Thank God Life (and Investing) Isn’t Like the Olympics

Originally in ForbesImagine that your entire life revolves around a single performance lasting less than 14 seconds. You’ve sacrificed your youth, close friendships and any semblance of a career in pursuit of validating your Herculean effort on the world’s largest stage. The hopes of your country on your shoulders. Tens of millions of gawkers eager to praise perfection — and condemn anything less.

And then.

You dork it.

Jeffrey Julmis

That’s precisely what happened to Haitian hurdler Jeffrey Julmis in the Olympic 110-meter semifinal heat when he crashed into the very first hurdle, tumbling violently into the second.

Wow. I love the Olympics, the pinnacle of athletic competition. I even see past all the corporate corruption and commercial sensationalism, drinking in every vignette, simply in awe of all that the human body, mind and spirit can accomplish in peak performance. But thank God life isn’t like the Olympics (even for Olympians).

We aren’t subject to the imperial thumbs up or down based on a single momentary contest (or even a handful of them). But we’re certainly capable of treating life that way, often to our detriment. Don’t believe me? When was the last time you said (or thought):

“This is the most important thing I’ve ever done.”

“It’s all leading up to this.”

We’re trained to think this way because that narrative is more likely to keep you from switching the channel, more likely to motivate you to buy that car (or house or hair product), all of it promising to be that singular moment or lead you to it.

This script is especially common in the world of financial products. If you surveyed the marketing collateral for a host of investment products, you’d think the product being sold was a sailboat, new golf clubs, a winery or beach house — a life without care. But success in investing is actually achieved through the tedium of saving and the application of a simple, long-term investment plan — not the sexy new investment product or strategy that pledges to deliver your hopes and dreams.

Thankfully, this is also true in life (and athletics). “Success” is cultivated in the millions of unseen moments, the application of simple disciplines employed in pursuit of goals that don’t expire the minute we’re out of the spotlight. And even at the moment of our most abominable failures, the humbled Haitian hurdler provided us with the only example we need:

He got up and finished the race.