Using the Lunar Landing Portfolio While Learning to Analyze Stocks Yourself

When the List Becomes Your Own

When I first started sharing the Lunar Landing Portfolio, I didn’t think of it as something others would rely on. It felt more like a journal entry—an organized way of capturing the companies I trusted, the patterns I recognized, the quiet rhythm of returns and drawdowns I’d learned to read over time. But then people began asking questions, leaning into the structure, using it as a starting point for their own investing lives. And slowly, almost shyly, I began to see it differently.

I think about my son, who approached me not long ago with a kind of restless energy—equal parts eagerness and doubt. “Can I really rely on your list?” he asked me. “Or do I need to figure everything out myself?” His question carried the weight of someone standing at the beginning of a long path, unsure which step is his to take.

I told him what I’ve come to believe deeply:
You can lean on the Lunar Landing Portfolio while learning to stand on your own.
You can hold the rails until your balance comes.

There is no shame in beginning with guidance. We all learn this way—by watching, imitating, trusting the scaffolding someone else built before we build our own. The portfolio isn’t meant to be a permanent crutch. It’s a temporary home, a structure sturdy enough to shelter your early confidence but spacious enough to let you grow beyond it.

Every stock in the Lunar Landing Portfolio was chosen through a methodical process—five-year returns, rolling-year windows, maximum drawdowns, stability, consistency, contribution to the larger market. When you use the portfolio, you’re not just copying a list; you’re stepping into a way of seeing. Over time, you begin to notice patterns yourself. You start asking the same questions I ask when updating the list. And slowly, the act of investing shifts from dependence to understanding.

I wanted my son to feel that—this gentle transition. I wanted him to know that relying on the list is not a sign of weakness; it’s an act of learning. But I also wanted him to feel the invitation embedded in it: Learn the method behind it. Grow into your own decision-making.

There’s a moment every investor reaches, a kind of inner turning point. One day you’re simply following guidance, and the next day something clicks—an intuition, a pattern, a sudden familiarity with the data that once felt overwhelming. You look at a stock and see more than a ticker symbol. You see stories encoded in lines and numbers. And without realizing it, you begin trusting yourself.

My hope is that the Lunar Landing Portfolio becomes a bridge to that moment.

Some people will stay with the portfolio long-term, and that’s fine. Others will drift away from it, not out of dismissal but out of growth. In both cases, the portfolio has served its purpose. It has supported them while they learned to listen to the market’s quieter messages, the ones hidden beneath volatility and noise.

I told my son that he doesn’t need to rush this transition. The portfolio will always be there for him—revised weekly, shaped with intention, grounded in the criteria that have carried me through my own investing seasons. But I also reminded him that one day he may outgrow it, and that will be a moment of pride, not loss.

In the end, learning to analyze stocks is like learning to know yourself. It takes time, mistakes, reflection, and the slow accumulation of understanding. The Lunar Landing Portfolio is simply a place to begin—a steady guide until your own instincts become steady enough to trust.

And when that day comes, you won’t need the portfolio to choose for you.
You’ll simply let it walk beside you, no longer a map, but a memory of where you started.