Run was fine. I got a bit of a late start so decided to push the lower body circuit to later in the day. I intended to just take a few 10 minute breaks over the course of the afternoon to get it done in bite sized chunks. Super unrealistic planning and I should have just banged it out immediately after the run. I never forced a break and work kept just coming at me all day. I started at 5:30am, I ended at 5:30pm (with a good break for the run in the morning). By that time of day, I am usually bagged and hungry but I managed to force myself to get the little circuit done this time. Good reminder to stick with my normal plan to stack this stuff in the morning and not to rely on getting anything done later.
Fully zoned out during the run and it was over before I knew it - nice when that happens, especially on the treadmill. Was listening to an audio book but basically didn't absorb a word of it, just lost in thought planning for random issues and events. Office was having a ski night last night and my wife was out, so I packed up the kids and took them skiing to double up on some dadding and work/social face time. It has been a few years since we have been skiing and hilarity ensued. Fortunately, all survived, with a couple solid scares.
Shoulder felt pretty okay. Near daily I forget to log a couple food items. Sometimes I catch them and sometimes I don't. It would be a rare week where whatever I have posted for kcals daily would actually tie in to whatever I post for the weekly summary. I only missed about 700 kcals on Tuesday. Not that it matters. With daily weigh-ins, the trend on the scale is the real guide and it is very unlikely any of my food entries are very accurate but whatever it is that I am stuffing in my face seems to be pretty close to maintenance for whatever energy I am burning.
With many scattered investment accounts, some managed and some self-managed, some tax advantaged and some not, we have ended up with a bit of a mess of holdings. I always intend to just buy super broadly based ETFs and call it a day, but it never seems to happen. We now hold something close to 120 individual securities plus another 25 or so ETFs and funds. Quite a number of relatively small positions.
Beyond geographical diversification between Canadian, US and International, I try to keep an eye on market sector allocations within the US and Canadian holdings. All International holdings are held by way of broad ETFs. I am looser with sector allocations than I am with geographical, but do try to slowly nudge things towards market weightings slowly over time. Given this, it probably makes sense to hold closer to zero individual holdings.
Our Canadian sector weightings are pretty close to market other than being a bit overweight on energy and underweight materials. There has been more drift on the US side with Tech being quite a bit over market weight right now, partially due to adding a bunch of holdings at a 50% discount last year, which promptly went on another 50% discount; but mainly due to a solid run up of a single stock. Also on the US holdings, we are overweight on energy and pretty light on industrials, utilities, materials and real estate, most of which are pretty small sectors anyway.
I am looking for market returns only and all planning is based on 5% returns, with a tolerance for half that, so while these holdings are a bit of a mess, they will hopefully serve their purpose.
Another Saturday easy run that got procrastinated to shortly after noon. Another planned upper body circuit that got pushed to Sunday, where it will most likely get ignored.
Investment crap:
Spoiler:
Ignoring distributions and looking at unrealized capital appreciation (or depreciation) to date for individual holdings only, larger winners and losers are currently as follows:
Sector Winners:
US Energy up 97% (Still a relatively small sector weighting despite being overweight)
Canadian Industrials up 69%
US Healthcare up 68%
CDN materials and US Tech up 63%
Sector Losers:
Canadian Tech down 25% (lots of discount buying in 2022 which went on further discount)
US Materials down 3%
Individual winners:
Apple up 918%
Toromont up 288%
McDonald’s up 268%
Individual losers:
Twilio down 55%
Algonquin Power down 53%
Nuvei down 45%
I have conveniently forgotten my -100% holdings that I ran into the ground in the dot com bubble in the late 90's. That experience is probably part of the reason I am so over diversified now.
Squats felt heavier than they should and the morning after I am feeling much more doms than I expected. Was a bit concerned this might happen with dropping down to only one 5/3/1 lower day per week and thus only squatting every second week. Thought tossing in some goblet squats into a shorter lower body circuit day may help, and maybe it does, but not enough.
Retirement crap:
Spoiler:
My financial and retirement goals have fluctuated over the years. At one point I was aiming to retire in my mid to late-mid fifties, maybe the end of 2026 through 2028, but between my wife, kids and I, somewhere along the way I decided we were all too spendy and I would be better off extending that to be better prepared. My wife having a little slip and fall in our home, resulting in a concussion, eventually resulting in a medical retirement from work, resulting in a decrease in current and future income also factors in.
I am quite conservative financially and desire to have savings that will see us through our retirement years comfortably, with some cushion to handle turbulence. My earnings power is relatively strong, and I have no clue what the future may hold for my kids earnings ability and opportunities, so I hope to be able to help them get on their feet to some extent financially as well. All the above considerations, combined with the fact that I have effectively managed to brainwash myself into believing that I quite love my career have combined to the extension of my planned retirement by a few years. The revised timing also lines up very well with how I see transition and succession plans shaping up for a nice clean hand-off of my duties at work also, which is important to me.
I have been zeroing in on planned retirement at the end of 2030 for a while now and I expect to have a seven-year window following that during which time I will continue to receive decent cash flow. So, although I expect to retire in 2031, I should not need to touch any retirement savings until 2038 and if we are smart with our monies, we should be able to continue saving through to that point. I should have solid consulting options at that time as well, should it be needed or desired.
That gives me a 15-year timeline for financial retirement planning and 8 years to prepare for the mental aspects of retirement plus a solid window of time to ensure the firm is well positioned to tackle the next couple decades and ensure solid succession and transition plans are in place. I can see a light at the end of the tunnel and it gives me a solid goal to focus my attention on. And at least one additional spreadsheet to obsess over.
whoa, this retirement stuff is detailed. I really should spend some time thinking about it.
We have compulsory 10% pension contribution in Australia and...in conjunction with a lot of property $$ growth in the last 10 years and the likelihood that my parents will leave me something semi substantial when they die (= 50% of their home and any other $$ they might have left), I've kind of been assuming I'll be ok if I can get through another 5 ish years of peak earning and maybe another 5 years of less than peak but still OK earning. (youngest kid has 6 years til he graduates high school). that still will probably mean selling our big family home and buying something smaller/cheaper in our neighbourhood or...moving up the coast and buying a nice place in a cheaper area)
But I wish I had a more detailed plan like yours. Should really get onto it...albeit I've got a shaky marriage which has the prospect for financial Armageddon.
I don't think I've read what you do for a living...is it something you can do part time/on a consultancy basis or is your 7 year window something else?
I should probably spend less time thinking about it. Between us, we are maintaining balance in the world on this front.
We have had professionals provide a financial needs analysis, project cash flows out to age 95 and look at estate planning (largely so they could try to sell us insurance) but I find a simple spreadsheet tracking projected savings/growth/cash-flow/draw down rates works just fine. If you have a good handle on how much you spend and how much you save it is fairly simple. If you don’t have that information handy, tracking things for a bit to figure that out is the biggest pain point. Projecting how your spending might change in retirement also takes a bit of guesswork.
I used to worry about retirement planning a bit more, but figure that whatever we are able to save will ultimately dictate our lifestyle and we SHOULD be able to adjust accordingly. I am semi-confident that I could adjust downwards, I have less faith that my wife can. Having a detailed plan no doubt helps alleviate my concerns as well and I assume that some focused attention on it will only help, in a manner similar to tracking and reporting workouts.
Divorce is nuclear bomb for financial stability and retirement planning. Buy flowers often!
I am in a professional services business that lends itself very well to consulting after retirement, but that seven year window relates to a bunch of loans, capital and other payments that will be owing to me that will not be paid out until following my actual retirement. Part of those payments is a pseudo pension/buy-out. None of those payments are guaranteed, so there will be ongoing business risk associated with receipt.
We have a couple government programs (CPP, OAS) that will provide some retirement income but no mandatory pensions beyond CPP. Given my line of work, it is largely up to me to me to save appropriately. My wife does have a pension that will factor into our income though.
January 23 – January 29 Daily Averages: 137.9 lbs/14.4% bf/2408 cal/214 carb/94 fat/167 protein/6:37 sleep
58.5 km total weekly running mileage at average pace of 6:04/km
Run was pretty good for the first hour and twenty-six minutes and then I was looking for excuses to stop. I didn't give any serious thought to doing a little 30 minute upper body strength training and will very likely just continue to let that slide. Everyone in my house has been sick over the last few days and I can feel it trying to get into my system.
This was the first week of the Hansons Half-Marathon Method training block. I am using a goal time of 1:37 to set the pacing which works out to:
- 5:44 to 6:21 per km for easy runs
- 5:07 to 6:03 for long runs
- 4:36 per km for tempo runs (goal half marathon pace)
- 4:30 per km for strength interval runs (longer intervals later in program)
- 4:24 per km for interval runs
Dropped the planned lower body circuit. Still not feeling great and both kids have now tested positive for covid. Accuracy of those rapid tests seems to be pretty sketchy, so I don't have a lot of faith in their positive status; however, I have no faith in my negative status either. This was a bit of a back off week for running anyhow, so just playing things by ear. Not entirely sure if I will be running today or not. Felt fine an hour ago, feel less fine now.
Slowed the pace slightly for this one. Felt okay. Still mostly keeping any sickness at bay and have been going to bed absurdly early. Feeling off but not terrible.
I seem to still be fighting some sort of bug and am neither really winning or losing. Getting more sleep than usual but still getting done whatever needs getting done.
My plan called for 5km at goal half marathon pace plus warm up and cool down for a total of 11km. Was still feeling run down, so swapped that out for a nice easy jog.
For a change, I think I over recorded cals. Felt marginally better Friday compared to earlier in the week but still feeling a bit funky.
Work/book crap:
Spoiler:
Over the course of my life I have morphed from a very lazy procrastinating slacker at work to being extremely self-disciplined, goal oriented and proactive (most of the time). Most of that change happened fairly late in life and I think that the main steppingstones were 1) having kids, 2) building an exercise regime, and 3) audio books. There is a solid (2.5) in taking on far more responsibility than one person can reasonably handle, but I do not recommend this path and I am probably just being overly dramatic.
When I workout I usually listen to podcasts, audiobooks or music. Music is usually reserved only for runs involving speed work. Over the past three or four years I have added audiobooks to the mix with the goal of listening to at least one per month. I usually fall short of that goal, but along the way I managed to consume a decent number of titles, almost all of which gave me something new to think about or reinforced one of those thoughts from another book.
I am mostly looking for books that will help me run a business better and most of those have some good spillover to personal life as at the core they tend to lean on simply improving relationships and mindset. Basically, be a better human and start with managing myself better. Some of those books are noted below, plucked from a recent office email stemming from a book club.
The books we have covered at our Book Club, or are currently covering, include:
• Extreme Ownership – Jocko Willink and Leif Babin (How U.S. Navy SEALs Lead and Win. A guide on leadership principles, teamwork, self-discipline, and high performance.)
• Radical Candor – Kim Scott (Caring Personally while Challenging Directly. How to give and receive guidance.)
• Atomic Habits – James Clear (An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones. A guide on how to change your habits and get 1% better every day.)
• Measure What Matters – John Doerr (How Google, Bono and the Gates Foundation Rock the World with Objectives and Key Results. Goal setting techniques.)
• The Infinite Game – Simon Sinek (Five essential practices to adopt an infinite mindset.)
• The Gap and the Gain – Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Murray (The High Achievers’ Guide to Happiness, Confidence, and Success. A simple concept on positive psychology, healthy relationships, mental well-being and high-performance.)
Underrated superpowers?
• Grit – Angela Duckworth (The Power of Passion and Perseverance. Who needs talent when you have grit?)
Change your mindset and yourself:
• Be Your Future Self Now – Dr. Benjamin Hardy (The Science of Intentional Transformation. Imagine the person you want to be, then BE that person now.)
• Personality Isn’t Permanent – Dr. Benjamin Hardy (Break Free from Self-Limiting Beliefs and Rewrite Your Story. You can be whoever and whatever you want to be.)
• Spacemaker – Daniel Sih (How to Unplug, Unwind and Think Clearly in the Digital Age. What is really important to live a fulfilling life, and how to achieve it.)
Increase your empathy and improve all your connections:
• Emotional Intelligence – Daniel Goleman (Why it can matter more than IQ. Expand your circle of caring and make a positive difference in our world.)
• Getting Naked – Patrick Lencioni (A Business Fable About Shedding The Three Fears That Sabotage Client Loyalty. The power of transparency and vulnerability.)
• Surrounded by Idiots – Thomas Erikson (The Four Types of Human Behavior and How to Effectively Communicate with Each. Understanding the people around you will change how you interact with everyone.)
Help with coaching and communication in addition to Radical Candor:
• Crucial Conversations – Kerry Patterson (Tools For Talking When Stakes Are High. Make it safe to talk about almost anything.)
• The Coaching Habit – Michael Bungay Stanier (Say Less, Ask More. How to work less hard and have more impact.)
More on teamwork:
• The Five Dysfunctions of Team – Patrick Lencioni (The Root Causes of Politics and Dysfunction on Teams and the Keys to Overcoming Them. How to create functional and cohesive teams.)
• The Culture Code – Daniel Coyle (The Secrets of Highly Successful Groups. How to build a cohesive, motivated culture.)
• The Ideal Team Player – Patrick Lencioni (How to Recognize and Cultivate The Three Essential Virtues. A framework for identifying and developing great team players.)
More self-improvement. A supplement to Atomic Habits.
• The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People – Stephen Covey (How to Lead Yourself, Influence, Engage and Collaborate With Others and Continuously Improve. Self-improvement.)
Different perspectives, innovation and reinvention:
• No Rules Rules: Netflix and the Culture of Reinvention – Reed Hastings and Erin Meyer (A guide to flexibility, innovation, freedom and responsibility.)
If you aspire to be a leader, read this twice:
• The Motive – Patrick Lencioni (Why So Many Leaders Abdicate Their Most Important Responsibilities. Understanding the importance of WHY anyone should lead.)
More titles on leadership/self-improvement:
• Dare to Lead – Brenee Brown (Brave Work. Tough Conversations. Whole Hearts. A playbook for developing brave leaders and courageous cultures.)
• Discover Your True North – Bill George (Becoming an Authentic Leader. Being the best person you can be.)
• Ruthless Consistency – Michael Canic (What Matters More Than Anything You Do Is Everything You Do. Develop the right focus, create the right environment, and build the right team.)
• Start with Why – Simon Sinek (How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action. A framework on which organizations can be built, movements can be led, and people can be inspired.)
• Leadership Strategy and Tactics – Jocko Willink (A Guide on Leadership. A direct, situational, pragmatic how-to guide that anyone can instantly put to use.)
• The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership – John Maxwell (Follow Them and People Will Follow You. A Leadership guide.)
• The Leadership Secrets of Colin Powell – Oren Harari (Wisdom and Foundation Beneath Colin Powell’s Leadership Success. A Leadership guide.)
More titles on business success:
• Traction – Gino Wickman (Get a Grip On Your Business. An entrepreneurial operating system.)
• Good to Great – Jim Collins (Why Some Companies Make the Leap…And Others Don’t. Lessons on eggs, flywheels, hedgehogs, buses and other essentials.)
• Kill the Company – Lisa Bodell (Identify Your Weaknesses Before Your Competitors Do. Small changes make all the difference.)
Okay run. Days with any combo of running and strength are a real challenge to follow through on the strength portion. Resisted the urge to push the strength stuff to later in the day.
Looks like I intended a 15km long run for this coming Sunday compared to the Hansons planned 11k. Thinking of spending that long on the treadmill caused me to add a km to this run with the intent of scraping one off of the long run later in the week. May repeat this again somewhere along the way.
I find the treadmill far less impact than running outside. Also far more boring. I dread long runs on the treadmill just due to the amount of time spent staring at the exact same thing. Love long runs outside.
Interesting; maybe it's just me being precious, but I feel like I slap my feet more on the treadmill than outside. I guess the take-home message is I have no idea what's going on.
I feel like I slap my feet more on the treadmill as well, but I have always thought that was just an auditory thing because of the constant repetitive smacking feedback sound. I am pretty certain my body thinks the treadmill deck is pretty soft and cushy compared to pavement though. Each of the past two winters a lot of lower leg pain has seemingly been relieved shortly after transitioning to the treadmill.