Slowly weaning off my compulsive habit of constantly checking my investment portfolio throughout the day. After about 1.5 months of playing in the stock market sandbox, I think I have more or less seeded all the investment fund into about 10 dividend-paying stocks (mostly ETFs). Ongoing work should just be leaving the stocks to grow at its on pace and occasionally cultivating them by harvesting (sell with gain) the ones that grew and bare fruits and fertilizing (buy) or even pruning (sell at a loss) those that are not growing healthily.
I came up with the investment metaphor while I was adding a little garden on the kitchen countertop. My friend bought me a thoughtful gift of a mint planting kit, I planted the sesame-sized mint seeds and finally installed a LED grow lamp with a timer that I bought months ago. Now I eagerly awaits for it to spout. While designing the little kitchen garden, I prepared a few extra plant pots to grow more edible herbs in the future.
Besides investment, I did manage to find time to work on more ideas for my sustainable design studio. I continued the experimentation with paper making and successfully recycled some of the juice cartons I had saved up into handmade paper. I also kept up with my running practices of 2-3 times a week and about one hour each time.
My current pace of life in Canada is much slower compared to when I was in HK. It’s not easy to slow down. Often times the fear of time being wasted comes to haunt me. But slowly I’m coming to realize that it’s ok to rest and just let time pass and the world runs its course. It’s like planting a seed, you can’t rush its growth by over fertilizing and watering. With the right conditions the plant will eventually grow at its own comfortable pace.
A protest by Palestinians against the Israel invasion was happening in my neighborhood earlier today. Brought back memories of the many protests that happened all over HK back in 2019. It also reminded me of the reasons I decided to return to Canada. Diversity, peace, and freedom (despite the slow pace) are the essential nutrients that kept our country strong, and I can only pray that it will forever stay this way. Amen.
