What is that one thing that has been a game changer for you?

After years of experience as a trader, I know that every trader has a unique journey.
We have to find our own ways and continuously test until we find something that works best for us but life is too short to make all the mistakes on your own.
That being said, we can always help new traders by sharing the worst possible mistakes we committed or the best tip that has changed trading for us.
I am opening this thread for all the fellow traders to share one such thing.

 

Giving up trading became a game changer to my life. Life is short. Don't waste your time trading.

 

Meeting somebody who knew what they were doing.

 

Semi-automating my strategy. I do the entry, the rest is automated.

 

I had two game-changers, they're both obvious and obviously related to each other.,

The first was that its pointless trying to trade by buying company shares when the stock markets are bearish.

The second was that every trade works better when it follows the major trend.

 

understanding wedges

i mean i knew what a wedge shape looked like.........but the technical definition of a wedge.......that took me a long time to understand........that was my.....own disability , i doubt if others would have had a problem

 

trade a portfolio instead of pinpointing entry for single position

 

I won't say a game changer, but yes, using stop loss while placing trades has turned out to be really helpful for me. That's why I always recommend new traders to use stop loss to limit their risk.

 

Journaling
100% ill say its journaling my trade at the end of each day has been the biggest game changer for me
understanding my emotions and writing it down.
Writing what i could have done better to squeeze more out of a trade,
Then before the start of next week on a Sunday, i review them and make sure those stay fresh in my mind for the following week.

 

There are so many as I look backwards, every ten years I have concentrated on different area of trading. Learn long term charting well, then learned scalping well, then automation and finally hedging. Going to breakeven protective stops after market has gone so far but not hit target, "grade" each trade in terms of how many seconds it took to get to target on scalping. But the blunt of my profits has always been in long term commodities with much less time in front of the screens. I went to scalping cause of boredom of long term trading, huge mistake as took so long to learn intraday tick movements. I wish I learned options much earlier as well as hedging.