The Gift of Time

"Happiness is not a goal; it is a by-product." Eleanor Roosevelt

We've been taught happiness is something we achieve after reaching certain milestones - career success, financial security, the right portfolio balance. But what if this approach has it backwards? What if happiness isn't a destination we reach after optimising everything else, but the natural result of how we choose to spend our time today.

The Mathematics of Mortality

I am just over a year away from turning 50. In four years' time I will be the same age my father was when he died. Four years ago, I celebrated my grandfather's 100th birthday. Last Christmas my sister was diagnosed with cancer.

This isn't meant to depress but to awaken you to reality. Time isn't infinite, and it doesn't wait for us to be ready. Purposeful living needs to start today.

If your parents are in their 80s, you might have fewer than ten more summers together. If your child is 15, you have just three summers left before they finish school and (hopefully) seek to live a more independent life.

The irony is profound: the more aware I become of time's limitations, the more I notice how our traditional approaches to wealth-building actually steal time from the very life we're supposedly building wealth to enjoy. We've created a system where financial optimisation comes at the cost of living fully in the present.

Here's what traditional investment approaches don't tell you: while you're spending hours researching stocks, analysing markets, and managing portfolios, life is happening without you. And all your effort is more likely to cost you money rather than make you money as countless articles explain - https://loricapartners.com.au/insights/how-investor-behaviour-undermines-long-term-success

The High Achiever's Paradox

Research from Harvard Business School reveals that successful professionals consistently underestimate task duration whilst overestimating their available time. They can recite their portfolio allocation to the decimal point but struggle to remember their last meaningful family conversation.

Success demands sacrifice, and time with family seems infinitely renewable. But time isn't money. Money can be earned back; time cannot. A missed school play doesn't offer a makeup performance. A conversation deferred with an aging parent might never occur.

Every decision carries an opportunity cost, and this principle applies mercilessly to time. The weekend spent reviewing investment reports, the evenings analysing market trends, the mental energy consumed by portfolio performance…all of this comes at the expense of being present in your life.

The Expensive Word

"Someday" might be the costliest word in the English language. Someday, I'll travel with my spouse. Someday, I'll teach my children about money, values, and life. Someday, I'll slow down and enjoy what I've built. Someday, I'll have those important conversations.

But "someday" assumes a guarantee that doesn't exist. Health changes. People age. Children grow up and move away. Interests shift.

Studies on time perception show that as we age, time seems to accelerate, largely because each year represents a smaller fraction of our total lived experience. What felt like forever in childhood becomes fleeting in middle age. Christmas trees start appearing in Westfield in September, you blink, and it’s Christmas Day. 

A Better Way: The Gift of Systematic Investing

Lorica Partners has built an investment approach over many decades founded on evidence-based, Nobel prize winning, systematic investing through globally diversified funds. This isn't just about returns - though the evidence consistently shows our approach typically outperforms over time. It's about reclaiming your most valuable asset - time.

When you embrace our approach to investing, remarkable things happen.

Instead of checking portfolio performance multiple times a day, you focus on what moves the needle in your life like relationships, health, meaningful work, and experiences money can't buy back.

You eliminate decision fatigue. Rather than constantly second-guessing investment choices, you follow a disciplined, evidence-based approach that frees your mental energy for what matters most.

You reduce anxiety. Market volatility becomes background noise rather than a source of daily stress. You sleep better knowing your strategy is grounded in decades of academic research rather than market timing or stock picking.

You create space for presence. The hours previously spent on investment research become available for family dinners, meaningful conversations, and being fully present in your relationships.

What True Wealth Actually Looks Like

True wealth isn't just financial. It's having enough time to spend on what matters while you still can. It's being present for the moments that money can't buy back. It's recognising that the ultimate luxury isn't a bigger portfolio, but time spent with intention.

Research from the Stanford Center on Longevity suggests that people who maintain strong relationships live longer, healthier lives. Harvard's longitudinal study on happiness found that the quality of our relationships is the single biggest predictor of life satisfaction.

Happiness is a by-product of a well-lived life, not a destination you reach after your next investment review.

The Gift of Time

You have a choice when it comes to investing - the path of time-consuming investment strategies that demand constant attention or embracing a systematic approach that delivers superior long-term results while giving you back your most precious resource.

The gift of time is waiting.

Author: Rick Walker

With thanks to the awesome NZ adviser and friend, Nick Stewart, whose article The Illusion of Time inspired this one.