February Update
Financial:
NW - 441,518 (decrease of 14,548). I front loaded my Roth IRA in early January. I've played around with DCA, front loading, or trying to buy the dips for my Roth. It's almost laughable how bad my track record is on this front. When I've decided to DCA the market has taken off in the first few months. When I've decided to front load it, the market tanks at some point in the first six months. Strategically buying the dips was somewhat successful, but it required quite a bit of mental energy. This all just reaffirms my thinking that front loading is the best near-term option for me. I'm usually sitting on at least 2 years of expenses, and it relieves some of the headspace with that account. It is a nice balance also as I DCA my 457.
The positive spin on the dip is that it didn't affect me at all emotionally or psychologically. In my seven years of investing I've never been affected much by any of the dips or corrections I've experienced. Some of the emotional reaction is likely muted because I'm still working. I think the bigger factor is that I'm constantly waiting for a recession or correction, as the CAPE has seemed really high for a long time.
I see my emotional reactions as a good sign for my long-term investing prospects, but I think the true test will come when I experience a 20%+ drop when I'm no longer working.
Goals and Habits:
I finished my first full month of tracking my goals and habits. This was partially inspired by the @AxelHeyst mastermind group and his Getting Things Done system, and partially inspired by the detailed tracking in some of the journals here. I'm tracking things I want to accomplish or work on on a weekly basis. It is a little odd in that the first day of the year was a Saturday, so I'm tracking from Saturday through Friday and then repeating. The practice has visibly impacted some of the things I wanted to work on.
The two biggest improvements are regular Spanish practice, and an increase in reading for pleasure. I've also been really consistent with daily meditations, stoic reflections, and gratitude journals. I only missed 1 daily meditation last month, and completed 57 of 62 of my gratitude journal entries. I hiked or walked between 51-55 miles last month, and finished 8 yoga sessions. I still haven't started my lifting regime back up, but will probably do it in the next couple of weeks. I've been relying on walking, intermittent fasting, yoga, and at-home ab workouts to keep up with my physical goals.
Guitar is the one habit I didn't spend too much time on this month. I tend to play for 30-60 minutes on the weekend. I've mostly used this tracking system to observe where I'm spending my time and how much time I'm spending on particular activities. I may decide to refine it so it is less of a passive tracking system in the future.
I improved on my anemic reading habit over the last few months. I finished Ready Player Two by Ernest Cline, The Starship and the Canoe by Kennith Brower, and the Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman. I also started Bob Dylan Chronicles Vol. 1, which I read about 15 years ago, shortly after it came out. I picked a couple easy fiction books to make some progress early in the year.
The Starship and the Canoe was quite interesting and has some ERE parallels. It follows Freemon Dyson and George Dyson. Freemon Dyson is a world renowned physicist who was trying to develop a spaceship using atomic explosions to propel the craft. His son George basically drops off the grid and ends up living in a treehouse, 95 ft. of the ground, in British Columbia. George is perfecting his own kayak and baidarka designs based on indigenous boats that were no longer used or in fashion. I naturally gravitated to the story of George Dyson and his adventures along the BC and Alaskan shorelines. It was pretty wild to see everything that Freemon and George accomplished that wasn't even covered in the Book. Here is a short video with visuals of all of this:
https://vimeo.com/124182572
Professional:
A good month at work. I've been actively trying to better manage my stress, and I think the daily meditation and stoic reflections help with this. Things are ramping up though, and I've got a lot on my plate over the next couple of months. I need to review my notes on Deep Work, keep away from distractions like podcasts or my phones, so I can keep making progress and refrain from falling behind.
I'm also committed to taking more regular, week-long breaks this year even though I've got a lot of deadlines. Blocked off a week in April to take a vacation with DW, and may take another in May. Looking forward to some longer trips this summer, assuming we don't pack it up and hit the road for some long-term vagabonding at that point.