How do we Know ????

You have chosen to peruse one of the most difficult tasks known to man – trading for fun and profit. Something that looks so easy, yet as you now know, is not.

There are several elements to master before consistent profits become reality. None of them are easy to explain.

First you must study the markets and how they react. While no two days, weeks, or years are exactly the same, they do exhibit similarities. Then you must try to understand the hows and whys of the things that drive price action – basically fear and greed. Then you must learn to spot (anticipate?) when excess has entered the picture – when it is reasonable to expect continuation, or change.

All of this is more art than science. But it is really more a study in psychology than anything else. You need not understand the fundamentals, or the technical aspects as much as you need to understand your opponent.

Once you have a grasp or understanding of the above, then comes the hard part – understanding and mastering yourself. Developing confidence. Overcoming your own fear and greed. Sharpening your skills and reaction time. Learning to have patience and discipline.

These things come more quickly to some then to others – most never achieve them. I know of no book, no video tape, or any course that really addresses these issues in any concrete fashion. Probably because new traders do not want to believe that this is what trading is really all about.

You have run into few if any consistently successful traders because you have run into few if any human beings who understand themselves and the people around them.

This message board is perhaps the best in the business, yet most participants remain in the dark, asking the wrong questions, dwelling on the wrong approach. But read and think about what you read very carefully and one day the light bulb will go off over your head - I promise you that.

 

Where do I sign?

 

Where do I sign?

 

When the student is ready, the master will appear.

 

Yes, but they're difficult to find. Nearly everyone here misrepresents himself. And nearly every one of those who are left will try to persuade you to do what they're doing (you can't possibly trade without Bollinger Bands, stochastics, MA crossovers blah blah).

There are, however, a few who will take the time to ask you a few questions and find out what kind of trader you are, then help you to determine whether you are compatible with your own system. As to the psychological issues that prevent you from trading your own system, those are for the most part outside the scope of a message board.

There are, of course, many successful traders who have no interest in message boards. Or don't have the time for them (you have to wonder when frequent posters find the time to trade - hint, hint). They have, in other words, lives. So don't make any assumptions about the profitability of trading by what you read on message boards. While it's true that only a small percentage of traders make a success of it, there's no particular reason why you can't be one of them.

--Db

 

How many people actually have even heard of trading as a skill (or believe for that matter) and can make a living at it? I was talking with this very thing the other day with my neighbor because they never see me leave the house from 6am to 3pm. When I told them I trade for a living they think trust fund kid, welfare, food stamps, or scamming the government. My statements were shown; both the $2400 one day and the $2800 loss another . Needless to say I have blown out many accounts (one recently) and when asked to teach them I decline and wish they didn't know now as what I have gone through to make a living I don't think others could. Many people have fallen into that position , try once or twice in anything ( options,stocks futures) and they say it can't be done. Trading is really about knowing yourself ( I am my own worst enemy) and if 95% don't know it exists and only 75% of those 5% make it it tells you how many people really know themselves. Read a psychology book and you will understand. You would do better with a degree in psychology than finance on wall street.

 

Tell your neighbors you work on the Internet

 

Trading is about having a system and sticking to it. I thought there weren't any consistently profitable traders in this market, but I was proven wrong. They most definitely exist and are kicking ass!

 

I beleive the implication behind that question is THE key to trading success. It strikes at the heart of the idea that trading is 80% psychology, 20% mechanics. Salvadore Dali once said, "the difference between me and a mad man is I'm not mad". That statement implies an absolute certainty of mind. Until you reach that level of certainty about trading, I honestly believe you cannot succeed. This has been the case with me, I just kept going in circles, wondering what was possible. When I just decided it was possible (don't ask how, that's way more than enough for at least another thread, perhaps a book) everything changed for me. In the moment I reached that conclusion, I was able to take actions and make decisions that just were not possible previously. Without certainty you cannot have committment. Without committment you will not produce the behaviours required to make it at this game.

 

Bundlemaker, your absolutely right about commitment. Many people who quit a steady job to work for a dot com a few years ago assumed they were going to be millionaires by just showing up. The same for trading ,only a breakthrough in your mindset made the difference between success and failure.