“Is your baby here yet?”

Many of my friends and family members have been asking me this question over the past few weeks. I have also been eagerly looking forward to my baby’s arrival since the beginning of 2012 as my baby was already 39 weeks due and ready for birth any moment.

But my expected due date (10th Jan) came.. and went..and still no sign of the baby. As I’m writing this post, my bags are all packed, nursery all set and I’m on standby, just waiting for any signs of labour to head to the hospital.

During these past few weeks of rest at home, I came to appreciate 2 valuable lessons which I found similar to investing and life in general.

1) Patience pays

Some things just cannot be rushed. People often say – the baby will arrive when she’s ready.

Although there has been no concrete studies that explains what exactly triggers labour, we do know that it is a natural process that will develop when the conditions are ripe. When the time comes, there will be specific signs of labor to watch out for e.g regular contractions, water bag bursting etc. Meanwhile, what I can do is to just wait patiently for baby’s arrival.

Simarly when it comes to investing, the right market conditions must be present for investing to be profitable. If the market conditions are not suitable, investing becomes difficult and may even turn out to be a frustrating exercise ending up in losses. Market performance is affected by various factors, such as the economic outlook, company’s performance and news as well as investors’ market sentiment etc.

Over the past few months, we have observed stock markets become increasingly volatile and choppy, moving up one day and down another alongside with investors’ worry and fear about the uncertain economic situtation in Europe and US.

In the Secrets to Investing series, I wrote about the simple rule of investing at the right time, which is when the markets are trending up (i.e generally moving in an upward direction. To understand how to assess the trend of a market, subscribe for the free investing tips here).

Apart from knowing when to enter the market, it is equally important, if not more important to know when to stay out of the market, so you can protect your capital. Besides avoiding the downward markets, it’s also important to stay out of sideways markets, where there is no clear direction. This is because when markets move sideways within a tight range, investing would not yield any meaningful return and would be a waste of time and effort.

So when markets are moving in an unfavorable manner (i.e downwards or sideways), it is important for investors to have patience and wait for the upward trends to resume before investing in that particular market.

What we can do is to position ourselves well for the next opportunity by preparing well in advance, doing our research, planning and monitoring the situation for the right conditions. Once the signs appear, then it is time to take the necessary steps to catch the opportunity.

2) Take time to smell the flowers

Sometimes the wait can be ardously long…  Especially for the impatient me who is always eager to get things moving and seeing progress, the waiting game for my baby’s arrival was a real challenge for me initially. Week after week, I wait excitedly for the signs but the excitment turn into disappointment as my gynae tells me “One more week”, “one more week”, not yet”. There was a period of time when I actually felt at a loss of what to do..literally running out of things to occupy my time!

Then I realised – all these years I have become so accustomed to being on the fast track of life, constantly planning ahead and chasing my goals, that I have forgotten what it is like to slow down and just enjoy doing nothing. Usually it’s only during my designated holiday trips that I fully let my hair down and truly enjoy the leisure moments.

These few weeks of waiting turned out to be a refreshing break for me; an opportunity for me to slow down and learn to enjoy being in the moment. Being fully present with whatever I am doing and enjoying the company of whoever I am with, putting aside all my worries or plans about the future and thoughts about the past.

Today’s a Gift, that’s why we call it the Present

Learning to enjoy every moment I have with my family, friends and myself while waiting patiently for my baby’s arrival – these are 2 valuable lessons I appreciated deeply during this period and I’m grateful for the Gift of NOW.

I hope that my sharing will also inspire you to enjoy every moment you have right now with whomever you are with; and to have the patience to wait for the right conditions of whatever you are working towards.

Lighten up. Laugh More.

Appreciate more. All is well.

To your success and happiness,

Yong Hui