Business is a high level profession because it demands best qualities from a human. Philosophy, psychology, attitude, competency, discipline, patience, intelligence, common sense, presence of mind, creativity, communication, analytical skills, etc. And trading is a business with an additional challenge of hyper speculation. So in addition to the above skills, a quck decision making skill is also required here. That makes speculation the toughest among other business. The setback among majority of traders is that they assume analytical skill is primary for success. Bloom's Taxonomy explains that creativity is the primary skill for success. And they also miss to see trading as a business and an art of psychological skill rather than technical or analytical skill. One important symptom of analytical oriented people is die hard attitude to win in arguments. They have preset ideas of what is right and what is wrong and have not sufficient space for creativity and multiple view points.
Creative imagination : Collection and connection Better understanding means more view points than only one or very few. Every thing has innumerable facets to get known. First we collect as many view points then we connect to see a better picture or understanding.
I didn't say that making a living trading is not tough. I take issue with this statement... https://www.elitetrader.com/et/threads/day-trading-basics.305348/page-9#post-4385801 "Stock trading is considered to be one of the most toughest profession in the world." It may be tough, but it is NOT "one of the toughest." That is relative. It's piddly-shit compared to what the majority of other folks out there do, is it not. Who out there dares to claim it is considered to be "one of the most toughest"? "No profession requires more hard work, intelligence, patience, and mental discipline than successful speculation." --- Robert Rhea That is a patently-false claim, and needs to be called out. And people need to stop trying to make themselves feel good about their losses under the guise that they fail because the job is "the toughest". Perhaps this would be put into better perspective with http://www.jobmonkey.com/uniquejobs/tough-jobs/
Overnight...I see where you're coming from with this perspective. I can only express my personal experience on this topic. When I was younger I was a security expert, in the first half of this "career" I arrested approximately over +100 individuals ranging from former convicts to the mentally insane for criminal activity (mostly theft). Many of these apprehensions were confrontational...all I was allowed was hand cuffs to contain the risks involved! To me, it's an apples and oranges thing. My previous career entailed life threatening situations and pushed me to mental extremes. In the beginning, trading was a psychological roller coaster considering it was a learning curve combined with family resources at risk. Anxiety was extreme! True, I'm not going to lose my life trading futures, although I know two people who've committed suicide over losing money! Trading is just a different kind of pressure and stress, but like any job that is "tough", it's going to be tougher if you aren't prepared or you're a noobie. How could I even compare my security job to trading? As a security specialist I was trained and took care of my body (weightlifting/boxing)...I was confident I could handle almost any situation/person...the job became less "tough". I assume the same for soldiers, fireman, surgeons, cops, etc. When I began trading I was reckless, vengeful, and uninformed, but I had to learn this was going to be very tough job to solve! In this regard, I believe trading for a living to be one of the most toughest endeavors to have accomplished in my life...+20 years later. Just my perspective.
Yes, exactly. You get it. It took you 20+ years to find one of the toughest endeavors to accomplish, after that amount of time as compared to what YOU had been doing before. And you did not blanket that statement on everyone else, as if saying that what everyone else did was less "tough" than what you did. That was my whole issue there previously in the thread, there. Man.
Fair enough and good point. I lost +140k my first few years before making a "modest" income from trading...only later did I reach a higher level. I will always have respect for the risks and training that others go thru on a daily basis.