Here’s a simple trick that can make you a better investor.

Pick a stock. Any stock.

Let's start with a company everyone knows: Apple (AAPL).

Pull up its five-year chart.

Apple Inc. 5-Year Chart

Now ask yourself one question:

If you had a time machine, when would you travel back to buy this stock?

I'm guessing you answered late 2022 or early 2023.

Maybe you chose mid-2025 too, when shares experienced another sharp decline.

Either way, you'd probably pick one of the low points.

Makes sense. We all want to buy stocks when they're cheap.

But let's take this one step further.

What was happening when Apple was trading near those lows?

Here are a few headlines from late 2022 and early 2023:

• Apple hits seven-week low after Barclays downgrade on demand concerns – Reuters

• Apple and Tesla: Tech shares tumble amid supply issues – BBC

• Apple's market cap falls under $2 trillion as sell-off continues – CNBC

Not very positive, huh?

Investors were worried about slowing iPhone demand, supply chain disruptions, and the broader economic outlook.

Apple had lost over $1 trillion in market value from its peak.

And if you were following the financial news every day, you probably weren't feeling particularly excited about buying shares.

Yet looking at the chart today, that's exactly when you wish you'd been buying.

Let's try another stock.

Here's the five-year chart of Meta Platforms (META).

Meta Platforms (META) 5-Year Chart

This one is even more interesting.

If you could travel back at any point in the last five years, when would you buy Meta?

Late 2022 is the obvious answer.

Meta bottomed during the week of October 31, 2022.

Shares collapsed 75% from their 2021 highs.

Today, that looks like one of the greatest buying opportunities of the decade.

But what were investors thinking at the time?

Here were some of the headlines surrounding that bottom:

• Meta shares plunge 24% to the lowest price since 2016 – CNBC

• Meta investors panic as Zuckerberg doubles down on Metaverse – CoinGeek

• Meta stock craters over bleak forecast and expensive metaverse bets – Reuters

Again, the news wasn't great.

Mark Zuckerberg was spending billions building the metaverse.

Investors were questioning whether he had lost his mind.

Advertising revenue was under pressure. Expenses were exploding. Wall Street was downgrading the stock.

Shareholders were heading for the exits.

But looking back, that's exactly when you wanted to be buying Meta.

Which brings me to what's happening in the stock market today.

What’s Really Changed?

Over the last two weeks, investor sentiment has taken a sharp turn for the worse.

AI stocks have been hit particularly hard.

Suddenly, the financial news is filled with reasons to worry.

Here are the biggest concerns:

The OpenAI Revenue Scare: The Financial Times reported OpenAI's annualized revenue was closer to $50 billion than the $70 billion investors had previously heard. That spooked AI investors. But much of the discrepancy comes down to how sales through cloud partners like Microsoft Azure are counted – not evidence that AI demand suddenly collapsed.

Interest Rates Are Rising: This is worth watching. But Treasury yields have actually fallen over the past week while the stock selloff has accelerated.

The War In Iran: Higher oil prices and further escalation are real risks. But this is something we'll just have to live with. Trying to predict Trump's next military strike or Iran's response is a losing endeavor – and certainly not something I'd build an investment strategy around.

None of these concerns have fundamentally changed the businesses we're investing in.

• Hyperscalers aren't canceling their AI infrastructure projects.

• Demand for computing power hasn't disappeared.

• Companies aren't suddenly abandoning the massive data centers they've spent years planning.

Yet stocks are moving lower and investors are panicking.

It’s starting to feel a lot like Apple in early 2023 or Meta in late 2022.

Of course, if you actually traveled back to those moments, you wouldn't know Apple was near a bottom or that Meta was about to begin an incredible run.

But the best buying opportunities rarely feel like buying opportunities when you're living through them.

I think that's exactly what we're experiencing today.

Five years from now, I bet we’ll be pulling up charts and pointing to this period the same way we point to Apple in early 2023 and Meta in late 2022.

We'll wonder why everyone was so scared.

Because from where I'm sitting, the long-term opportunity hasn't changed.

Just the short-term sentiment.

I suggest you invest accordingly.