Staying the Course During Market Volatility
- Jeff Schlotterbeck, CFP®
- Jan 23
- 3 min read
If your phone notifications have felt louder than usual lately, you’re not imagining it.
Geopolitical tensions, policy uncertainty, market swings—when headlines pile up all at once, it can feel overwhelming. The kind of news cycle that makes it seem like everything is happening everywhere, all at once.
Markets notice this noise, too. Stocks drop. Yields jump. Gold surges. The reactions feel urgent, dramatic, and hard to ignore.
Before diving into the details, though, it’s important to start with the most meaningful point:
Nothing about your long-term financial life likely changed this week.
Your goals are probably the same.
Your timeline is probably the same.
The reasons you invest are probably the same.
What changed is the volume of the world around you.
Why Uncertainty Feels So Uncomfortable
Human brains are excellent at spotting danger. That instinct kept our ancestors alive. But it’s not always helpful when we’re trying to make long-term financial decisions.
When uncertainty clusters—multiple alarming headlines at once—our nervous system treats it like a fire alarm. Everything feels urgent. Permanent. Immediate.
That reaction is normal.
It’s also not a great portfolio manager.
Markets react to stories in the short term. Fear. Relief. Speculation. Narratives that spread faster than facts. But over longer periods, markets care about more durable forces:
Corporate profits
Interest rates
Inflation
Productivity
How much people earn, spend, and save
Those forces move gradually. Headlines move by the minute.
This is why sharp market moves often feel enormous in the moment—but look surprisingly small in hindsight. Big swings make for dramatic charts and urgent commentary. Over a multi-year plan, they often become footnotes.
Staying the Course During Market Volatility Is Part of the Plan
I often describe staying the course during market volatility like turbulence on an airplane.
When a plane hits rough air, everything feels wrong. The cabin shakes. Drinks spill. Your body tenses. It feels dangerous—even when the aircraft itself is operating exactly as designed.
Turbulence is uncomfortable. It’s loud. It demands your attention.
But it does not mean the plane is in trouble.
Markets work the same way.
Volatility isn’t a sign that something is broken. It’s the price investors pay for long-term growth. If markets were calm all the time, long-term returns would likely be much lower. You can’t separate the reward from the uncertainty any more than you can separate a smooth flight from the possibility of rough air.
The Real Risk Isn’t the Market—It’s the Reaction
Periods like this don’t usually cause damage on their own.
The real risk is what people do next.
When fear rises, it’s very human to want relief. To sell just to stop the discomfort. To chase whatever feels “safe” in the moment. To rewrite long-term plans based on short-term emotion.
Those decisions often feel protective at the time. Historically, though, they’re the moments when long-term returns are most likely to be compromised.
Your financial plan was built with weeks like this in mind—not because volatility is pleasant, but because it’s inevitable.
Every decade has its own version of “this feels unprecedented.”
The early 2000s had terror attacks.
The late 2000s had a financial crisis.
The 2020s opened with a global pandemic and inflation shock.
Each period felt unstable while living through it. And yet, progress continued.
What Still Matters Most
The factors that have the greatest impact on your financial future remain firmly within your control:
How much you save
How diversified your portfolio is
How much risk you take relative to your goals
How disciplined you remain when emotions run high
How long you stay invested
Those quiet decisions matter far more than any single week of headlines.
If you ever feel uneasy during volatile periods, that’s human. You don’t need to suppress it—you just don’t need to let it drive.
Markets will always have moments of turbulence. The goal isn’t to eliminate every bump. It’s to stay in your seat, trust the design of the plan, and keep moving toward where you actually want to go.
That’s how short-term noise becomes long-term progress.
If recent market moves have raised questions or you’d like a second perspective, I’m always happy to talk it through. Sometimes a quick conversation is all it takes to put turbulence back into context.
Risk Disclosure: Investing involves risk including the potential loss of principal. No investment strategy can guarantee a profit or protect against loss in periods of declining values. Past performance does not guarantee future results. This material is for information purposes only and is not intended as an offer or solicitation with respect to the purchase or sale of any security. The content is developed from sources believed to be providing accurate information; no warranty, expressed or implied, is made regarding accuracy, adequacy, completeness, legality, reliability, or usefulness of any information. Consult your financial professional before making any investment decision. For illustrative use only.
