You’re Not One of Them

I use SoFi for my stock portfolio. I consolidated my student loans with them shortly after graduation and liked the setup — the interface was simple, and it was easy to buy and sell stocks.

At first, I looked at stock purchases as a kind of game. I didn’t put much money in, but it was fun to watch the numbers slowly tick up and grow.

Things started to change over the past few years as my NVIDIA holdings grew. That’s when I sat up and really started paying attention to the world at large.

As I’ve educated myself on geopolitics, finance and kept up with current events, I came to appreciate the connective tissue between everything. Being informed lets you read the tea leaves a little, and that has real benefits for life planning and investments.

I’m very fortunate.

I have a career I love and am well compensated for it. I’m making more money than I ever have — my younger self would be floored. But the crazy thing is, things are so tough out there that this makes me upper middle class. And while money is less of a daily stress for me than it is for most Americans, it’s still there.

So I’m always looking for ways to grow what I have. I’m no financial expert — still a novice with stocks, honestly — but I was excited when SpaceX was gearing up to go public. And when I got an invite to the IPO, I’ll admit it: I drank the Kool-Aid like countless others. I thought about the gains Tesla has seen and started to salivate. An invite to a thing like that is its own kind of privilege — and I knew it.

I put in an order for about 35 shares and set the money aside, hoping to get in on the frenzy.

Friday came. I got the confirmation on my order and read the news as SpaceX went live. Shortly after, another notification came from SoFi. I excitedly opened the app, and there were my shares.

Four.

Not thirty-five. 

Four.

And then it hit me — something I’ve known for years and keep being reminded of:

I am not one of them.

Nor will I ever be.

Here’s the thing about IPOs — it’s the same illusion as flying first class.

With first class, you board early, you get the wider seat with more leg room, maybe a warm towel, and booze and goodies. For a few hours you get a taste of the “good life.”

But the truly rich aren’t up front in first class. They’re not even on your plane.

They have their own.

The four shares reminded me of where I get to sit. The lion’s share, the kind that can actually change someone’s life, went to people who have their own plane.

And that’s fine. But it’s also bullshit.

Enraged, I immediately sold my four shares of SpaceX.

Some will call me an idiot for doing that. But after doing the homework I should’ve done more extensively in the first place, I realized that maybe I dodged a bullet. I then took the money that I had set aside, and used it to further diversify my portfolio like I should have.

Reaching the ceiling for most people isn’t about how hard you work, how you plan, or how closely you read the tea leaves to inform your decisions.

The ceiling was built long before the invite ever hit my inbox — and the invite, it turns out, was for first class.

A taste, by design.