As I sit down to write each week, I generally turn to the events and themes that most impressed me that week. Reading from a wide variety of sources, I sometimes see patterns that I feel are worthy to call to your attention. I’ve come to see my role in your life as a filter, a connoisseur of ideas and information. I don’t sit down to write with the thought that I need to be particularly brilliant or insightful (which is almighty difficult even for brilliant and insightful people) but that I need to find brilliant and insightful, and hopefully useful, ideas among the hundreds of sources that surface each week. And if I can bring to your attention a pattern, an idea, or thought stream that that helps your investment process, then I’ve done my job.
As I reflect on this, two thoughts come to my mind. First, that I should write a weekly piece describing some of the ideas and concepts I have come across. A weekly contribution could serve as both a form of instruction to others. It could serve as a filter or idea broker for others interested in these topics. It serves as a proxy network for connecting with others with similar interests. Interestingly, John Mauldin's idea is not to be "brilliant or insightful." He is not building a network based on his own superior ideas. Instead he's trying to find brilliant and insightful, and, "hopefully useful, ideas" to share them (for free) to anyone interested. This is one way idea-brokering creates value--by connecting ideas with people. In fact, Mauldin is explicit to include different ideas, ideas from perspectives different from his own. I think this is to add dimension and perspective to his own thoughts and reflections. For me, John Mauldin's weekly piece helps me stay informed of the financial and economic world better than traditional news media or other outlets. I enjoy reading them. I think I enjoy it in part because he writes specifically to the nonconsumer of investment literature--those who don't have access to or can't afford (in time or money) the high cost of professional financial and economic analysis. His writing, is not necessarily interactive--meaning I'm not contributing. But, for me, it is surely informative and useful. I am able to form an opinion.
The second thought that comes to mind from reading Mauldin's letter is the idea, or hope, that as I write weekly, I can improve my own thoughts and ideas and the thoughts and ideas of my readers--my connected neighbors. There are two parts to this thought. 1) Because writing is an activity that has opportunity costs--meaning the time I spend writing is time I don't spend doing something else--I must make decisions, judgments, or evaluations of what to write. I can't write down everything I read. Besides what is the value of rewriting everything that has already been written down? Writing down ideas affords me the opportunity to evaluate what I read. I hypothesize that as I write week after week I will begin to improve how I choose what to write based in part on what I've written. 2) The second part to improving the thoughts and ideas of connected neighbors and me is to give, receive, and share feedback on what is written. I don't know what form or frequency the feedback will take. As my writing is refined or becomes more focused the kind and frequency of feedback may stabilize. Maybe more significantly, you, my connected neighbor, can improve your own evaluative skill as you see and seek value in your circumstance. I'm looking forward to it. Let's go.
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