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The Mind of a Trader

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The Best Way To Find An Answer... Is To Ask

Thu, May 14 2009, 16:58 GMT
by Steven Croft

Trading Metro

Trading has always been and always will be an exciting, yet challenging skill.

The best traders around the world, at one time could never make a profitable trade, however they did the one thing that separated them from those who never got better. They asked for help.

Asking for some help takes courage, but the rewards are powerful. Almost any question that can be asked has an answer. Each of us must make the decision to step out of our comfort zone and ask someone for help.

Once we do that, a whole new world of potential success will open up for us and we will receive answers. Take the time to be honest with yourself and discover what the real question is that needs to be asked.

Then take the time to find someone who is already successful in trading and listen to them, learn from them and apply their answer to your trading.

Will this work? You will never know unless you ask.

Listen to the author's thoughts

Victory is in the Eye of the Beholder

We have all heard the phrase "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder". I want you to adjust that and think about "Victory being in the Eye of the Beholder".

There is not one hard and fast rule as to what a victorious trading session is. Many will possibly say that profit is the only variable in determining that, yet just as in any other area of your life, there are many perspectives.

If a person ran a one mile race and their finishing time was 1 hour, you would think that they could never consider themselves to be victorious in a race, yet if this person had not been able to walk in the last ten years and then accomplished that, we would all say that it was an amazing victory.

When we trade, each of us needs to step away from what the crowds say and not just follow everyone else. True victory comes to those who see what they have been doing and then set new targets that will stretch them, teach them and allow them to grow. We might fall during this process, but we will only fail if we decide to never get up.

Listen to the author's thoughts

Step Outside Of Your Comfort Zone

Each of us has a comfort zone. That area where everything seems to work like we desire, stress is almost non-existent and we can basically move forward with our eyes closed and not worry.

This might sound like the best way to trade, however, if we never strive to grow, to adjust, to refine to get better, we will actually fade away and regress instead of remaining comfortable.

It is a challenge to try new things because once we step outside of the area where we know 100% what we are doing, we will experience nervousness, mistakes, criticism, stress and more.

There is also a great amount of success awaiting those who will step forward and grow. Once we move outside of our comfort zone and enhance our trading skills, increase our trading, add to our strategies, etc. we will soon grow into these new skills and environments and in a very short amount of time, this will be our new comfort zone which will be the reward for moving forward instead of sitting still.

Remember... everything is difficult before it becomes easy.

Listen to the author's thoughts

Become a Great Trader Without Trading

Sometimes history can assist us in becoming greater at what we want to do.

However, one of the biggest struggles we all face is that fact that we generally know what we need to do, but because we do not like the task, we do not do it.

As a trader, we all want to become better. Instead of using only our time in front of the charts to enhance our skills, use the time that we cannot even trade to become better.

Every Saturday (in U.S. time zones), the markets are closed. This is the perfect time to have you own personal trading school. Sit down with your trading journal of all of the trades you made last week along with your charts or the screen shots of your executed trades and analyze what you actually did.

You will soon discover that the information surrounding these trades will provide a wealth of information that will assist you in seeing your areas of strength and areas that you need to strengthen.

If we never look at where we have just been, then we will never be sure that the path we are continuing on will get us to our desired destination.

Listen to the author's thoughts

Building a Bridge To New Programs

Every bridge that is built needs to have an important first step accomplished.

A thin wire must be sent from the starting point across the expanse to the proposed ending point. Today that is much easier than it was before airplanes were built.

In earlier days, a designer had to be very creative in finding a way to get from point "A" to point "B". Once the first string was delivered then the process began to connect the two sides of the expanse.

A trader will at some time in their career meet the end of the road they are on and there is no place to go at the edge of the cliff. That is the exact point where we all must realize that we need to be creative and build a bridge to the other side where new programs, ideas, tools, strategies and more await that will enhance our skill sets.

It all starts with an idea and a desire to grow. From there once the first step is accomplished, there is no place that your success cannot travel since you now are capable of designing and building whatever you need to reach new horizons in your trading career.

Listen to the author's thoughts

Published on  Thu, May 14 2009, 17:08 GMT