Why I broke my own investing rule in Q2
And the lesson I'm still figuring out.
There’s a difference between taking profits and touching the stove.
I spent Q1 doing the former, trimming positions that had run higher than I expected and teaching myself how to take what the market had given me. It wasn’t comfortable, but it felt measured.
Q2 was different.
I kept taking profits where I thought they made sense. But one decision stood above everything else I did between April and June.
I sold part of my buy-and-hold portfolio.
It wasn’t an emergency.
It wasn’t panic.
It was intentional.
And I’m still not sure whether it was discipline or rationalization.
I’ve spent nearly four years building routines that remove emotion from investing.
Buy every month. Stay invested. Trust compounding. Ignore the noise.
Those rules exist for a reason.
The moment you start making exceptions, each one becomes a little easier to justify.
That’s what made the quarter so uncomfortable.
Was I being opportunistic?
Or was I convincing myself I was smarter than the process that got me here?
The answer still isn’t as obvious as I’d like it to be.