When The Economy and the Markets Bring Enough Stress to Go Around

The economy and the markets aren't particularly friendly these days. People are watching their investments lose value. Big companies announce layoffs. Inflation keeps climbing higher. So-called safe haven investments (e.g. bonds and gold) haven't been particularly friendly either. 

If all this creates stress, join the club. There's certainly enough stress to go around.

Last week ended with a big bounce in stocks; but the week found stocks down. Gold and whole precious metals world was smacked around yet again, falling to new lows. Commodities, for a while the darling of 2020, have been correcting, some items pretty dramatically. 

Only cash - specifically the US Dollar - has held up. If you've got a bunch of cash, great. Just don't fall asleep with it and expect to wake up happy and content. Remember: Cash continues to be slowly (not so slowly these days) strangled by the loss or purchasing power that comes with inflation.

At least bonds have shown some signs of life lately, with yields slipping a bit. A bit. And that after months of losses as yields soared. Well, at least it's something, right?

And, hey maybe Friday's bounce begins a more substantial Bear Market rally. The so-called rally last month was pretty much a dud as Bear Market rallies go. So maybe some temporary relief awaits us in the coming weeks. If so, and you're not comfortable holding whatever percentage of stocks you hold (especially those fallen angels: tech stocks), you could use this as a time to pare back and secure some cash for future opportunities.

Or, you could buy what Wall Street will likely be selling if the rally gains steam: that the Bear Market has bottomed and its time to pile in. Good luck with that.

Then again, if we don't get some sort of shot of adrenaline from a beefy Bear Market rally, we're in bigger trouble that it already seems we are.

With all this, with the stress it creates, prayer looks pretty enticing to me. Not necessarily praying for markets to go bullish so I can make money. Prayer for peace - peace of soul. When we lose our peace, we lose everything. It makes that market losses look like chump change. At least that's how this stressed soul sees it.

If you agree, here's something to beef up your peace of soul, even if we don't get a beefy Bear Market rally. It's from an English Benedictine Abbot who wrote a lot of helpful spiritual stuff when he was alive. (He's dead now.) These selections address the soul that finds it stressful to pray. Yeah, that can happen. And it's especially bad when the world is shoveling stress on you, like it is now. (And we haven't even gotten into the social and cultural mess or the Pandemic Mess that won't go away.) 

Maybe you'll get some solace from Abbot Chapman's words. Maybe it'll motivate you to pray. That would be good.

In any case, these are short. Read them slowly if you want to get anything from them. They're not complicated. You don't need a degree in theology. You don't have to be particularly "holy" to benefit. Here we go:

A Good Prayer

“Possibly the best kind of prayer is when we seem unable to do anything, if then, we throw ourselves on God, and stay contentedly before Him; worried, anxious, tired, listless, but – above all and under it all – humbled and abandoned to His will, contented with our own discontent. If we can get ourselves accustomed to this attitude of soul, which is always possible, we have learned how to pray. We are never afraid of prayer and we can pray for any length of time – the longer the better, and at any time.” 

A Sign Of A Good Prayer

“I think you will find that the more time you can reasonably give to being alone with God, the easier it becomes to enjoy it (I don’t mean pleasure, but the feeling that it is worth doing – that you are not simply lazy and wasting time). The test is not whether you feel anything at the time, but whatever afterwards you feel (quite illogically) better and more determined to serve God. The one thing you should gain by quiet prayer (just remaining with God, and making a number of aspirations to keep your imagination from wandering) is to feel the rest of the day that you want God’s will and nothing else.”