Investing for Freedom
I read Morgan Housel's The Psychology of Money in early 2026, which perfectly captured a mindset I’ve been trying to build for years. My investing journey actually began in 2024, but I tried to get into the market as early as 2020. Back then, the barrier to entry was infuriating. Because I was living in Türkiye, brokerage platforms constantly blocked me from creating an account. I remember accidentally opening an options account instead of a standard brokerage one and immediately throwing away $50. It was ridiculous: opening a proper investing account was an uphill battle, but opening a gambling account was effortless.
At that time, AI tools didn't exist to help navigate the bureaucracy, and I hit dead end after dead end. WeBull, eToro, and Investing.com were just three of the many platforms where my applications failed. After a while, that kind of friction drains your enthusiasm. You think, "Whatever, I’ll just look into it later."
Let this be your wake-up call. If I had successfully invested in the S&P 500 in early 2020, I would be up roughly 150% today—more than two and a half times my money.
$1 would be $2.50
$100 would be $250
$1,000 would be $2,500
$100,000 would be $250,000
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Looking at those numbers, it’s hard not to feel regret about how long it took to get started.
When I finally managed to open an account in 2024, it was with Yapı Kredi, which restricted me to buying individual stocks. I fell into the trap of listening to YouTubers for stock tips. Even with zero initial knowledge, two years later I am technically up by about 10%. But guess what the S&P 500 did in that exact same timeframe? It surged close to 40%. My individual stock-picking drastically underperformed a basic index fund.
Fed up with limited local options, I finally opened an Interactive Brokers account and bought my very first ETF. Fast forward to today: I am living in the UK, I’ve opened a tax-free ISA, and I am using Trading 212 to aggressively build my portfolio. After deep-diving into research, I settled on the NASDAQ-100, finding its risk/reward ratio incredibly appealing for my goals.
In my first year on the new platforms, I’m already up over $700. But I know that short-term number means absolutely nothing. While it’s reassuring to have green pixels on my screen, this is money I won’t touch for the next 10 to 15 years. I am fully aware the markets might crash. The AI bubble might pop. And guess what? I will ride that roller coaster. Not only will I ride it, but I’ll keep buying shares the entire way down and back up. Seeing red numbers actually makes it easier for me to invest because everything is on sale.
Eventually, I will automate the whole process as the experts suggest, but for now, I enjoy the psychological control of manually placing my money exactly where I want it.
The stock market is the greatest wealth generator in human history, and it is open to anyone willing to look past the initial hurdles (which are becoming less and less daunting). This is a call to action. Don’t wait for a market crash. Don’t give up if a brokerage platform makes it difficult to sign up. Push through the administrative walls.
Use AI to help you. Tell Gemini or ChatGPT what your investing goals are and what barrier is stopping you—they will give you the advice you need to push forward. Then, just do it. Put your first chunk of capital into a reliable, broad-market ETF with a risk profile you can sleep with at night. If you want the lowest-risk approach, go with a global fund like the FTSE Global All Cap.
Do this for your future self. Be a friend to the person you will be in 10, 15, or 25 years. Give yourself freedom—the freedom to turn down a bad job, the freedom to transition to part-time work, the freedom to write full-time, and the freedom to exercise creativity because your financial foundation buys you the time to do so.
