NOTE:HOW MANY ‘DIVES’ APPLE STOCK HAS HAD.
If you’ve ever seen the mini roller-coaster climb of a stock after many months or years, you are more than familiar with the sting of regret. It’s Monday-morning quarterbacking for sure. On the way up, it’s the frequent roller-rides down that kept you from investing. But in the end, the ups were more than the downs and you can hear that awful expression escape from your very own mouth, “I should have…”
Quoting John Eldredge: “Many of us have chosen simply not to want so much; it’s safer that way. It’s also godless. That’s stoicism, not Christianity. Desire often feels like an enemy, because it awakens longings that cannot be fulfilled IN THE MOMENT…Awakened souls are often disappointed, but our disappointment can lead us onward, actually increasing our desire and lifting it toward its true passion.” From The Sacred Romance.
Desire makes us vulnerable to the mini roller-rides down. At the time, those valleys do not feel ‘mini’ at all. It’s those same head-jerking motions, though, that make the ride climb. Many of us just don’t have the stomach for the ups and downs.
Now, if you were to overlay the zig-zaw pattern of the stock in our example over a typical mountain range that you might want to climb, you would conclude that persistence will get you to the peak. We all know that the view is from the top, right? Wrong. The view is always from the bottom. Everything at the top is Monday-morning quarterbacking. You might look out from up there on your trail and say, “Oh, I can see now that all of those valleys still eventually led us upward.”
Suppose we truly knew that the dives were part of the engineer’s design to help the roller coaster gain momentum for its next climb. Further, suppose we could see our entire life-scape from this vantage point. How would we look at the many dives and the incredible climbs back up? I wonder if it’s simply the fear of not knowing if we’re in a mini-dive or a free-fall.
When I was in business, I made a discovery about success and how growth-charts can be pretty deceptive. Going into one meeting, our CPA’s wide smile and explanation went something like this: “It’s remarkable, just like a mountain going up and up.” Only, it wasn’t that simple. If you could zero in on the real story, the steady climb would look more like a staircase. Every time we were about to grow, we’d hit major roadblocks (kind of the invert of the dives). That would be our next step. But it didn’t feel like an “opportunity,” more like a wall that couldn’t be scaled.
Stocks, mountains, roller coasters and life are humbling. We think we know which way is up. But it’s easy to get reversed on the way to the peak where we are sure the grandest vista lies. But as we chug along, we bump into the paradox that faith commands the greatest view.
“I will lift my eyes to the mountains; from where shall my help come?” Psalm 122:1 NASB
Great Word Bob! Just wish there was a different way to grow-up. God bless-Frank
Dramamine for the soul!
Reading Larry Crabb’s “Shattered Dreams”. The killing of our “lesser desires”, though extraordianarily painful, can open the road to the truest desire of our heart, the eternal one, that will give us the true joy we long for. But we must be willing to experience the pain fully, acknowlege the desires, and learn to trust. That’s the profound severe mercy of life on the pilgrim road. So glad we are travelling together. Love to you and yours, Bob! Loriann
Loriann, Sorry I missed this! Yeah, God’s middle name is Redemption or Mercy or…fill in the blank. I am a pilgrim that seems to hit a lot of potholes. It’s good to know fellow travelers experience the same things. Love to all, Bob