Can You Trust Your Gut?

It takes more than rationality to build wealth and make sound financial decisions. Savvy investors must also know when to trust their instincts. [Liberty Through Wealth]( SPONSORED [Gold Chart]( you own gold?]( Somebody recently decided to buy a lot of it... And I think I know why. [Click here for details on a brand-new way to invest in gold.]( Wednesday Wealth Recap - Is the American Dream over? Is the country in decline? Not even close, according to Alexander Green. In [this recent article]( Alex explained that "Americans today are living longer, richer, freer lives than any people at any time in history." And he backed this claim with hard data. - In case you haven't heard, there's a global chip shortage wreaking havoc on tech manufacturing. In fact, demand has so exceedingly outpaced supply that the semiconductor chip market is positively on fire. Nicholas Vardy shares [the best ways to profit from this red-hot sector](. - Income investing is a tried-and-true investment strategy, but it can be hard to identify which dividends are safe... and which are not. That's the idea behind Wealthy Retirement's [Safety Net column](. Recently, Research Director Kristin Orman took a look at a business development company with a whopping 8.9% yield. - Chief Trends Strategist Matthew Carr sees the next "gold rush" on the horizon, and it's an important one. This week, he revealed [two must-know pick-and-shovel plays]( that stand to reap major benefits as this new "gold rush" sector takes off. Note from Senior Managing Editor Christina Grieves: Investing is a skill. As Mark Ford writes below, it takes technical know-how and trustworthy instincts. If you're looking for help with either of those, I recommend you check out [The War Room](. Back in 2019, our good friends over at Monument Traders Alliance - Bryan Bottarelli and Karim Rahemtulla - launched The War Room, a first-of-its-kind live trading research platform where you can get instant recommendations and interact with like-minded readers. And in just over two years, Bryan and Karim have led those readers to 987 winners, and their model portfolio has beaten the S&P 500 by 1,550%. Now they're making a huge promise... guaranteeing at least 300 wins this year. Curious? [Click here to learn more about The War Room and this guarantee.]( THE SHORTEST WAY TO A RICH LIFE Why Intuition Beats Rationality in Building Wealth Mark Ford | Founding Member | The Oxford Club [Mark Ford] A good while ago I read an article in the Harvard Business Review titled "When to Trust Your Gut." This is a subject I've spent some time thinking about. And my feeling has always been that experience-based gut instincts are more valuable than MBAs from the likes of Harvard, Wharton or Yale. I was happy to see that this article supported my view. The author, Alden M. Hayashi (who was senior editor of the Review when the article was published), says quite correctly that, in making good business and career decisions, it makes sense to rely on both reasoning and gut feelings. "The higher up the corporate ladder people climb," Hayashi says, "the more they'll need well-honed business instincts." In lowlier positions, he argues, one should rely more on [facts, figures and established protocols](. Instinct is still important, but when you're new to a company, your gut can lead you astray. This makes sense when you consider that the nature of a new position or company may be different from what you've seen before. [Middle managers]( who shoot from the hip often make costly mistakes, Hayashi says. But those who sharpen their pencils and follow the rules keep the bottom line black. After one moves up the power chain, however, attention to detail becomes less important, Hayashi argues. At a certain level, having a reliable gut instinct is perhaps the most valuable thing. Hayashi looks to the late Ralph S. Larsen, former chairman and CEO of Johnson & Johnson, to explain why. "Very often, people will do a brilliant job up through the middle management levels, where it's very heavily quantitative in terms of the decision making," Larsen says. "But then they reach senior management," he continues, "where the problems get more complex and ambiguous, and we discover that their judgment or intuition is not what it should be. And when that happens, it's a problem. It's a big problem." SPONSORED [Bill SLAMS Biden: "A Disaster!"]( [Bill O'Reilly Slams]( This Must-See Showdown Reveals What's Ahead for You, Your Family and Your Money... During the Biden Presidency. [WATCH HERE.]( Richard Abdoo, former chairman and CEO of Wisconsin Energy Corporation, agrees. He says that as business speeds up and decisions must happen faster, instinct is even more important. Henry Mintzberg, professor of management at McGill University and longtime proponent of the utility of intuition, believes the subconscious mind is always processing things the conscious mind may not be aware of. A sense of revelation (the "Aha!" moment) occurs when the conscious mind finally learns something that the subconscious mind has already known. I agree. Decision making at the higher levels of business cannot rely solely on rational thinking and logic. To make the best decisions, we must also call into play our [emotional intelligence](. (Emotional intelligence is basically the same as our gut feelings.) Go With Your Gut To explain how gut feelings work, Hayashi refers to Herbert A. Simon, a professor of psychology and computer science at Carnegie Mellon University. Simon, who studied decision making for decades, claims that gut feelings result from observing repeated patterns and rules. Emotional intelligence involves noticing, storing and "chunking" such patterns so we can retrieve them instantly and automatically. In my own nonscientific thinking about gut feelings over the years, I've come to the same conclusion. The human mind has an amazing capacity to recognize and remember patterns. Much greater than our ability to remember and recall facts. In chess, for example, Simon found that grandmasters are able to recognize and recall about 50,000 major patterns of the huge number of ways in which the various pieces can be arranged on a board. How do they do it? How is it that some executives seem to have the superhuman ability to make good and profitable decisions? It's all about this mysterious process of recognizing and storing patterns. According to Hayashi, the experts say they do this while also cross-indexing them. That's when our brains find patterns in one experience that correspond to patterns in other experiences and "tag" them for instant and automatic recall when we need them. I - and just about every advertising writer I know - do this routinely. While watching commercials about a Rolex, we may notice a pattern in the pitch that is similar to a newspaper ad on vitamins and/or a radio spot on some financial scheme. We sometimes recognize the patterns consciously. Very often we don't. But they are all there, somewhere in our gut. And that's why, if you want to [become a better decision maker in building wealth]( you should expose yourself to as many ideas and experiences about business and finance and investing as you can - even if that means going as far as reading the Harvard Business Review. Good investing, Mark [Leave a Comment]( JOIN THE CONVERSATION [Facebook]( [Facebook]( [Twitter]( [Twitter]( [Email Share](mailto:?subject=A%20great%20piece%20from%20Liberty%20Through%20Wealth...&body=From%20Liberty%20Through%20Wealth:%0D%0A%0D%0AIt%20takes%20more%20than%20rationality%20to%20build%20wealth%20and%20make%20sound%20financial%20decisions.%20Savvy%20investors%20must%20also%20know%20when%20to%20trust%20their%20instincts.%0D%0A%0D [Email Share](mailto:?subject=A%20great%20piece%20from%20Liberty%20Through%20Wealth...&body=From%20Liberty%20Through%20Wealth:%0D%0A%0D%0AIt%20takes%20more%20than%20rationality%20to%20build%20wealth%20and%20make%20sound%20financial%20decisions.%20Savvy%20investors%20must%20also%20know%20when%20to%20trust%20their%20instincts.%0D%0A%0D MORE FROM LIBERTY THROUGH WEALTH [The Best Ways to Profit From the Red-Hot Semiconductor Sector]( [The Beginning of the Best Thing That Ever Happened]( [A Swing Trade Success Story: 50% in 2 Days]( SPONSORED [Author of Get Rich with Dividends Is Giving Away His Ultimate Dividend Package FOR FREE!]( [Click Here to Get Marc Lichtenfeld's Ultimate Dividend Package]( Including Details on His #1 Dividend Stock... the Safest 8% Dividend in the World... the Top Three "Extreme Dividend" Stocks... and Much, Much More. [For Free.]( [The Oxford Club]( You are receiving this email because you subscribed to Liberty Through Wealth. Liberty Through Wealth is published by The Oxford Club. Questions? Check out our [FAQs](. Trying to reach us? [Contact us here.]( Please do not reply to this email as it goes to an unmonitored inbox. [Privacy Policy]( | [Whitelist Liberty Through Wealth]( | [Unsubscribe]( © 2021 The Oxford Club, LLC All Rights Reserved The Oxford Club | [105 West Monument Street](#) | [Baltimore, MD 21201](#) North America: [1.800.589.3430](#) | International: [+1.443.353.4334](#) | Fax: [1.410.329.1923](#) [Oxfordclub.com]( The Oxford Club is a financial publisher that does not offer any personal financial advice or advocate the purchase or sale of any security or investment for any specific individual. Members should be aware that although our track record is highly rated by an independent analysis and has been legally reviewed, investment markets have inherent risks and there can be no guarantee of future profits. The stated returns may also include option trades. We expressly forbid our writers from having a financial interest in their own securities recommendations to readers. All of our employees and agents must wait 24 hours after online publication or 72 hours after the mailing of printed-only publications prior to following an initial recommendation. Any investments recommended by The Oxford Club should be made only after consulting with your investment advisor and only after reviewing the prospectus or financial statements of the company. Protected by copyright laws of the United States and international treaties. The information found on this website may only be used pursuant to the membership or subscription agreement and any reproduction, copying, or redistribution (electronic or otherwise, including on the world wide web), in whole or in part, is strictly prohibited without the express written permission of The Oxford Club, 105 W. Monument Street, Baltimore MD 21201.