The best gifts are the ones that keep on giving, and that's what this episode of Rule Breaker Investing all about! Today's show highlights the things you've told us that you learned from Motley Fool co-founder David Gardner, called out and amplified to help us all navigate another challenging year. Now that's an awesome birthday present.
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A full transcript is below.
This podcast was recorded on May 14, 2025.
David Gardner: Once a year, well, it happens to you, too. You have a birthday. That time of the year, every year for me, is mid-May. We've had a tradition with this podcast, which is that you give me a gift, which you did once again this month. Thank you so much. You give me a gift in the form of notes, emails, tweets, sharing what you've learned from this podcast, and then I get to organize those thoughts and give a gift back. A concise summary of the cardinal points made, the most frequently recurring points that you make, which really, in a way, summarize Rule Breaker Investing, especially for new listeners. This series is entitled What You have Learned from David Gardner. Here in 2025, well, it's volume 6. What you've earned from Me. Thanks for the birthday present. Only on this week's Rule Breaker Investing.
Welcome back to Rule Breaker Investing. Yeah. It's my birthday this week. As I mentioned at the top, one of my favorite birthday presents comes in the form of listeners reaching out directly to share what you've learned from me, what you've learned from this podcast. Now, I'm a little bit self-conscious entitling this episode, What Have You Learned from David Gardner? Because I'm actually the first to make jokes, especially about professional athletes, when they refer to themselves in the third person. Things like, what's ahead for Michael Jordan? The journalist asked. Then Michael lawyer says, something like, well, Michael Jordan's thinking a lot about his future, that sort of thing. Often, it seems like the sports journalists are almost setting up the athletes to use third person by asking them questions directly in the third person themselves. Anyway, what have you learned from David Gardner? Well, here's David Gardner to share that back this week. But I hope it's clear that as I share out these responses, taken together, they provide a pretty good summary of what I've tried to do, to embody and to teach over these years in a compact and efficient format. So if I'm doing my job right this week, you're going to be getting info rich, highly efficient views of how to approach investing and a little bit of business and life, too, but mostly investing because that's what you tell me you're learning here, most of all, on Rule Breaker Investing.
This year, we're going to do it in five themed points and then feature three lovely letters. Before I bring out the first of our five themes, I have three things to share upfront, bookkeeping items. First of all, my guest next week is business author superstar Seth Godin, he of the very many wonderful books like Purple Cow about branding and marketing. In fact, Seth was my first ever author in August when I started that series on August 1st, 2018, Seth Godin next week. Second, you'll notice something new in the coming weeks for this podcast and other Motley Fool podcasts, and that's ads. We're going back to the future on Motley Fool podcast. You're going to hear a few ads during some of our podcasts. That's, of course, a good sign for the Motley Fools growth. Advertisers want to pay us to get messages to you. It's something we once did for some years on this podcast, but then some years after that not. Well, that's beginning again this May. Virtually every other big podcast these days has ads, so I hope it's not too distracting. It won't surprise or disappoint. Anyway, I wanted you to hear that from me. Third, it's time for our page breaker preview. As I shared at the start of the year, my 2025 book Rule Breaker Investing is available for pre-order now. After 30 years of stock picking, this is my magnum opus, a lifetime of lessons distilled into one definitive guide. Each week until the book launches on September 16th, I'm sharing a random excerpt. We break open the book to a random page. I read a few sentences, so let's do it.
A few sentences from page 46 of the book, "Add up. Don't double down. Make it an option only to add to your winners to what's doing well in this world, never the opposite. Do so with the knowledge that most others, including most professionals and almost all large mutual funds as a requirement to maintain diversity are doing the opposite, rebalancing, averaging down, cutting the flowers, and watering the weeds as the old saw goes." That's this week's page Breaker preview to pre-order, my final word on stock picking shaped by three decades of market crushing success. Just type Rule Breaker Investing into amazon.com, barnesandnoble.com or wherever you shop for fine books. When you think about it, a great investment book literally pays for itself. To everyone who's already pre-ordered, hey, you can do it this week and give me another birthday gift, thank you. That means a lot. Now, on to the five themes that you've learned for me in whether it's the past year, 2024, 2025, or maybe the past few years or the decades length of this podcast, or maybe even you're a longtime Motley Fool member years before that. Thank you for these. Let's lead it off with theme number 1. This one comes from @Anandkhatri on Twitter X. Anand, you wrote, Happy birthday, David, Just Keep swimming. Those three words, of course, pulled from Dory, the character from Finding Nemo, a phrase I've been delighted to bring back time and time again, especially during times of volatility, sometimes market troubles. That really was a big theme for this podcast.
For me, if you were with me in 2022, we just kept swimming through a really bad year for stocks. Even in just the last couple of months, the volatility that we've experienced is nearly unprecedented, well, in recent times, anyway. That's why it makes so much sense for you and for me to just keep swimming. Anand, you get it, and so many others do, as well. What does keep swimming look like with your money? Well, it means, if you are a wage earner, which many of you are, I hope you're saving every two weeks. Ideally, up to 10%, even more than that, if you can, of your salary, but maybe 5% as an initial goal. You're saving every two weeks, and then you're taking that money, and you're putting it into your 401(k) plan or your IRA. You're buying the funds or stocks that you've thought about ahead of time, you've set yourself up, and you're regularly adding every two weeks or maybe every month, or maybe you clump things up and do it quarterly, but you always inject that money into the market, knowing two things. One, neither you nor I has any idea where the market's headed over the next day or a week or quarter or even year.
That's thing number 1. We can't really know where the market's headed. But thing number 2, the market's headed up. That's what it does over time, and we'd be making a huge mistake, cutting off the power of compounding returns in our lives, if we did not steadily and regularly add money to the market. Many people were scared out of the stock market, I submit to you in the first quarter of this year or in the start of the second quarter, April. There were some bad days on the market and a lot of bad feeling as tariffs hit the world. Then we started learning, well, the tariffs weren't necessarily as real as they were initially purported to be. They still exist, but in much trumped down versions of themselves. I'm happy to say that's better for the economy, and clearly the stock market has liked that a lot. People who got upset and just sold out of the market, worried about the future of the economy, made the mistake of getting off that compounding returns train or taking it back to a marine theme. They didn't just keep swimming. Anand, I'm glad that you did. I did as well.
This too shall pass. These moments happen over and over through time. It always is hard to experience, and volatility comes for different reasons every time it feels. Yet, just keep swimming. Theme number 1, what you've learned from David Gardner. Let's move on to theme number 2. This one, spoken well by @Chosum on Twitter X. Thank you, Steve Z. Happy birthday, David, so many lessons learned over the years, going back to the hard copy days. That means that Chosum either was a subscriber to let's say Motley Fool's stock advisor, back in the aughts, back in the early days or some, perhaps Steve, as well. Some of you may even remember our very first version of the newsletter. That would be 1993, '94. Before we even launched on AOL, the Motley Fool was a newsletter that people could subscribe to in hard copy, of course. But anyway, Steve goes on to say, can't say thank you enough. Then he includes a meme photo. This is the famous Wayne Gretzky line. Skate to where the puck is going, not where it has been. Steve, you sign off with all the best. Well, thank you for the birthday wishes. That line, skate to where the puck is going, not where it has been is certainly one I've used from time to time. I'm not sure Steve, you would have learned that from me, because that's really Wayne Gretzky's famous line. But we love lines like that because what they do is they point us to where our noses should be aimed and our eyes should be gazing, and that is forward into the future. Wayne Gretzky, it was often said, was great, one of the great hockey players of all time because he skated to where the puck was going, not where it had been. In the same way, true Rule Breaker Investing involves asking ourselves, where is the world headed? What are the companies? Usually, the early upstarts.
The open AIs of today, the Amazons of a generation before, so many different rule breakers across so many different industries. Who are the companies innovating that are leading us into that future in which we want to live? I stay focused with my future money, not just on future companies, but ones that I perceive personally as helping our world. I don't want to invest in things where if they do really well, I feel like we'll all be worse off. I'm always focused with my money on the future and on what I think is my best vision for our future. I encourage you to do the same. If you're a regular listener of this podcast, you know that. If you're a Rule Breaker fan, you know that that is portfolio principle number 1, the six principles of the Rule breaker portfolio. Number 1, the most important, make your portfolio reflect your best vision for our future.
Future is the theme of number 2. Skating with our money to where the puck is going, it doesn't have to be true of every stock that you pick. You can certainly go with companies that have been around forever. For example, at this point, Apple's been around for about 50 years. It's still a company that is helping invent the future, but it also has a deep and rich past. Whether we're talking about companies like Old Dominion Freight Lines or I think about wonderful companies like Microsoft, a stock that I've literally never owned, as great as that company has been, for the most part, whether you own it or whether you don't, thinking about company that are vital that pass the snap test. If I snap my fingers and that company, that stock you're researching, disappeared overnight, would anyone notice? Would anyone care? That's the snap test. Most of our great stocks would definitely pass the snap test. Lots of people would notice. A lot of people might be heartbroken if that company, that stock you're researching disappeared overnight. On the other hand, if not a lot of people would notice or not a lot of people would care, that's not a company that's very well positioned for future impact. The gains made by our investment dollars are almost directly tied to how important the company you're investing in is to the world today and into the future. I'll close with theme number 2 future by just mentioning, I don't know, is this a humble brag? I'm not sure. But what is my license plate on my car? It's a Washington DC plate, and nobody else took this. I paid whatever it was $25 I paid up for a vanity plate. F-U-T-U-R-E, my license plate is future. That's where I try to stay focused with my own thinking and with my investing dollars. Let's move on to theme number 3. Thank you, Sanmeet Deo.
Sanmeet, of course, regularly heard on this podcast is one of our Motley fool analysts. He wished me this happy birthday. Happy birthday, David @svdeo21 set on Twitter X. Sanmeet, you said I've learned to bravely invest in my most creative and wild investment ideas. I really appreciate that point. That's obviously tied somewhat to the point we just made about investing in the future, because when we're talking about creative and wild ideas, it's usually we're speculating somewhat. We're imagining forward how the world might work if eVTOL comes true. Do you know what eVTOL stands for? It's an acronym for electric vertical takeoff and landing vehicles. Archer Aviation, Ticker symbol ACHR, I want to thank you back, Sanmeet, because you were the first one who pointed out Archer Aviation to me, Ticker symbol, ACHR more than a year ago. It's been a pretty strong stock. It's had a good week for anybody who's following the market and seeing the earnings the company came up with this week. By the way, that company has no earnings. That's often what happens when you're investing in the future, following, as Sanmeet has some of his most creative and wild investment ideas.
Not every early upstart company has revenues, even let alone cash flow. It's always going to be speculative when we're following our most creative and wild investment ideas. That's why I think it's good to be diversified. Not every stock should look like that in your portfolio, but I want to thank back, Sanmeet, because you're the one who turned me onto that Rule Breaker company, and it's been fun to watch and see how well it's done. Still early days, we'll see how it plays out both for Archer itself and then just for the eVTOL industry at large. At its best, it represents almost personal fliers. Like if you are living well outside New York City and have a one hour commute, there is a future in which you might be taking off from your driveway and just 10 minutes later landing at work. It's not going to happen overnight. It's certainly not going to happen all at once. It may not even happen at all, we'll see. That's part of taking a creative and wild approach sometimes to the markets, which I think Rule Breaker Investing should inspire you occasionally, not every time, dear listener, to do. Bravery is what Sanmeet is calling out here, and you've learned bravely to invest from me, and thank you, Sanmeet. I'm honored. Onto theme number 4. I've got two tweets that both exhibit. This one, the first from @dannyvena, longtime fellow fool, writer and contributor at The Motley Fool. Danny wrote, happy birthday to my foolish friend and mentor longer than a decade now. Danny writes what he's learned from me, but time is the biggest advantage we have as foolish investors.
@Scott_Pierce on Twitter X said something similar, so I'm grouping them together under the rubric time. Scott, you wrote, I can't point to any one thing that I learned from you, but you keep reinforcing solid basics in a very entertaining way. In a culture that once it now, Scott writes, you preach compounding by for the long term. I could go on Scott writes, Happy B Day. Well, thank you, Scott. Thank you, Danny. Time. The first thing I think about time is we have to let it pass. It happens one second at a time, snapp and our money compounds overtime if we let it. Now, that first double that you get, on average, the stock market doubles every seven years. That first double you get feels like it takes a long time, speaking of time. Waiting seven years for initial money you may have put into an index fund to double, that's not inconsequential. That's almost a decade. Of course, if you buy a good Rule Breaker stock, it can double faster than that. I think we've done a good job over the years, finding those companies at Motley Fool Rule Breakers, but you have to let time happen. But then seven more years pass, and you double again. But this time, you're now up four times from your original investment after that second seven year period, not just a double. Then when that happens again, seven years more, it doubles again from where it started that seven year period. Now you're up eight times in value. If you started investing when I did at the age of 18, you're still not 40 yet, and you're now up eight times in value. If you're doing your job right, just keeping swimming, staying focused on the future, and occasionally following brave hunches, you will well outperform that pace over the course of Theme Number 4. Time.
As we age, it becomes even more evident looking backwards, how important it was to start early, how important it was regularly to add money into the stock market, into your investment brokerage account, into your retirement plan to add money. Then, if possible, what I do, which is to pick stocks. I much prefer to pick stocks directly than invest in funds. I feel like an index fund, which is a wonderful instrument and something The Motley Fool certainly popularized over our 30 plus years out there. A lot of people come up to Tom or to me and say, Thanks, guys. You guys got me out of managed mutual funds. I'm in index funds. I'm a lot happier doing better. That's true. Yet, I'll still point out about index funds that they buy every company. Most of them, the diversified ones anyway, all the good ones, and all the bad ones and all the ones in between. I feel as if you and I can just stay focused buying stocks directly in the best companies. We won't always be right which one's best. But if you're right more often than not, or if you're really right when you're right you will well outperform your index funds. I realize it takes extra risk, which is why you and I are Rule Breakers, spending time talking about Rule Breaker Investing this week. Most people in the world, I submit, don't listen to this podcast. I wish everybody did, especially on my birthday. But most people don't follow this approach. Most people don't invest directly in stocks at all. I think, especially if you do you recognize over the course of time, especially as we age and looking back, you see the benefits of letting time happen in your portfolio, finding great companies. Theme Number 4, thank you, Danny. Thank you, Scott, and others. Time.
Now on to my final theme, Theme Number 5. This one coming through loud and clear. Four different correspondents in with this one. I'll just read them right off. @Brian Bikof. Brian, you wrote many things. Have you learned from me, but winners keep winning/let your winners run has have the most impact. Happy birthday. Thank you, Brian. @HtownRich1, Happy birthday, David, the Number 1 answer. Is long term buy and hold. I have to have patience. Some stocks I did not. HtownRich1 says Chipotle and Chipotle were stocks he did not have patience with, but Amazon, MercadoLibre, and Shopify, I have reaped great rewards. HtownRich1 says with patience and long term buy and hold, thank you. David, well, you're very welcome. Holding and winners are the big theme coming through here, Dear listener, let's go to the third one @Casey_ on the line on Twitter X Happy Birthday, David. Winners keep on winning has got to be my favorite. @Sox, as in either White Sox or Red Sox, probably a baseball fan here @Sox20052 on Twitter X, you just simply said, hold on to your winners. I love spiffy-pops. Well, I think it's pretty self evident what we're talking about here with Theme Number 5. That is finding great companies that are winning and then allowing them over time Theme 4 to win by holding long-term, buy and hold LTBH. Some people say, I've always said, long term, buy to hold. I don't think you automatically hold everything. I think you should intend to buy to hold, but of course, sometimes things come up or you decide you don't like the stock anymore. It's OK to move that money over to another company or stock that you like better. I just wouldn't do that too often. I would always invest for a minimum of at least three years. But what do winners do? I've rhetorically asked any number of times on Rule Breaker Investing on this podcast over the years, what do winners do? I know you know the answer, dear listener. That's right. They win. Not every winner wins every time and not every winner wins all the time. In fact, great winners like, Well, I'm thinking of NVIDIA.
I think that's the best stock I've picked for Motley Fool Stock Advisor. Possibly Netflix has outperformed it, but both of them are up hundreds of times in value for our Motley Fool members. Yet NVIDIA has gone sideways sometimes five years at a time. Such a winner as NVIDIA, even itself sometimes doesn't win for an extended period of time. But overall, rather than focus so much on the stock and the stock price, just ask yourself, what are the companies that I'm invested? What are they doing? Are they winning? I can tell you that even as Tesla went sideways or NVIDIA went sideways for years over the last decade or two, Netflix was going down for a while. Those companies, as businesses were still growing right through market drops. What do winners do? They win, and therefore, how should you treat your winners? The answer is hold them, let time pass. Hold on to your winners @Sox20052 said, and I love spiffy-pops.
A quick word about spiffy-pops, especially for new listeners. What is this spiffy-pop? It's a term I invented. It's something I thought needed to be recognized, needed to be a goal for you and for me as an investor. Have you ever had of spiffy-pop? Anytime a stock pops, and I would usually say a minimum of 5%. Like your stock had good earnings, so it pops after hours. It goes up. I would say 5% or more, I would say that's a pop. But what's a spiffy-pop? A spiffy-pop is when a stock pops up by more dollars per share than you initially paid for it when you first bought the stock. When a stock gains more, in one day, you make more money in one day than you initially paid for the stock when you first bought it. That's not just a pop. That is a spiffy-pop. My screen name on The Motley Fool for so many years, TMF spiffy-pop. It'll certainly be mentioned in my Rule Breaker Investing book as it comes out in September. I want the whole world to know about spiffy-pops, because most people following financial TV or following too closely the movements of the market from day to day aren't allowing their stocks to win for them in such a way that they would ever have a spiffy-pop and sometimes when I rock out this phrase spiffy-pop and explain it briefly to an audience, they're left in wonder going, is that even possible? Not only is it possible, it's actually happened literally thousands of times now in Motley Fool services, thousands of times. In fact, every time Netflix moves up more than half a percent these days, just an itty, bitty move up, it's spiffy-pops for members. We've had them thousands of times.
If you take the Rule Breaker Investing approach, if you follow us foolishly, you too, along with @Sox20052 will have spiffy-pops by holding winners. There's one last tweet I want to share from Twitter X, which summarizes a lot of the five themes you've just heard. This one comes from @LeftLateral. You simply said, happy birthday, David. I learned from you don't double down on losers. Let your winners run, hold for at least three years. Look for visionary, disruptive companies, full stop. That tweet on its own @LeftLateral captures a lot of what I just shared over the last 20 minutes or so, the cardinal summary points of how to approach the markets. I would say as any investor, but especially as a Rule Breaker investor. I said at the top. We're doing five themes this birthday week. You just heard them. If that's all you have time for, feel free to take off and do something else with your day or week. But if you're staying with me, you're going to hear three lovely letters, a little bit more extended form from a few people who took the time to write in directly. I want to start with Royan van Riezen. Royan, thank you for this note, what I've learned, thanks to David G, Dear David, I'm a self made investor and my journey started more than 30 years ago in Grade 10 economics when I was first introduced to the stock market. Royan, writes, I got my first real money lesson during the 2000, that would be year 2000 tech collapse, a hard but valuable teacher. I was lucky enough to sell one big winner before the tech bust, so I probably thought I was pretty smart, and I tried and failed to trade my way to riches for a little while afterward. I chased penny stocks and small caps. I had no business buying. To be blunt, the companies sucked, and I knew little about their businesses.
Adding to the frustration was working with stock brokers, which left me feeling powerless, Royan, writes, and out of control. Online trading became available to everyday investors, I started taking control over my investments with new perspectives. I still thought I could trade, but I gradually started shifting focus toward quality. I caught the gold bull run thanks to following Jim Sinclair, Royan, writes, that would be when gold shot up for a little while, made some good money, and was smart/lucky enough to sell out of it early. Giving me the capital I needed to build something more serious. I explored various investment content online, cautiously trying a few subscriptions, always worried about being ripped off. But over time, I kept coming back to The Motley Fool and the buy and hold mentality. Even though the subscriptions seemed expensive to me, at first, the quality and depth of the ideas drew me in. Sure, I saw contradictory views sometimes, but I came to understand that Fool content has core contributors and then freelance writers, as well. Differing views aren't a flaw. Royan, writes, they're part of a Fool's strength. Thank you for that. We call that, by the way, Motley at The Motley Fool.
There is no one party line on any stock we encourage. All of our employees and our contract writers. So much of the work you'll see out there on the Internet to think for themselves and be accountable to themselves for their best thoughts for you, even if they don't like the stock that we just recommended. Picking it up there, Royan, that realization you wrote led me to subscribe to Motley Fool Stock Advisor. That's when the real shift happened. I began to understand that Stock Advisor leaned more conservative, offering proven winners that originated in a portfolio subscription at usually much lower prices. If I wanted more growth, I need to balance it with some risk. I embraced the portfolio concept, buy a basket in an industry or theme, knowing you'll have winners, losers, and do nothings. This felt logical, and I put much of my hard earned market cash into building my first Fool guided portfolio.
I followed the instructions to the letter. Experiences had shown me how difficult the long game is for most people, but years of studying the markets with real money had already prepared me to see its truth. I'll just insert briefly, Royan, I love how it all started for you in 10th grade. You'd been watching, observing, and learning for many years as you arrived at this key point, picking your letter back up there. I began to pull all of my savings out of the various mutual funds and money managers I'd been paying. And became a self directed investor, and I was apprehensive about it. This was everything I had saved. But I knew I had to trust in the process, and it would take years to see if I'd made the right decision. I had to learn extreme patience. As I started consuming all things Motley Fool, I discovered your podcast, David, and I thought, this guy's smart. Not just smart. This is very kind, by the way. It's a little embarrassing for me to read this. Not just smart, kind, confident, and someone who understands that life is not a zero sum game. You've taught me to look to the universe and see abundance, creativity, and endless possibility. Sure I got a little carried away along the way. Wanting every Motley Fool subscription, they all seemed good to me. Watching the SPAC meltdown and seeing stocks like PayPal tumble after buying at the highs was an eye opener. But now I hold core positions in proven winners. I'm not afraid to buy higher when the thesis strengthens, and I add during macro corrections when the long term vision remains intact. Royan van Riezen begins to conclude, I also cherry pick Fool subscriptions like Microcap Mission and always Rule Breakers to keep some excitement and discovery alive. Investing is a difficult journey filled with temptations, contradictions and hard earned lessons, but I've benefited immensely from getting to know The Motley Fool way. For that, I am truly grateful. Happy birthday, David. Thank you for everything you've given to your listeners and followers over the years with appreciation, Royan van Riezen. Well, thank you, Royan, and there's a lot that I want to add. That was so lovely. I especially loved your line that I've taught you to look to the universe and see abundance, creativity, and endless possibility. That's my favorite line in your beautiful letter. But I guess I'll just underline two things before moving on to letter Number 2. The first is, let's call it from hype to horizon watching. Your turnaround began when you traded frenzy for discipline. You moved off those penny stocks that you mentioned, and you moved into a Fool guided basket approach. I would really say you moved from chasing one off hopes and dreams into a more disciplined framework, a portfolio, a basket approach. Then, as you said, you learned extreme patience to let your winners run. It's a reminder to us all, I think that quality plus time is the engine of real compounding.
Hounding. As we move, I think we all make this progression at some point in life, usually from youth to, let's say, less youthful. We go from hype to horizon watching. We start thinking and playing the long game. Then one other thing I'd like to underline, which is what hooked you wasn't just the stock picks, but our culture. That respectful debate that we have among our contributors and a tribe, you'll see this anytime you attend Fool events that sees abundance instead of, I would say zero sum thinking, trade off thinking. I'm somebody who cares a lot about kindness. In fact, I think that's one of America's core values. I'm always looking for that. I value that so much in everyone around the world, but especially here in America.
I think at our best, kindness is one of the five American core values, and I would always say a sense of community, which is as powerful as any investment idea. Surrounding yourself with community, whether it's friends and family wherever you are and live, maybe you have friends at work, water cooler talk around the market, or maybe you have the Motley Fool there to help guide you and provide you some of that community, that second voice that could help you, that still small voice that may be speaking when everybody else is heading for the exits or maybe shouting about how bad things are or will be. A community feels very important to me. Thank you, Royan. Let's move on to letter Number 2. This from my biggest fan, Jumm. Hello, David. It's been a while since I wrote in. This year's not been very easy. Since the beginning of the year, I've been a bit less optimistic than my usual self, Jumm writes. I find myself disengaged from social media. I've never thought that geopolitics would have affected my mood and outlook on the world as much as it did. You've talked a lot about what it means to be an American. Although my citizenship was not through birth, Jumm writes, I have been so proud to become an American and grateful for the opportunities this great nation has given me. However, a new leader and a new way of conducting business have brought my spirit down quite a lot.
These actions have shaken my belief and the integrity of our constitutional values. It's just my opinion, and I know it's not shared by all. I also apologize if it comes across as aggressive. In the past, it's never occurred to me to base my investments on geopolitics. For the first time, I've started to question my long term mindset, not just because of market conditions, but because of a deeper shift in the country's constitutional values. When the fundamental principles that support stability and the rule of law start to change, it makes me wonder how safe it really is to stay invested here for the long run. It's not just about the profit, it's about trust in the system. I'm sorry to have started the happy birthday email with such depressing statements. I want to shift gears now for something more cheerful. With all of the above said, it's because of what I've learned from David Gardner that kept me from selling my shares, kept investing in our future, and stayed optimistic. It's not just one thing, Jumm writes.
It's accumulative of many things I've learned from being a part of the Rule Breaker and Motley Fool universe, from believing that there are more good people in the world than bad to believing in the good businesses that create value for the world. I remain hopeful that many great companies and the business sector will be far more influential in moving the nation forward, the most valuable lesson of all in times like this that I learned from you. David comes in the very cheerful voice of a tiny blue fish. Just keep swimming. It kept me on track with a smile on my face and lifted my mood instantly. Happy birthday, my friend. I want you to know that what you do creates positivity. It cultivates hope and connects people. During my dark moment, fellow Fool Jason Moore reached out and we made a deal. He's going to be a supplier for my pure Canadian maple syrup, despite the trade war. Ha ha. Thank you, Jason. Thank you, David. Enjoy your birthday. Have a blast. Forever a Fool, Jumm.
Well, thank you again for another lovely note, a note very different from the first one and a note very understandable from the context from which it was written. Jumm, let me just say two things in response, in addition, of course, to thank you. The first is that even when geopolitical shifts shook your optimism, I love that the Rule Breaker emphasis on just backing and investing and adding to fundamentally strong value creating companies, companies that pass the snap test and believing in more good people than bad. That kept you invested in America's future and the world at large, rather than fleeing in fear. I think those things run much deeper than any near term geopolitical environment. I truly believe I've said this many times in this podcast, the private sector is way bigger than the public sector, and most of the leadership you're going to find in the world, not just in 2025, but 25 years ago and 25 years from now, most of the leadership comes from business, from most of us who every day are working at companies trying to provide a product or service that other people will value enough to if we're for profit, pay us above our costs for the product or service that we offer. That is happening with everything that you eat, everything that you wear, many things that you enjoy, whether we're talking about entertainment or our world at large. Social media. Yep, that's people, too. That comes from for profit companies. Technologies around us that keep proliferating and keep getting most of the time better, these things run much deeper than any near term political environment. It's very important for me to say that once again. I hope you hear me on that. I hope everybody hears me on that because it's fundamental to my thinking and my rational optimism, which I've held my whole life long, and I always will.
Maybe that's the second thing I want to say. Optimism as a practice, that tiny blue fish's mantra, just keep swimming. I love how it became I'm not going to say a lifeline for you. I hope it wasn't that serious Jumm, but I do want to say it was a go to for you. That's proof that a simple, cheerful cue can instantly reset your mindset, can carry us through darker times. Obviously, I don't want to take too much credit. This is Pixar's movie. I will say, I will take credit for picking Pixar, which I did more than once for Motley Fool Stock Advisor. Of course, it ended up getting bought out by Disney, and so Motley Fool's Stock Advisor has multiple positions in Disney, but we never actually bought Disney for Stock Advisor members. I just recommended Pixar. Then later, also, I recommended Marvel. Both of those became Disney positions over time. But of course, I'm a huge Pixar fan, and I'm a fan of Finding Nemo, and I love that message. Just keep swimming. I'm glad you do, too. Thank you, Jumm. Let's go to the final letter. Best for last. Well, you be the judge, dear listener. Thank you, Mark Long, for this note, David, as a longtime Fool subscriber and Rule Breaker investing podcast listener, I look forward to your episodic programs, Mark writes, from the Market Cap Game Show, to Blast from the Past, mental tips, tricks and life hacks to stock stories and pet peeves. My favorite is the annual, what have you earned from David Gardner? Each week, I'm left feeling smarter, happier, and richer. This time of year stirs up emotions for me, Mark Long writes, mostly good memories and great lessons, but also sadness and gratitude.
My father Stan was also born on May 16th. He shares a birthday with you, my dear Fool. He went home to the Lord at the age of 68 and is deeply missed. As in the past around this time of year, we Fools write in to share what we've learned from David Gardner. I would like to share three things I've learned from my father, as well as three things I've learned from you. One of the things I learned from my father was not to practice mistakes. Often on the weekend, along with my two brothers, my father would play horse that basketball game where you challenge each other to hit a tougher shot, and if you don't hit the shot, you spell out the word horse, as I think a lot of listeners will know. But anyway, that's what Mark's talking about. My father would play horse on the driveway with us, shooting at the backboard attached to the roof of the garage. When one of us kids would try a trick shot, something that would never be seen in an actual game, my father would tell us we shouldn't practice mistakes. Using good form and follow through would serve us better in the long run.
Another thing I learned from my father is that those who look for trouble usually find it. As little boys with short attention spans, we would sometimes get into mischief like playing ding dong ditch at the neighbors houses or do something dangerous like pulling someone on skates behind a bicycle. These actions would frequently result in a sit down with my father and him reminding us about looking for trouble. Let me just add Mark is somebody who himself occasionally played ding dong ditch in Georgetown in the streets of Washington, DC. I don't feel proud of that, by the way, but I hear you, my friend. You go on to your final example from your dad. My final example of what I learned from my father was not to be idle. After high school, I enrolled in general education classes at the local community college. After the first week of class, I decided I wanted a break and dropped out. When my father learned this, he gave me an ultimatum.
Either go back to school or I was going to have to work. His idea of work was sending me to my uncle's farm in upper Iowa during the fall semester. I spent three plus months baling hay, feeding the cattle, and cleaning out the house stalls. I even had to put up a barbed wire fence after I ran over it with the tractor. When my uncle ran out of work for me to do, I was offered up to the neighbors. No days off, just work. I learned my lesson. Well, those are three amazing stories and lessons learned from your dad Stan Long. Thank you, Mark. You go on. From David, I've learned many things. I've learned to invest in companies that reflect the world you want to live in. My father smoked cigarettes for about 20 years, and because of this, acquired chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. The last few years of his life were very difficult. I choose not to invest in companies whose products can be harmful. Another thing I've learned from David Gardner is to buy in parts, not all at once. When you have identified a company worthy of adding to your portfolio, divide the amount you're going to invest by two or three, start a position, and then make an identical purchase a month later then in another month. I call that buying in thirds. Mark, thank you for it. He goes on. If you still have conviction in the company, this is a win win process. If the stock is increased in price, since the initial purchase, you have, in effect, purchased the initial position at a discount, which, yes, Mark always will raise a smile. If the stock has fallen in price since the initial purchase, you are lowering your cost basis.
Assuming you still have conviction in the company, this is a great strategy. Of course, I agree. The final lesson you've learned from me, you say I first heard about the rowboat and the sailboat from David Gardner. The person in the rowboat sits backward as they row. In essence, they are looking at the past. The pilot of the sailboat must look forward to see where he is going. While we can learn from and remember the past, it is important to look and plan for the future and what lies ahead. After each episode, I truly feel happier, smarter and richer. I'm looking forward to your book, and of course, happy birthday. Fool on. Mark Long writing in from Valencia California. Well, thank you so much for that, Mark. I want to underline a few things here as we close. First, I'm so glad that you found buying in thirds. Ever since I first did it, just as we started The Motley Fool, I wanted to buy AOL stock, and I divided it up into three tranches because I didn't feel fully comfortable at that early stage as an investor. I didn't know what Rule Breaker investing was yet, and AOL felt a little risky but so promising, and I decided, why don't I divide my money up into three and buy three months apart once each month, same day of the month, closing my eyes, not looking at where the stock had been, whether it had gone up or down, and just get fully invested that way. Buying in thirds has been a Motley Fool staple ever since. I also appreciate you rocking my rowboat sailboat metaphor. There's not time to go into it now, but believe you me, it's one of my favorites. Of course, it makes an appearance early on in my book. I want to add there's another boat there that we talk about. That's the canoe, which sits in between the rowboat and this sailboat. I'll leave that for fans who know it to smile knowingly and for those who don't know it yet, to wait to learn a little bit more, the rowboat, the canoe and the sailboat.
Then finally, I really want to underline what you wrote about your dad. I love how he taught you timeless virtues. The three that I picked up from you were first avoiding, as he said, practicing mistakes, not hot dogging it with horse shots because that's not really going to help get better in the real game of basketball or maybe we'd say of investing your life. Avoid practicing mistakes. The second, steer clear of trouble and the third, keep busy. What I love in conclusion about that is each of those is not just a life lesson he gave you. Each of those also works as an investing lesson. It mirrors our investing journey. That first one, avoid practicing mistakes, that sounds to me like let's focus on sound fundamentals, whether we're talking about your own approach and habits as an investor or sound fundamentals in the companies that you're investing in. Focus on that. Second, you said, steer clear of trouble.
Don't go looking for trouble. In investing, I would say sidestep needless risks. I've made a lifetime habit of just largely avoiding penny stocks altogether. Most of them are rinky dick companies with no meaningful impact in the world. Almost all of them fail the snap test. That's an example of lots of people going looking for trouble, investing in companies that really aren't worthy, sadly, of their hard earned doh that they are investing in them. We can sidestep many needless risks, as your dad taught you. Then finally, you mentioned the importance of keeping busy, and you felt that firsthand on an Iowa farm. I would say, in the same way, staying engaged with our investing our whole lifelong. You don't need to follow your portfolio every day, even though I do. I just love following the game of the stock market, just like I love following baseball, my favorite team every day. But you can follow on a quarterly basis, if you like, or just on an annual basis, but staying engaged in your portfolio's progress is a good way to keep busy, not too busy over time. I want to thank each of my correspondents who took the time over the last week to share what you've learned from me. It means a lot on this birthday week to me. That's what you've learned from me, all podcast long, at least in the 2025 version. Now, I hasten to add some of you also have a birthday this week. To you, I say, together, happy birthday to you, as well. To everybody else who does it, happy birthday to you on your birthday. We're not going to talk about this every week. Obviously, it's slightly self indulgent that I highlight my birthday every year, but I want to say, happy birthday, fun, fetti, thrown your way, dear listener, whenever you have your birthday. I would be remiss if I didn't close in saying, so many of you have taught me so much too. Fool on.
