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Musings Report #38 9-18-15 What We Learn From Camping
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What We Learn From Camping
Last week I mentioned that I'd just returned from a 4-day camping trip to Lassen National Park and Humboldt State Park (redwoods) in Northern California.
Every camping trip is memorable, and recreational in the sense of allowing us to recreate/restore ourselves--our sense of place, self and balance in a social-economic world that is often crazy-making.
This prompted me to ponder what we learn from camping--backpacking, bike-camping, or car camping.
The first thing we learn is to choose what we pack and carry carefully. The smaller the load, the greater the care, of course--a backpack or bicycle panniers have extremely limited space, and the additional weight of non-essentials is an immediate and lasting burden. Car-camping affords much more space, but it has strict limits as well--especially if you car-camp in a compact car with no racks or extra storage.
We set up our tent next to two guys camping out of a large recent-model Subaru with a storage pod on racks. They complimented us on camping out of a Honda Civic with no racks--and we had open space in our trunk.
This is not due to sacrifices in food or cooking. We eat extremely well while camping and carry a full complement of cooking gear, including a wok, saucepan, frying pan, etc. two decades of camping together out of compact cars has taught us what's essential, what's nice if you have a bit of extra room and what is a waste of space. It's simply being efficient and well-organized--two very valuable skills.
The second set of skills arise from the practical necessities of camping: how to properly position a tent for comfort and privacy, how to set up a tent on a variety of soil types (carry plastic stakes for sandy soils and a hammer to pound in aluminum stakes on hard soil), how to cook a multi-course meal with one burner (or two if you have a dual-burner stove), how to tie on a propane lantern mantle, how to lay down a campfire that doesn't need constant attention, and so on.
If the camping ground doesn't have showers (many don't), learning how to take a sponge bath in the cramped quarters of a tent is also a useful skill to learn: if nothing else,you learn how little water you need to feel a whole lot cleaner.
These practical skills pay dividends in all sorts of ways in the rest of life.
Then there's what we learn from being quiet in a quiet place. (This assumes you're not camped next to an RV with a ball game blaring and a generator running. This sort of thing makes us grateful for the occasional "tent-only" loops in campgrounds or walk-in sites.)
If you're in a fairly remote site, there's no cell phone or wi-fi coverage, so the digital distractions are stripped away. You start noticing bird songs, the crackle of a neighboring camper's early morning fire, and the song being sung by a toddler a few sites away.
Beauty is under-appreciated in a culture of commerce and distraction. If it can't be sold or displayed as a signifier of hipness/wealth, it has no value.
The beauty visible to campers is not for sale and can't be worn/displayed. It's the first light warming the tops of the trees as the sun breaks over the ridgeline. It's the deer in the meadow when the dew is still on the grass blades, the jumble of branches in a streambed--the list is essentially endless.
Sadly, people who never experienced camping as children often find the prospect of roughing it unappealing. They can't imagine why anyone would bother with the discomforts of sleeping in a tent (actually quite comfortable with good air mattresses) when a motel room is so much easier and more comfortable.
But a motel room teaches us nothing, and doesn't lend itself to the restoration of sanity and equilibrium. Comfort has its limits.
Summary of the Blog This Past Week
As the "Prosperity" Tide Recedes, the Ugly Reality of Wealth Inequality Is Exposed 9/18/15
Here's Why the Status Quo Is Doomed 9/17/15
The American Disease: I Deserve to Get Away with Anything and Everything 9/16/15
The Next Financial Crisis Won't be Like the Last One 9/15/15
Why the Fed Would be Insane to Raise Rates: The Rising U.S. Dollar 9/14/15
Best Thing That Happened To Me This Week
My friend G.F.B. came up with a cover design for the new book that people like right away. Progress!
Market Musings: Hedging Is Unnatural
I want to talk about being a successful trader/investor this week--not necessarily the most profitable trader but a good trader, i.e. one that can outperform over the long haul.
Nobody can top the performance of a trader with huge risk appetite and a hot hand. Putting all your chips on a few numbers maximizes your gains. Do that a few times in a row, with no losses, and the gains are spectacular.
But eventually whatever system the hot hand was using is copied by others, and its power wanes. The hot hand turns cold and the losses mount quickly, erasing most or all of the spectacular gains.
The key to being a successful trader/investor is the ability to do what is unnatural for humans: to be patient, not make impulsive decisions, and to hedge one's major bets (a.k.a. investments).
Hedging means betting against the investment you just made. If you bought a stock because you're confident it will go up in value, why bet it's going to drop? And if you're not confident it will go up, why buy it in the first place?
You only make an investment/trade if you're confident of the trend/direction, and yet the first thing a successful trader must do is place a hedge on the trade, i.e. a bet he's going to be wrong.
Hedging is not that hard. If you buy 1,000 shares of XYZ, expecting it to rise, the hedge is 10 puts just out of the money. If the stock tanks, the puts are in the money, i.e. their value rises. The farther your stock drops, the greater the value of the puts.
Puts are not free. The cost of a hedge increases the cost of the trade and dampens net gains. Like insurance, hedges add transaction costs. If the stock goes nowhere, the puts expire worthless and you've lost the money spent on the hedge.
This can go on for quite some time, and it gets tiresome throwing money away on hedges.
Then something like the August swoon hits, and suddenly you're a genius for having the unbreakable habit of keeping a hedge on every major position.
What makes a successful trader/investor is not the ability to pick winners so much as the ability to maintain good habits through thick and thin.
The focus is on maintaining the discipline, not on maximizing gains. This is very unnatural, and so it's no wonder so few humans become successful traders/investors.
My personal goal: Make 10 disciplined trades in a row. In other words, don't lose discipline.
From Left Field
For Silicon Valley Hopefuls, Is College Irrelevant? -- for some, yes...
How our energy problem leads to a debt collapse problem -- energy = money/debt/capital
What Middle Class? How bourgeois America is getting recast as a proletariat --worth a read...
Brisk daily walks can increase lifespan (via John F.)
Baylor hospital faces hard questions after claims against former neurosurgeon (via John F.) -- the guy made the hospital tons of money, that's why....
Big polluters: one massive container ship equals 50 million cars (via Joel M.) -- burning sludge for fuel...
Lower Blood Pressure Guidelines Could Be ‘Lifesaving’ (via John F.) -- generic meds are cheap, start by losing weight....
9 Things To Do to Prepare for Hard Times Ahead -- you know all these but nice to review...
Jimmy Carter: The U.S. Is an “Oligarchy With Unlimited Political Bribery” --we know this, too, but it's striking that an ex-prez has to say it publicly for people to admit it's true...
Hunter S. Thompson's Best Life Tips -- taking drugs is not one of them....
Which jobs will AI automate? -- all the ones that can be commoditized....
3-D Printing vs. Factory Jobs (via David C.) -- succinct overview of the impact of 3-D printing on trade
There is a sort of gratification in doing good which makes us rejoice in ourselves. Michel de Montaigne
Thanks for reading--
charles |
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