Fighting bears

How should you react when you meet a bear close-up and personal? It is one thing to dissect data about bear markets dispassionately in abstract, but quite another when it is your wealth that is being destroyed. I have met bears several times, so the experience is becoming routine for me, even if still unpleasant, but the first time is a dreadful shock to anyone's financial health. My first was the worst, namely 1972-74, but I have since survived seven more severe attacks. When fighting bears, it helps to start with an understanding that the boring but beneficial buy-and-hold strategy is...