Oakland, CA | Financial Planning; Understanding the Mind: Thinking Fast and Slow

Hi, my name is Erik Wolfers. I’m the managing member of First & Main Financial. We’ve been helping clients with personal finances since 2001. Today I’m going to talk a little bit about the investing mind or the investing mindset.

If you haven’t heard of or read a book called Thinking Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman—it’s a very dense but fantastic book. Daniel Kahneman is a behavioral economist who won the Nobel Prize, and he and his research partner discovered many things about how people react or behave depending on certain circumstances.

I think it’s easy to argue that if you don’t have good control of your mind or understand how your mind works, then it’s tough to be a good investor. The mind can come up with a lot of things depending on circumstances or emotions or past experiences that may feel good or feel scary, and then if you go against what feels scary than you feel good or better, and this may be against your best interest as an investor.

As a professional investor we focus on knowing the things that can be known. There are a lot of facts and proofs and science that goes into personal finance and investing—sticking with those things while constantly monitoring markets and economics and making a determination about how it all plays out, and whether there’s a sense in doing something different or not doing something different over time, so that our clients get the best results that were capable of.

There’s actually a lot of ancient wisdom that goes into the concept of controlling your mind or understanding your mind, so there are a lot of benefits, not only in long-term investment success, but also just in having a good and balanced life.

If you are looking for some financial guidance; whether for a one time financial plan or continuing advice on your investments, we invite you to meet with a First & Main Financial planner for a free consultation. We would be more than happy to sit down with you, assess your situation and review our services to help navigate your financial future.