How I’m Feeling About Russia and Ukraine
Video Transcript:
Hey, everyone, I wanted to take a couple minutes before the weekend hit to just send out a brief video and share some thoughts that I’ve been having over the last 24 to 48 hours.
Wednesday night, when I got home, I was getting ready for bed (and getting ready to turn myself off from social media) when everything really started going off over in Ukraine.
For last couple of weeks, a lot of us have been watching and trying to anticipate if we were going to see a conflict escalate overseas, and now we all have the answer to that. But, I just wanted to share with you that, as much as my instinct, as a financial advisor, as a financial professional, whatever term you might want to use…
My instinct has been to want to immediately have something in writing. I’d put something out like some kind of press release with charts and data and kind of show everyone really, you know, hey, that skirmishes and market tantrums happen all the time. But, I do realize that at least part of me feels that that, you know, it’s okay to just sit in the moment and be human, and realize that what’s going on overseas is, is really awful.
It’s tragic in so many ways. You know, we’re going to basically have a front row seat to violence in Ukraine– social media, the internet, and the connectivity of the world now allows us whether we want to or not to be able to witness some horrific things and heartbreaking things. So, I won’t try to pretend that I’m not feeling many of the same unsettling feelings and heartbreaking feelings that that a lot of you guys are as well.
I am hopeful that things will turn around and that there will be a relatively speedy resolution to this somehow, maybe some in some miraculous way that will happen. I don’t know, I don’t know. What I can tell you here is what I do know– I do know that we do our best to plan for everyone according to their goals. And so even though, right now, it doesn’t feel like this was on anyone’s bingo card, I would remind you that COVID wasn’t on anyone’s bingo card either.
And yet, we’ve continued to persist and endure. I would encourage you if you pray, please be praying for the people of Ukraine. Be praying for our leaders, that they make wise decisions, even the ones that we don’t agree with, let’s pray for wisdom. And remember that we still have work to do.
You know, I will get up tomorrow morning. Hopefully, I’ll enjoy the weekend with my family. And I will get up and on Monday morning, I will go back to work. And I will work as hard as I can for all of the families that we serve. And I trust that many of you that are still working are going to be doing the same thing. And so, while this is uncomfortable and unsettling, I just want to encourage you that for those of you that we work with, we’ve been planning for the appropriate time horizons, we’ve been planning for your financial goals.
And if you need to talk about anything we are here. If you want to call and go through things, again, we are here. I want you to know that it’s okay to be unsettled. It’s okay to be nervous, because some of the things that we’re watching it should be unsettling for most people. In a sense, that it’s just not how we’re supposed to see things play out. Or we would like to see things play out, right? But be encouraged and know that you have a plan.
And we’re going to do our best to work that plan and stick to that. If things have changed and your circumstances have changed or your goals have changed, we want to know so we can make adjustments. We can help you talk through and think through what adjustments would make sense for you. But I just wanted to send out a brief word to let you know that we’re thinking about you. We are watching and monitoring things from our end and we’re not asleep at the wheel by any means. And it’s okay. It’s okay to be a little unsettled right now.
We’re here for you. And if you need to talk, please don’t hesitate to reach out. Alright. Have a great weekend.