Long-term investing would not necessarily be described as exciting. And buying a stock and leaving it alone for 30 (or more) years doesn't require much thinking at all. People like to do things that make them feel smart or at least offer some excitement. So long-term investing takes a certain discipline to see the thought involved and feel the eventual excitement it creates.

When you take a stake in a great company before everyone else sees that it's great and you have the patience to wait for it to succeed, you discover that you were lucky enough to own a share in what they're doing, and you profit handsomely from the hard work they put in as much as they do.

In the case of Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) and Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT), following such a strategy would have led to astronomical gains for the early investors who stayed patient. As little as $1,000 split equally between those two stocks at their initial public offerings (IPOs) would be worth a life-changing sum of money today. 

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Source Fool.com