Q4'23 - Reflections and Results

Reflections

I would like to start off this post with one word -- Gratitude. I am very thankful for what I have, who I have become, how my character is constantly evolving and all the new communities and friendships I made along the way.

One of the pivotal moments in my mid twenties was chancing upon a blog post from one of my favorite (then) Digital Nomad, Johnny FD. He mentioned New Years Reflections is way more impactful and effective than New Years Resolutions. Once I internalized this and changed my approach, my results took a positive turn.

The idea behind it is simple. When you reflect, you are looking back retrospectively on what you have done, if you have done absolutely and utterly nothing, you will have zero results, zero accomplishments, zero growth. You cannot say you have achieved something without putting in the work, it simply isn't possible.

The process of reflection can therefore be a much painful experience vs "creating a resolution" because you cannot lie your way through tangible results. Most people set resolutions without actually wanting to change, because the pain of change was never greater than the pain of not changing. And creating resolutions doesn't give a person a measurable way to track his/her progress. Reflecting does.

I'll give you an example... and I'll always use health and fitness to illustrate because it applies to everyone and is the most widely applicable.

You're 90KG today. Your goal is to lose weight and hit 80KG in 1 year.

-- What most people do is announce a resolution "I want to lose 10KG this year prioritize my health".

Nine times out of ten, that will fail. And each year the same cycle repeats, perpetuating the vicious cycle. Next year you aim for that same 80KG goal weight but you never actually knew what went wrong the previous year and what needs to be true for you to start achieving your goal weight.

-- Let's flip the script. You reflect instead. You stagnate at 90KG after 1 year. You track your monthly results (numbers don't lie) and after a year, you realize you overate / didn't build enough muscle and lose enough fat. Because you actually reflected, you feel the pain of having wasted an entire year of progress. That spurs you to action next year. Sacrificing 1 year of progress to understand this only to start making progress the following years is well worth the sacrifice if you ask me.

Self-Reflecting has become a non-negotiable part of my December routine. I have learnt so much from just doing some deep thinking. I'll share some personal examples:

1 -- I used to confuse Motion with Progress. A rocking horse keeps moving, but it doesn't go anywhere. A stallion gallops, exploring new terrains. Movement = Work. Getting Movement is good, because you are working. But if you are working hard but not moving forward, you are working on the wrong things.

Case in point -- Earlier this year, I was trying to do marketing to grow Arete's social media organically. I tried to make nice posts, aesthetic to the eyes. I was spending hours doing up marketing collaterals. The reality is this does not resonate with my audience. They were more interested in seeing my results, how I made money with Options and how I demonstrated that I could solve their problems. Even with a not so well-formatted post, it gathered more organic growth and new asks.

2 -- Money is like water. It is fluid. It moves. Water evaporates, clouds form and rain falls and flows into rivers. Money is always flowing from somewhere to somewhere else. The biggest rivers are in the financial markets and Options is a GREAT tool to collect water from these big rivers.

3 -- Surround yourself with people better, smarter, stronger, richer... normalize becoming more and realize how little we actually expected from ourselves. This is why I have multiple groups of friends, I cherish them all. When it comes to serious business and growth, who I am surrounded with determines >70% of my decisions. I realized that it is very easy to be comfortable, but the coveted rare "freedom treasure" can never be found there.

Results (YTD 2023)

After 12 months of work, I am happy to share that we have demonstrated growing a small capital of $5,000 to $12,200, a 145% YTD return. The goal set out in Jan'23 this year has been accomplished.

This will be the transparent evidence that Options can be a safe and consistent way of growing your portfolio.

I am going to attach Oct'23, Nov'23 and Dec'23 MTD results here. To the handful who are reading this post, hope you see what's possible and that you can do it too. We also pivoted to a new platform IBKR somewhere in Q4'23, and I actually restarted with another smaller account ($10,000) and managed to grow it to $20,000. Attached the image below as well.

Thanks for reading, see you in 2024 !

Godspeed,

Arete