How to simplify your trading?

Trading can be all consuming, if you allow it to be. It’s true that it takes time and commitment to get to a point with any new skill where you feel comfortable. Undoubtedly striving for perfection, for continual improvement, is an admirable quality, but successful trading does not require immersing oneself in a furnace of frenzied activity on a daily basis. The whole point about trading in the style of the ‘Lazy Trader’ is that trading is a means of supporting a life beyond trading, not for trading to become your life.

It is true that trading successfully is not easy and that to get to a point where it becomes regularly profitable will take time and commitment. Exposure to the market and trading with diligence will automatically build the skill set required to get to that point, but it doesn’t, in fact shouldn’t, involve a whole lot of blood, sweat and tears. Never become fixated, or obsessed, by trading. It must not dominate you. It is simply a tool towards achieving financial growth, and like any new skill set, mistakes are made along the path to mastering it.

An important part of trading successfully in a stress free manner is to simplify it. It is very easy to overcomplicate things; there are almost an infinite variety of strategies and markets. Don’t feel you have to try and target everything. It simply isn’t possible. By far the most effective approach is to be very focused on just a few markets and one time frame, that which fits with your lifestyle and other commitments. Within a focused area of the markets and employing a single time frame there can be many opportunities. You don’t have to be, in fact should never be, trying to trade everything.

Your trade journal will tell you which markets and strategies have been most fruitful; pare down your operation to concentrate on those. Always remember that knowing when not to trade is as important as knowing when to trade. If you have a lot going on and you’re trying to target a lot of markets and currency pairs then you’re working too hard and making life difficult for yourself, which is likely to be reflected in the results. It’s a question of targeting and then working to your strengths. It will not only be more profitable but also more fun.

In fact simplifying your trading should be a goal. Try to achieve a point where market analysis, risk management, execution and money management become second nature, and then you will have the freedom and time to concentrate on your trading goals, i.e., the ‘deeper’ reason(s) you took up trading in the first place, not simply that you just wanted to try and make more money.

Keeping your trading pared down, simple, but effective, is the most efficient way of getting the most from it. Remember that less is more in trading. One way of achieving this is to use the End of Day time frame as part of your strategy where opportunities are clearly defined and minimum time is required from the trader. It’s ideal for those with busy lives and other commitments and for whom trading is a means of supplementing income rather than a way of life.

You will often find that the pros have a very simplified approach to their trading, one that they’ve honed to perfection!