Are you one of those who is always playing games on his cellphone?  

When it comes to playing games, do you like the most challenging games – the tougher the better?

Do you like games of skill?  Do you prefer games that require knowledge and skill, versus games of chance?

Do you like a game where your score is clear cut and easily measured at any instant?

The moves in this game are made every working day between 9:30 a.m. and 4:00 p.m.  But the planning, strate-gizing, research, and decision-making for your next moves can be done anytime, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Successfully buying and selling stock – and making a profit overall – is a reality-game that makes the games on your cellphone seem like child’s play.  

You not only need to pay attention to stock prices, and by extension, the news about the corresponding business-es, but you also need to be aware of the U.S. economy generally, and how its changes will affect the prices of stocks you are watching.  That means you will ultimately learn to keep an eye on the actions of the Federal Reserve, the guardian of the economy.  You also need to be aware of the impact on your stocks of politics, elections, and what is going on in Washington, DC.

Investing in stocks does not require you to be smarter than the next guy.  Investing is not about being brainy.  Stories abound of “little old ladies” who are astonishingly good investors.  

Plenty of people will give you advice if they learn you are investing.  It is up to you to decide what, if any, small grains of truth might exist in what they have to say, and to put those grains together with what else you know and have already learned, to your benefit.  It is crucial that you ignore and disregard the rest.  The vast majority are armchair quarterbacks.  Most advice is bad advice.  Successful investors do not talk about their successes.

Successful investing is not a competitive sport.  Successful investing is a personal sport:  it is you against the investing world.  Investing requires that you build your personal, individual skills.  

Investing requires you to build up techniques that work for you.  Your personal techniques and choices will be different from those of others.  Investing requires you to be independent in your thinking.  Your personality will be a factor in your level of success.

You do not have to be rich to play.  You do not have to mortgage the farm to play.  Start with $500, or $1,000, or a quarter of your life savings, but not all of it:  if you succeed as an investor, soon enough your investments will far exceed your savings.  Open an investment account at a discount brokerage, like Charles Schwab or Fidelity.  Both have offices in downtown Greenville, where you can deposit your first check to get start-ed.  Then start buying what you can afford – no more.

What stock should you buy?  Buy what your level-headed research tells you is a stock in a good company with a good, growth-oriented future.

Never buy for sentimental or emotional reasons.  Such purchases will almost certainly be losers.  Stock prices are real-world facts.  An investor must have real-world reasons for each purchase of stock.

Plan on keeping the stocks you buy for a long time – a year, two years, five years.  Especially if the economy is in a decline, hold onto your stock.  Wait for the economy to recover, and for the stock to be the winner you anticipated.  If stock prices are down, buy more stocks when you can afford it, to diversify your portfolio, to reduce the inherent risks involved in investing, and to in-crease your opportunities for success.  

All companies have occasional downturns: their product becomes obsolete, the CEO retires, a competing company begins a great advertising campaign – the world, the economy, the businesses, your priorities, your perception and understanding, and you yourself change over time.  Factor all that into your investing choices.

Challenges abound.  Other people face the same challenges, and remain successful investors.

Investing is the ultimate game.