Looking up: What does success really look like?
It's that time of year when Spotify hands music lovers their ‘Wrapped’ - a neat summary of your listening habits. Mine tells me I have the musical taste of a 21-year-old. Which is flattering, until you realise it's because I've been listening to far too much Chappell Roan, Sabrina Carpenter and Taylor Swift. As a 58-year-old bloke, I often feel about as visible as a 58-year-old woman. But apparently, my ears are young.
My Garmin fitness watch has opinions too. It reckons I've got the VO2 max of an 18-year-old. That's the maximum amount of oxygen your body can use during intense exercise. Brilliant news, obviously. Until I went to see my doctor, who informed me my cholesterol is too high and my ‘heart age’ is five years older than it should be.
So what am I – 21, 18, 58, or 63?
The data doesn't tell the whole story
Last Sunday, I ran the Milton Keynes half marathon. My Garmin predicted I'd finish in 1 hour 28. Given that my last run had taken me 2 hours 40, I knew this was fantasy. I finished in 2 hours 31, which I was absolutely delighted with – ten minutes faster than my own prediction, and the result of a 16-week training block.
But here's what the data can't tell you: the experience of running those 13 miles. The conversations I had along the way. The conscious effort I made to look up from the path three feet in front of me and actually see the canal, the trees, the parkland, the wildlife. The satisfaction of crossing that finish line.
The watch knows I ran 13.1 miles in 2 hours 31. It doesn't know about the journey.
How we keep score
About 3,000 people entered the Milton Keynes half. Just over half were under 35. I ran in the veteran 55-plus category, and I finished 99th out of 108 men who completed the race.
Top 100 – sounds good, doesn't it?
Bottom ten – not so impressive.
Same result, different framing. As running coach Bennett (who I wrote about last month) would say: think about all the 58-year-old men who were watching rather than running.
In addition, of those 3,000 who signed up, 400 didn't even start. Another 50 didn't finish. The stats are all over the place before you even begin to interpret them.
This is the thing about data: it's useful, but it's not the truth. It's a snapshot, a number, a ranking. It doesn't capture what matters. It can't tell you about effort, growth, enjoyment, or the experience of the thing itself.
Age is a terrible way to keep score. So is net worth. So is finishing time.
What the obituary won't say
I've been thinking about this lately. When someone dies, you don't see their obituary say: "She was 85 and had £500,000 in the bank." You read about the life they led. The people they loved. The things they did. The journey.
Milton Keynes is built with cycle paths and footpaths woven through it, so they didn't even need to close roads for the half marathon. The course is beautiful. But my journey around it would have been completely different if I'd finished in 1 hour 8 minutes. I'd have been too focused, too in the zone, to look up. I wouldn't have chatted to people. I wouldn't have noticed the light on the water.
Sometimes, looking three feet ahead is exactly what you need to do – when you're navigating tricky ground or pushing hard. But if that's all you ever do, you miss the view. You miss the point.
Head down for too long
Over the past six months, I've noticed a lot of people with their heads down. Worrying about what's directly in front of them. The Budget. Tax changes. Market wobbles. IHT on pensions. These are of course, all valid concerns, don't get me wrong.
But when you're always looking three feet ahead, you lose perspective. You stop seeing the bigger picture. You forget to look up.
This time of year especially – with Christmas drinks and conversations and that subtle pressure of keeping up with the Joneses – it's worth remembering what we're actually trying to achieve here. What does a successful investor look like? What does a good life look like?
I can tell you what it's not: it's not a number. Not your age. Not your net worth. Not your portfolio performance relative to the FTSE 100.
Putting life into your money
Running might not be everyone's thing. Dancing, travelling, building something, spending time with grandchildren – we all have our own version. And that's the point. We're not judging ourselves against what others are doing. We're trying to enjoy our lives. To live them. To look up occasionally and take in the view.
This is what I mean when I talk about putting life into your money. It's about using your wealth to create experiences, support people you care about, do things that matter to you. Not hoarding it for a score that nobody's keeping. Not optimising every decision for maximum efficiency. Not treating your financial plan like it's a race to finish with the most left in the bank.
Because nobody's going to judge you on the size of your estate or the quality of your investments. They're going to remember how you lived.
Having said all this – if you'd seen me coming down the stairs on Monday morning, you might have questioned whether the half marathon was worth it. Everything hurt. But even that's part of the journey. The ache reminds you that you did something. That you showed up.
An invitation to look up
As we head into a new year, I'd love to help you work out what ‘looking up’ means for you. Not what the data says you should do. Not what the projections suggest is optimal. But what you actually want.
What does success look like for you? What's your version of looking up from the path and noticing the canal in the morning light?
If you'd like to talk about it, please get in touch. We'll work it out together.
And in the meantime, if you're heading out for a run – or a dance, or a walk, or whatever your thing is – try to look up every now and then. You might be surprised by what you see.
Wishing you all a very happy Christmas and a wonderful new year.