So there I was, answering questions from my board, when the age-old question came up. "Do I invest now, when everyone says we're in for a huge correction?"

DejaVu. I'd been here before. Not just this type of question, this type of quandary.

I've been investing in the market for a number of years. I remember when I first started. I just jumped in. No knowledge, no manual, no methods, just jumped in head first. I've made money, and I've made mistakes. The dejavu comes when I realize that's not the first thing I've ever done by just doing it.

The first thing I did head first, no knowledge, no manual, certainly no methods, was having a family. I decided I wanted kids. So, without another thought, I had kids. I was very upset to find out they didn't come with an owner's manual. And here, too, I've done well, and I've made mistakes.

The thing that brings the quandary most to mind is the correlation between my kids and the market. If I told my daughter that the sun was yellow, she'd swear it was blue. I say black, she says white. Sometimes I'd say white just to hear her say black. If I wanted her to stay in and do her homework, all I had to do was pretend it didn't matter to me one way or another. It then became very important to her to stay in and do her work. If I liked the latest boyfriend, she broke up with him the next day. So, I started liking the ones I hated, and hating the ones I liked, and we've been much happier ever since.

Right about now, you're thinking, where's the correlation? Well, when I look at the market, and really think about it, and read all the news, tally all the numbers, it's a certainty that if I decide the market will do well, the next day it will close down about 50 points. If I say it's going to plummet, sure enough, it goes up.

Calling the market has become as contrary a thing for me as my daughter always was. The market isn't made up of one person. You can't get a handle on it by watching and learning its mannerisms. You can't know what it will do if the Feds decide to raise the interest rates. You equally can't possibly know what it will do if they lower the rates. Jobless claims? Who knows? Housing starts? Your guess is as good as mine.

So what exactly does one do to try to stay invested without the day-to-day worry? Well, you could do some research. Check out the companies you want to invest in. Take a look at their management, look into their financial statements, get some earnings projections, or talk to the Investor Relations department. You could do a PEG, or a YPEG, and you could look for its relative strength. You could even go so far as to visit the company to get a feel for how well it's run. This will give you some insight into where you're investing. With this kind of knowledge under your belt, you can rest reasonably assured that the company will do well, and then sit back and let them do what they do best.

Or, you could do what I do. You could fire up that computer every morning, bring up the Dow and the NASDAQ statistics. And then you could look it right in the eye, and say, "You're going to go down, you're going to go down". If it's true to form, it should go up. Hey, it worked for boyfriends!

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