“Time is but the stream I go a-fishin in.”

- Henry David Thoreau

Dear Reader,

Ordinarily I devote this column to ideas about spiritual wealth. Today I’m going to talk a little bit about material wealth, too.

Not that the two aren’t interrelated.

Novelist Joyce Carol Oates once wrote, “The only people who claim that money is not important are people who have enough money so that they are relieved of the ugly burden of thinking about it.”

French existential writer Albert Camus agreed. He said, “It is a kind of spiritual snobbery that makes people think they can be happy without money.”

In many ways, they’re right. How can you feel genuine contentment if you are harassed by bill collectors, living paycheck-to-paycheck, or worried whether you have enough to retire?

Don’t get me wrong. Money doesn’t buy true love or friendship. It won’t solve all your problems, fix your marriage, turn you into “a success,” or make you charitable if you’re not already charitably inclined.

But money is the most egalitarian force in the world, bestowing power on whoever holds it.

It gives you the freedom to make important choices in your life. No one is free who is a slave to his job, his creditors, his circumstances, or his overhead.

Money allows you to support worthy causes and help those in need. It allows you to do what you want, where you want, with whom you want. It’s called financial independence. And it’s a great feeling.

As author Tom Robbins once remarked, “There’s a certain Buddhistic calm that comes from having money in the bank.”

As my regular readers know, I think more about money than most. I worked on Wall Street for 16 years as a research analyst, investment advisor and portfolio manager. For the past eight years, I’ve written several thousand words a week about the economy, interest rates, currencies, stocks and bonds.

Fortunately, I’ve taken all this information rattling around in my brain and turned it into something worthwhile. This week John Wiley & Sons released my new book “The Gone Fishin’ Portfolio: Get Wise, Get Wealthy… and Get On With Your Life.“

It is currently ranked #3 on Amazon’s bestseller list.

The book sums up all the best things I learned in more than two decades as an investment advisor. So I want to share it with you. It is the book I wish someone had handed me 25 years ago, so I didn’t have to learn so many lessons the hard way.

I tried to cover all the basics: saving, investing, cutting costs, minimizing taxes and dealing with the psychological hurdles the markets throw in your way from time to time.

The Gone Fishin‘ strategy itself is a simple but sophisticated investment system that I created several years ago. It is based entirely on low-cost, tax-efficient mutual funds. (You can use it in your IRA or 401k… or invest in it through any broker.) It’s so simple, in fact, that it allows you to manage your money yourself in less than 20 minutes a year.

The rest of the time you are encouraged to travel, play golf, spend time with your kids and grandkids, or just… go fishin’.

I’ve given the portfolio a light-hearted name. But securing your financial independence is serious business. The money that you will retire on - or are already retired on - should not be treated like chips in a poker game.

The Gone Fishin’ Portfolio is risk-averse by design. Yet it has compounded at 17.3% annually since inception.

I don’t want to suggest that you can eliminate investment risk entirely. That’s not possible. The Gone Fishin’ Portfolio will fluctuate in value. But this is a realistic approach. No other investment system comes closer to guaranteeing you long-term investment success.

So I do hope you read the book and take the time to share it with your kids and grandkids.

“The Gone Fishin’ Portfolio: Get Wise, Get Wealthy… and Get On with Your Life” is available at your local bookstore. However, Amazon is currently offering it for 45% off the cover price. (To order, click here.)

Incidentally, I make clear in the book that money is not your most precious resource. It’s time. Time is perishable, irreplaceable and, unlike money, cannot be saved.

My goal is to allow you to redirect your time from worries about money to high value activities, whether that’s work you enjoy, time spent pursuing your favorite activities, or just relaxing with your friends and family.

In “The Pleasures of Life,” Sir John Lubbock writes, “All other good gifts depend on time for their value. What are friends, books, or health, the interest of travel or the delights of home, if we have not time for their enjoyment? Time is often said to be money, but it is more - it is life; and yet many who would cling desperately to life, think nothing of wasting time.”

The Gone Fishin’ Portfolio offers you the opportunity to reach financial freedom. But it guarantees you more time to devote to the pastimes and people you love.

Perhaps that is what recommends it most.

Carpe Diem,

Alex

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Alexander Green is the Investment Director of The Oxford Club and Chairman of Investment U, a free, internet-based research service with over 300,000 readers. (The Oxford Club’s Communique, whose portfolio he directs, is ranked third in the nation for risk-adjusted returns over the past five years by the independent Hulbert Financial Digest.) Alex has been featured on “The O’Reilly Factor,” and has been profiled by Forbes, Kiplinger’s Personal Finance, CNBC, and Marketwatch.com, among others. He lives in central Florida with his wife Karen and their children Hannah and David.