In the field of investment, patience is arguably the most precious and indispensable quality.
Many are often perplexed: why do numerous investors who are proactive, diligent, and exceptionally intelligent, even possessing doctoral degrees, struggle to become outstanding, stable profit-makers?
The answer often lies deep within: most people precisely lack this key element of patience.
In investing, the importance of patience far exceeds diligence, intelligence, and academic qualifications.
Most proactive individuals are unwilling to settle down and wait.
Smart people often overestimate their ability to turn the tide, attempting to skip basic accumulation and instead leap directly to wealth's summit.
Once there was a gentleman who was full of ambition, determined to become a billionaire by 40.
At 35, he realized his wishes were far from reach and resolutely gave up his job to start a business.
In five years, he ventured into various fields such as travel agencies, coffee shops, and flower shops, yet each entrepreneurial attempt ended in failure, leaving his family in dire straits.
Exhausted, the wife sought help from the monk.
Upon hearing this, the monk invited the gentleman to the courtyard.
The courtyard was as large as a basketball court, filled with lush, century-old trees.
The monk, holding a broom, said solemnly: "Sweep away the fallen leaves, and you will be told the method to earn billions in wealth."
Though the gentleman was half-convinced, he could hardly resist the temptation of wealth and took the broom to start sweeping.
An hour later, he had finally swept from one end of the courtyard to the other. Joyfully turning around, he saw that the ground he had just swept was already covered with leaves again.
He was anxious and hurriedly swept, but until nightfall, the leaves on the ground remained unchanged from the beginning.
The gentleman was beside himself with anger, throwing away the broom and questioning the monk why he mocked him.
The monk remained calm, pointing at the falling leaves and slowly said: "Desire is like the leaves that cannot be swept away, layer upon layer obscuring patience. Patience is the voice of wealth."
"You have a desire for a hundred million in your heart, yet only a day's patience in your body."
"Just like autumn leaves, they must wait until winter for the leaves to fall completely before they can be swept clean, yet you wish to complete it in a day."
Investing is the same; patience has many specific manifestations within it.
While waiting for investment opportunities, patience means not blindly following trends and not being misled by short-term market hotspots.
For example, in the stock market, one would not impulsively enter just because a certain stock suddenly hits the limit up multiple times.
Instead, one must patiently analyze industry trends, company fundamentals, and other factors, waiting for truly potential investments with reasonable valuations to appear.
Just like value investors wait for quality stocks to become undervalued due to short-term market panic before decisively taking action.
In the process of holding assets, patience is even more critical.
Many people cannot bear the impatience of slight fluctuations after buying stocks or funds.
True patient investors will firmly hold onto quality assets.
For instance, holding onto some blue-chip stocks with stable growth over the long term, even when their prices adjust due to overall market fluctuations, remains unfazed.
Because they know that the value of a company will gradually reflect in its stock price over time, and frequent buying and selling may not only miss out on significant upward opportunities but also erode profits due to transaction costs.
When facing market fluctuations, patience is also a winning strategy.
The market is like an unpredictable ocean, sometimes calm and sometimes turbulent.
When the market is down, patient investors do not panic and cut losses.
For example, during a bear market, some investors patiently wait for the market to bottom out, not swayed by short-term pessimism.
They firmly believe that the market will have cyclical rebounds; as long as the fundamentals of the assets they invest in remain unchanged, they will hold their ground and wait for the market to warm up.
The timing for profit is often not closely related to personal effort but depends on market sentiment – the so-called "timing and fate."
Sometimes you are blameless, yet you labor in vain due to untimely opportunities.
As the ancient saying goes: "A horse may have a journey of a thousand miles, but it cannot go without a rider; a person may have lofty ambitions, but they cannot be fulfilled without luck."
Only by patiently waiting for market opportunities can one have a chance to profit.
Those who consider themselves clever, attempting to fight against the market and force trends, will eventually be eliminated by the market.
Opportunities always favor those who patiently wait.
