Last week, I visited one of my favorite cities, San Francisco, to attend the annual MoneyShow. The mood of the show this year was quite a bit drabber than it has been in the past. I think that investors are getting tired of struggling to eke out investment gains, and I can’t say I blame them one iota. In fact, I totally understand the feelings of uncertainty facing individual investors right now, and I think that part of the reason we are seeing so much bias toward the downside is because investors have thrown up their hands in frustration and just decided to call it quits with respect to equities.

While I certainly understand the feelings of insecurity and downright fear that many investors have toward equities right now, I want to caution you against becoming too bearish. Sure, there are a lot of headwinds right now, and those headwinds must be considered when making any allocation to stocks.

Yet, if you enter into the market with a targeted focus on finding solid opportunities at a great value, you likely will benefit during the long term. Now, I am not advocating some kind of buy-and-hold strategy here, far from it. What I am advocating is that you not get sucked into thinking that the only place for your money is Treasury bonds or cash under the mattress.

There still are plenty of opportunities in emerging markets. There also are plenty of international and even domestic equity plays that continue to outpace the wider market. Just remember that if you do buy into stocks, do so with only a small portion of your total portfolio -- and always do so with a firm stop-loss order in place to protect yourself if you are wrong.

We’ve actually done both of these things in my Successful Investing advisory service. Our relatively small allocation to equities, along with our tight stop-loss strategy, helped to protect our portfolio from any significant damage.

If you’d like to find out how to protect yourself from the creeping bearish mood on Wall Street, then check out my Successful Investing advisory service today.