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John A. was ready to call it a day and head off into the proverbial sunset in early 2009. Like many retirees, he was eager to live the life of his dreams.

Only, the timing couldn't have been worse.

The stock market tanked in 2008 and continued to drop precipitously into early March. John's financial planner had all but conveniently disappeared, and John found all the red in his brokerage statements deeply disturbing. He recalls some of his stocks "dropping by more than 50%."

Yet, John stuck to it.

In fact, he stayed "in to win" – something we talk about frequently.

I asked him why he'd decided to hold his positions at a time when other investors were bailing out as fast as they could. He said it was simply because he'd invested in high-income companies that made products and services the world had to have, which reflected solid management acumen, and mirrored his vision of the future.

All of which ought to sound very familiar considering those are the exact principles around which Total Wealth is built and why we take the approach we do.