Jim Rogers - A Gift to My Children: A Fathers Lessons for Life and Investing

My Dear Daughters,

Your father is an investor, a man who worked hard to learn all that he could to earn enough money to retire early, and, as a result, was able to do so at the age of thirty-seven. I want to share with you what I've learned from all my experiences.

Growing up in the small rural town of Demopolis, all I ever wanted was enough money to ensure my freedom to do what I wanted in life. I had my first job at the age of five, collecting empty soda bottles at the local baseball field. I worked a bunch of other jobs throughout my childhood and eventually made it to Wall Street, where I saw the opportunity to be paid to pursue my passion for traveling all over and understanding the world. And indeed I was: In less than fifteen years, I accumulated enough wealth to retire. Freed from the need to toil in an office, I could go wherever I wished and combine my passions for adventure and for learning all about how the world really worked.

I've always enjoyed working and being successful, but now, what brings me more joy than anything else is my family. I want to share with you those things that are important for you to know so that you too can have happy and successful lives.

There are going to be moments in life when you must make very important decisions. You will find many people ready to offer you advice if you ask for it (and even if you don't), but always remember that the life you lead is yours and nobody else's. It's important to decide for yourself what's important to you and what you want before you turn to others. Because while there will be times when outside advice proves wise, there will be at least as many times when it proves utterly useless. The only way to really evaluate other folks' advice is to first learn everything that you can about whatever challenge you are facing. Once you've done that, in most cases you should be able to make an informed decision on your own anyway.

You were born with the ability to decide what is and what isn't in your best interest. Most of the time, you will make the right decision and take the appropriate actions, and in thinking for yourself, you will become far more successful than had you gone against your own judgment. Believe me, I know.

Early on in my investment career, I made the mistake of basing a few important business decisions on colleagues' opinions instead of conducting the research necessary to make an informed decision. It wasn't due to laziness on my part; no one could ever accuse me of that. But, being new to Wall Street, I tended to assume that my more senior colleagues knew more than I did, and so I attributed too much significance to their opinions. You know what happened? Each of those investments ended in failure. Eventually I stopped allowing myself to be influenced by others and began doing the work myself and making my own decisions. Talk about an epiphany. It took me until I was almost thirty years old to realize thisand also to see that it's never too late for a person to change his approach both to business and to life.

I remember once reading a magazine interview with American swimmer Donna de Varona, winner of two gold medals at the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo. The reporter pointed out that earlier in her career, she had been a good swimmer, but not a great one. Now the seventeen-year-old had just placed first in two four-hundred-meter events. What happened? She replied, I always used to watch the other swimmers, but then I learned to ignore them and swim my own races.

If people around you try to discourage you from taking a certain course of action, or ridicule your ideas, take that as a positive sign. Sure it can be difficult not to run with the herd, but the truth is that most long-term success stories are written by folks who've done exactly that. Let me give you an example.

When I was thirty-two years old or so, a Wall Street colleague of mine invited me to join a smart and successful group of financial guys who regularly got together to swap ideas over dinner. At the time, I and a partner were in the early years of our hedge fund called the Quantum Fund. It was a big deal to be invited to these dinners, and, I must admit, I was a little nervous. After all, these were the big guys in my field, and most of them had a great deal more experience than I did.