I’ll never forget what my dad said to me. Not in these exact words…

But the meaning stayed with me for life: Willie, always think differently.

My dad was a Creative Director. He was good at what he did. When I was much younger, I would peek at his work while he sat at the corner of our home, working on this computer – fully immersed in his projects. That little corner felt like a window into another world.

When he was free, he taught us how to use his computer – played games on it, even learning how to program simple games. Beyond his work, he was a devoted family man.

From watching him, I learnt something about creativity. In advertising, great creative work doesn’t come from being strange or complex. It comes from seeing what others don’t see. It was having a different attitude.

My dad thinks differently from the crowd. While my primary school classmates were using Windows PCs, I grew up using an Apple Macintosh. Back then, I didn’t like it. My friends would laugh at me when I told them my computer mouse had only one button. I realized and agreed with my dad later on how powerful the Apple Macintosh was, and yes – it’s still far superior than the Windows PC (sorry, Windows fans).

I was exposed to the idea that thinking differently was a powerful mental model.

You see, I’ve been writing on my financial blog, dividendtitan.com since 2020, and having taught investing classes before that. If you’re starting out investing, I want you to know I don’t teach a baby how to tango. But you also don’t need to dance like Al Pacino to succeed in investing and achieve your financial freedom.

Instead, you need to think differently and stick to simple investing principles.

I bought my first stock in 2010. I was stubborn as an ox. I believed going after all the complex, popular strategies like arbitrages and options that hedge fund managers use meant “smart investing”. I was wrong. Remember the time I shared with you about my “one-stock portfolio”? Back then, I’ve recorded big gains every now and then. But after factoring the few big losses too, I realized my total returns weren’t worth the risk taking and huge amount of time spent.

I also first learnt about Warren Buffett from a book my cousin lent me years ago. Now, no one really knew how Warren Buffett invested back then. It was around the time during the subprime mortgage crisis. No one really bothered how Warren Buffett invested then. Yet I was mind-blown by what was written in the book – No complex strategy, just a way of simple investing:

1. Analyse stocks as businesses
2. Manage a focused, low-turnover portfolio
3. Understand the difference between Investment and Speculation

Warren Buffett was a different investor. He stuck to this principle that allowed him to turn Berkshire Hathaway into one giant, compounding machine. All he assumes is if you can buy wonderful businesses at a fair price, you only need a small handful of them, you’ll essentially beat the market.

Then later on, I discovered dividend investing. Again, I noticed a quiet group of highly successful wealthy clients who simply accumulated and protected their wealth through passive income. That got me into a boring, unpopular strategy – dividend investing.

These ideas of investing are usually boring, unpopular and they work. More importantly, these ideas form a lattice of understanding in your mind. Howard Marks wrote in his 2006 article, Dare to be Great:

I somehow knew that to succeed in investing, we must think differently and be contrarian not for the sake of it, but contrarian in attitude. I admit, I make mistakes all the time. But I’ve also navigated and avoided the big crashes including the US debt crisis (2011), the China stock market crash (2015), COVID-19 pandemic (2020), the tech bubble crash (2022) and so on.

Simply put, think differently in attitude. It’s one of my mental models that has allowed me to achieve my financial goals. Instead of following my peers in banking who’d rushed to buy cars and upgrade to condos, my biggest spending was on books. This allowed me to save and invest aggressively, which helped me to eventually quit the rat race.

What are your mental models for investing? Hit "reply" to share with me.

Have a great Sunday!

xoxo

Willie Keng, CFA

Founder, dividendtitan.com

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