[turtle]

Yeah, I'm not in this to gamble. I did that in the Caribbean and really just don't like losing money. I know there is always a risk when investing but the goal is minimize the risk while maximizing the gains. I used to listen to Dave Ramsey a lot and he is a strong promoter of "growth stock mutual funds" in general. Not any one specifically, just using them as your investment because there is little risk and almost always a 12% growth, at least when I last listened to him.

I was reading one of Cramer's books and he talked about not holding onto a stock so long you think it is a pet. I think his point there really is to be agile with the stocks and not pick something just to put all your eggs in one basket. I still have the Apple stock I bought first. Why did I buy the stock though? Was it to show support for Apple? Nope, it was to make money. So when I'm ready to liquidate it I'll turn a profit. Hopefully I'll reinvest it rather than just spend it though.

I guess it really comes down to the goal for why you do what you do with the market. Are you looking for high interest savings? Then buy and hold can work. Are you looking to replace your day job, then you would need lots of reinvesting dividends as well as enough profit to be able to pull from that to live off of. I want to get to that point. While I love what I do for a job, I don't want to have to work.