Shady Mccoy & Investors- Emotions Usually Win

Shady McCoy & Investors Emotions Usually Win, You Lose

by: Brendan Magee


One of the most entertaining aspects of last week's Eagles game was the drama surrounding Shady McCoy's return to Philadelphia and playing against the coach that traded him, Chip Kelly. Upon his trade, McCoy stated that his race played a role in being traded to the Buffalo Bills.  All week long speculation ran rampant about what would happen when these two men came face to face.


Even though professional athletes get traded all the time, clearly, McCoy did not expect to be traded and has voiced his upset publicly on many occasions. By his statements leading up to the game and behavior after it, he's still quite angry. Kelly has tried to defuse the situation. He owned up to the fact that McCoy's trade had not been handled in the best way. He said he should have contacted McCoy before the announcement by the media, and that McCoy deserved better. He said if the occasion arose he would shake McCoy's hand in an attempt to put the whole episode behind them.


Whether it's burying old wounds or investing, emotions can easily over power what you know to be the right thing to do and keep you stuck in a bad spot. You perceive someone to be embarrassing you, you get furious at them. They are done as far as you are concerned. Unfortunately, you may have only perceived an insult. Maybe your best friend/ tormentor was making a joke (perhaps it was a bad joke) with no intention of hurting your feelings, at all. A life long friendship maybe damaged forever, based on a simple misunderstanding and the emotions that take over. Anyone else and you would tell them to talk with their friend and work things out. Simple, but not when emotions are running so high.


Same thing with investing. The market drops by a few hundred points. Your portfolio is down 15% maybe 25%. You get scared. "This is all the money I have! I can't lose it! I can't go live with my kids! How humiliating would that be!"


Any one else's account and you would know what to do, calm as a cucumber. "Buy low
/sell high. This is a long-term investment. Let's turnoff the cable television shows and go get some ice cream or play some golf. There's no need to panic." None of this is easy when it is your money, but this is exactly what you know you should do.


The key for getting through life's challenges big or small and investing is recognizing and appreciating the enormous power that your emotions and instincts have. You also need to be able to recognize the areas of life and investing where they are going to be working against you. In other words, you need to be able to know where your emotions will have you engaged in self sabotage, and get help.


Last week in a radio interview, Ike Reese and Seth Joyner, two former Eagles' players, talked to McCoy about the time they were both traded from the Eagles. They were trying to give him the benefit of their experience. They both said how emotional and upsetting that had been for them. They felt as if they'd been slapped in the face by the Eagles. They spoke about how hard it was to separate personal feelings from what was purely a business decision.


McCoy having placed unwarranted racist accusations at the feet of Kelly, Joyner and Reese were trying their best to help McCoy take the high road and get beyond this incident. They told McCoy that it is ok and natural to let emotions get the better of your mouth. People could understand that. Everyone has been in that situation and could forgive all grievances if they were owned up to. McCoy refused the opportunity and left Lincoln Financial Field still stuck.


If as an investor, you are stuck. If you cannot say  that you have the peace of mind or experienced the success you were looking for with your money and investing, it's not because you do not know what to do. Own equities/stocks, diversify, buy low/sell high are rules are the time tested rules for ssuccess and I am sure you have heard them at some point in the past. Consider that your emotions and instincts at some point got the best of you. They had you say yes to something that you can look back on and say, perhaps grudgingly, was inappropriate to do with your money. Perhaps you can see where this has happened more times than you can count? That's ok. You are human and our humanity can be difficult to deal with.


Let's have our come to Jesus moment and own up to our fallibility. Let's own up to our inability to police our own instincts and emotions and, for a moment take a look at what would be possible if we stopped letting our emotions get the best of us. How different would our lives and investments look?
Then get help and take the coaching. You and Shady will be the better for it.


Brendan Magee is the founder and president of Inevitable Wealth Coaching. With questions or comments e-mail Brendan@coachgee.com or call 610-446-4322.