longer and further stocks fall, and the more steadily 

you keep buying as they drop, the more money you will

make in the end—if you remain steadfast坚定的 until the end.

Instead of fearing a bear market, you should embrace it.

“you will be much more in control,” explains 

neuroscientist Antonio Damasio, “if you realize 

how much you are not in control.” 

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