"Imperfection."

Almost everyone is screwed up, broken, clingy, scared, and yet designed for joy. Even (or especially) people who seem to have it more or less together are more like the rest of us than you would believe. I try not to compare my insides to their outsides, because this makes me much worse than I already am, and if I get to know them, they turn out to have plenty of irritability and shadow of their own. Besides, those few people who aren’t a mess are probably good for about twenty minutes of dinner conversation.

This is good news, that almost everyone is petty, narcissistic, secretly insecure, and in it for themselves, because a few of the funny ones may actually long to be friends with you and me. They can be real with us, the greatest relief. As we develop love, appreciation, and forgiveness for others over time, we may accidentally develop those things toward ourselves, too.

Both the 1997 Asian Currency crisis and the 1998 LTCM debacle happened early fall, September into October. Stock fell 10% in 1997 and 20% in 1998. In both instances the S&P-500 closed the year at a new ATH.

"You"

The main thing is the YOU beneath the clothes and skin—the ability to do, the will to conquer, the determination to understand and know this great, wonderful, curious world.

Don’t shrink from new experiences and custom. Take the cold bath bravely. Enter into the spirit of your big bedroom. Enjoy what is and not pine for what is not.

Read some good, heavy, serious books just for discipline: Take yourself in hand and master yourself. Make yourself do unpleasant things, so as to gain the upper hand of your soul.

Time is free, but it's priceless.

 

All financial markets might be sideways into next week’s FOMC announcement.

By the end of “walking in the shade”, the last volume of Doris Lessing’s autobiography, written in 1997.

 

Today JNK bonds signaling risk on while the other sectors remain red, IYT, XRT, IWM, what does that mean? Fed is still very much supporting the market, but the economy is continually slowing down. Eventual outcome?

"When all the experts and forecasts agree – something else is going to happen."

Indices are entering rollover. Those two weeks are the worst two weeks of trading cycle while open interest rolls from September to December. New, fresh direction often comes after expiration.

In a seemingly invulnerable, one-sided market, the only chance bears have, is in finding a slight opening and exploiting it with full-blown aggression. 

As it stands now, we know how early it truly is both in today's session and overall with where we are in the bull run to make any presumptions about a market top, let alone a standard correction even underway.

But we do know that bears actually scored some points this morning with their downside pressure on the IWM, ETF for the small cap Russell 2000 Index. 

To be sure, without AAPL, FB, GOOGL, MSFT, TSLA and the rest of the gang at least dipping a bit, there really is no broad market correction of which to speak, only constant and grinding rotation like we saw during the summer. 

In summary, the line of least resistance is still to the upside. Continue to raise stops where appropriate and, most importantly, adhere to your stops if they are hit. "One of the worst forms of complacency is ignoring your sell stops in a bull market."