Rande Howell

zdo After an event has happened, you are left with the memory of it. Here we are looking for a memory that the brain has associated with a calm, soothed state of mind. what ever memory you have that already have these elements embedded into it is workable. We are trying to get the mind to work with us also. You are on the right track. Rande Howell

what you show here is what I consider to be a fundamental difference between th mindset of the basic retail trader and one who trades within the context of a trading company. Both can be successful financially, and yet they bring very different perspectives to the table. Rande Howell

These kinds of situations will be addressed as we move into mindfulness training. What you are talking about is at the level of internal dialog. The emotional regulation practices are used to calm an emotion down before it takes over mind. There will be a subtle ness to your situation where emotion corrupts mindset, so the ER skills are a start. But learning to see what you can,t currently see is the point of entry for you from my estimation. stay tuned, these skills will be explored soon. rande Howell. I,m on my new iPad and trying to get the feel of it. a little clumsy right now.

As an experiment I offered 5 scholarships to a course I teach on developing the mind for trading. It is free to them. The intent was to see if the psychology forum could really focus on the psychology behind performance in trading and stay focused on it. And I wanted to see if I could add a social learning element to a webinar course. I believe social learning is a missing element in courses where there is not a group setting. Trying to figure that out. If it can, my hope is that these can be offered more often. For more info, go to the forum where Developing Traders State of Mind is being discussed and ask questions. There, you will find people who are working through the course. My hope is that more particiapants int he course take advantage of the forum. Rande Howell

Would prefer these questions in the other forum. They are good guestions. People could answer your number 1 for themselves. In my own observation, I have found this to be the case. Ultimately your brain has learned how to deal with uncertainty across many domains and when exposed to uncertainty in trading, it tends to fall back into familiar patterns to deal with the circumstance. This is called response generalization. In other domains of life, we can avoid knowing and stay in not knowing. Trading, this is much more difficult position to stay in. We can't maintain an illusion of control in the markets as we can in other domains. Breathing and muscular tension are elements of an emotion. So when more acknowledged elements of an emotion (feeling and arousal for instance) show up, these elements are also present. They are also elements of an emotion that can be used to manage the intensity of the emotion so that the emotion does not reach critical mass and sweep the mind away. They are not the solution, but they are a management tool so that the brain does not get over heated by the excititory process of an emerging emotion. The meaning of associated with the emotion and triggering still has to be changed. But it is much easier to work meaning (trader's beliefs about uncertainty) when the train is in the station rather than with a full head of steam. I used to not focus on these two elements so early in training, and without these skills, it was much more difficult to learn to think differently. Again, these would be good guestions to pose in the other webinar. My hope is that you will post them there. Rande Howell

I would want to get a better understanding of what "subconscious" forces you are talking about. Usually they are simply parts of ourself that we avoid seeing. And in trading, what we have avoided so well comes to stalk us. What you'll notice is that the first skill set worked with is breathing and relaxation. It is these skills that keeps the brain from over reacting and we can begin to see what is actually going on in the mind that stops us from performing better. Rande

zdo As a person builds the skill sets, he doesn't go through them in a linear fashion. Leaps are made. Our job, particularly in the beginning, is to make sure that when a leap is made that the rest of the learning is also pulled in the chain. Emotion will be linked to internal parts of self soon. This is much like football. The student practices skill sets and over time they become automatic and not thought about. They become automatic memory as are the associations that you don't want to show up in trading. Rande Howell

zdo -- Don't know how much leverage. We're going to find out. My hope is that "voice chats" happen and people are able to develop a rigor in their helping one another. The guy from Russia is doing exactly that. He's making inquiry based on comments already made. My desire is for the focus to remain what is opening up in their understanding of themselves in trading. Pipsquip (msp) is on the money. He sees the fear of loss happening in his trading and recognizes that interrupting the arousal of fear by breathing and self soothing are the first steps in the journey for him. He also doesn't advise -- he simply relates his experience. This is engaging. My hope is that people dial in and explore. Rande Howell

If we can't be open about ourselves in trading here, I am willing to simply open a forum attached to my website where the environment fosters social learning. This is important to me and is why I choose a public forum. How public remains to be seen. Let me know. Rande Howell

The first class is about naming the fear, so that you have a handle to grasp a tool with. But most importantly, it is about developing the fundamental tools used to quell emotional tempests. Getting that under management -- all that breathing, SafePlace, and Fear Inoculation stuff - is about developing the tools to deal with the biology of emotion. With that tool, the body can be calmed and we can actually get to the problems of psychology that plague traders. Rande Howell

Please take your own advice

Mighty Mouse Wow. My hope is that you have as much training and experience in psychology and experience with people as you do in trading to base your observations on. If you are going to bully (or be honest with), at least try to find a domain in which you are competent to assess in. My hope is that you stick to trading. Once again, I see little reason to be in converation with you. My hope is that you are well in your world and have found deep connection in friendship and purpose that gives your life meaning. It is not a world I would choose to live in. Rande Howell

gosu Why not check out your projections before believing them? Talk to people over the next several weeks. Or you can stay where you are. Either way, it is your world that you are building, not mine. Good luck. Rande Howell

It's a big stretch, being that you have no basis for the assessment -- outside of your suspicions. One of the pieces in this course helps people move from making ungrounded assessments about characterizations of people rather than their performances to grounded assessments where the observer's suspicions, biases, and conjecture are no longer projected onto the performance of another. The world changes when we become aware that we are projecting our stuff on other people and start owning it. Rande Howell

SIUYA As always, I appreciate your double-edged humor. I didn't know you were coming. Look forward to it also. I'll tell you what is interesting to me. A number of people asked to come to this webinar. 5 were selected. And only 3 actually have followed through. It may be that they had to actually give a real email address (Go to Webinar requires it). Or life got in the way. Not sure. But they have not as of this moment taken advantage of a $750 value that they were being offered for free. My concern is that people's hesitation to act in their own concerns is pretty shallow, even when the door is opened for them. I understand the hesitation to act when risk is involved, but there is zero risk here. zdo went through some effort to select, to the best of his ability, those who were sincere and motivated. Where is the commitment to action to the follow through? Sounds like a trading issue to me...... PS. I will review before submitting. Rande Howell Rande Howell

Yeah, a lot was revealed. Here is what was revealed in my mind in rereading my answer. That I should not reply to comments in a hurry as my wife is urging me out the door so we can go out to dinner. That review button is pretty cool for buffing up comments. You'd figure that after 4 books and a past career in advertising as a creative director, photographer, and copywriter that I could write English better than that. Go figure. I do apologize for not reviewing my comments before submitting. And I promise not to place my desire for food and my wife's irritation with the amount of time I spend on this forum in front of my responsibility to present readable copy in front of people. But the intent of my response was on the mark of what I wanted to say. Rande Howell

A repeating pattern re-emerges. The test for competency in trading is for people who have passion for trading. Please check into the forum about the course. That's the criterion for other to assess by. There is grounding rather than an axe to grind. Out side of that, not interest in getting sucked into the cyclic nature of your conversations. Be well Rande

Psychological demon is a term I use for self limiting beliefs. In the polls I do on my webinars, a full 60-70% of the people voting find perfectionism as the biggest obstacle in their performance in trading. In this organization of self, the person believes they shouldn't lose. Yes, this is a learned belief from families and culture, but it is still a self limiting belief in the domain of trading where trading success is measured in the management probabililties rather than the need to be right. It is that belief that becomes the psychological demon. As an accountant this belief could be an effective belief, but not in trading. We are all embedded in a historical conversation about money, worth, mattering, and adequacy. From my perspective, this is unavoidable. I have worked with a number of traders who have gotten to a successful level of success, and once they hit this goal -- they began to realize that money did not solve deeper exitential questions about their value as a human being. They thought it would, but it didn't. This was my intent in discussing people like Bill Gates. Other traders don't bring this kind of history into trading. It is a very different narrative for them. For sure, other traders never revisit their attachment to money and continue to live their lives. I have also worked with a number of traders who have Asperger-like personalities where emotional nature was extremely limited. They have the makings of very successful traders. This lack of emotional intelligence shows up in other areas of their lives as a problem in their ability to connect with others and build attachment. In trading, and for them, these qualities serve them well. The large majority of people learning to become traders really need to develop a mindset that allows them to separate fear from uncertainty -- and learn to manage it. It is this domain of people that need help. People who have already figured this out clearly do not need help building a psychology that opens the door to effective trading. Bottom line, the assumption I hold is that all percieved reality is observer created. As you awaken the observer of thought, beliefs, and biasews to new perspectives, the observer changes and therefore the circumstance that they create changes. Rande Howell

Who says I choose to work traders? It arrived in my lap. They initially were just another population of people with problems. Then more and more traders keep showing up. It finally dawned on me that as a population, traders were highly motivated and had a sense of urgency that really made a difference in the change process I use. I would say I made a choice after the fact. Trading is a mansion with many rooms occupied by very different kinds of people at very different levels of competance. Your understanding of trading will be very different than others. From what you say, trading for you is taking place on a level that many traders have not evolved to yet. It doesn't mean that others are not suited for trading; it simply means they have a different learning curve. What most traders find out is that it is their psychology that stands in the way of their success. And that trading exposes their cleverly hidden psychological demons. It is that axion in trading that states: 80% of trading is mental. Taking a journey approach to life, trading becomes the context that a trader evolves in to create the possibility he strives for. A lack of success does not mean he or she is not suited for trading -- it simply demonstrates the elements of his or her psychology that need to be re-examined and re-built for the rigors of successful trading. Many people train to become proficient in a sport with no desire to play at the top levels. Good enough is simply good enough. It is their passion that keep them in the game. It is the striving that matters most in building the mental skillsets that is needed to evolve. Most traders simply desire to make a comfortable living at trading. Few want to be the best in the world. They simply want to be good enough. Having worked with wealthy people, one thing I know for sure is that they do not know joy any more than regular folks. It just appears that way to regular folk. Their problems are just more exaggerated because money hids them from having to deal with their human condition. In trading, as in life, your beliefs about the self and about your capacity to negotiate life produce the life you live in. In trading this is called: You trade your beliefs. It is these beliefs that must be changed for a more effective trader to show up. They are not born that way. But they must equip themselves. I believe it is this aspect that you miss. With highly financially successful traders, trading can still teach -- rather than just being a means of extracting money. The conversation of money still can evolve. Instead of staying stuck in their tiny ego, the question becomes, "Now that I have all this money, what meaning does it have for me that I can help make a difference in the world?" A powerful new way of understanding the self and our connection to the struggle of others becomes possible here. Bill Gates and Warren Buffet (as well as Ted Turner) have passed the threshold of their old money conversation and have evolved it so that a new world begins to show up. I have a deep admiration for Jim Goodnight of the company SASS that he founded. Though he is a billionaire, he still asks the question: How do I serve? What he knows is that when he is gone from this world, he will disappear into time. His money will simply be a decaying memory. What he also knows is that he has strived to make a positive difference in the world based on the fortune he was blessed with. So success simply opens the door to more evolved conversations about the purpose and meaning of money in the journey of life. Each trader is exactly where they need to be to learn the lessons they need to be learning NOW. Later, as current lessons become standard practice, new lessons becomes possible. Rande Howell

Most human beings I have met are struggling to get their act together. Some better than others. I still do practice as a licensed therapist, but find that this aspect of preparing people for the journey into life as very limiting. Trading presents a forum that exposes all the laundry -- both good and bad -- it is this that I enjoy. There are strengths and weaknesses within each of us. Learning to heal the wounds that bind us to mediocrity and to grow the strengths within each of us is what actually inspires me. I find trading to be to be a wonderful medium to work in. It is nearly black and white in terms of beliefs creating the reality we live in. Rande Howell

gosu I actually appreciate your comments. They provide a good stage for traders to explore their perceptions about trading -- and are given the opportunity of questioning them. So keep the comments coming. Observe the forum and find out how a mind can be trained for trading. Then assess from that position. This is my invitation to you. My sense about your assessments is that no matter how much evidence is presented, your opinion would never change. I'm comfortable with that. But, check out the forum and see what is happening as people go through the course. It will at least give you a basis for evaluation. It is the human mind and beliefs that engage the tools of trading. The tools of trading do not trade, the human being and mind do. Teaching people to face their fears and their self limiting beliefs so that they can act from inherent strengths is not limited to trading. It is the way we create our lives. When I talk trader educaters, they are very clear that the missing element in their teaching is the psychological element. They simply don't know how to teach it. So there seems to be a serious problem with experienced and successful traders being able to teach the psychological skills needed to perform the methodology they are teaching. It is simply a different skill set than they possess. The need for managing emotions and changing self limiting beliefs is exposed by trading. Trading does not teach you how to change basic beliefs that limit a trader's potential. In trading, that drama of life is on steriods. It cannot be avoided as in other domains of performance. What the vast majority of traders acknowledge is that the same fears and beliefs that inhibit their trading performance are also active in other aspects of their lives. They are just no so in your face as in trading. It takes a person who has a grasp of human nature, not trading, to work with belief. It is then applied to trading. In particular, few people are taught in their formative period how to separate uncertainty from fear -- the body and brain certainly do not naturally. It is a process that can be taught There should be traders who have gone through my training in this forum. I know they will be attending the course. Whether they will be participating in the forum, I don't know. They are not active on TL. If some do participate, engage them. There will still be folks exploring the course with each other. And, if you can, bring an open mind. If not, well, that's okay also. To your prosperity Rande Howell

And Just So No was a joke to most of the people who were in the trenches doing treatment with youth and their families as I was during this time period. We did get a lot of parents in denial who thought their kid would never lie to them or would never do such things. Of course, the same things are happening today. Back to the topic. Rande Howell

steve46 Well, being that it is going to be public information and I'm not in charge of the forum, it should be easy to access without filters from me. I'm leaving zdo in charge of evaluation. I trust his judgement. And I look forward to the discourse that is brought forth. Rande Howell

Kids keep doing drugs and more of them. The campaign was designed to lessen the problem. That is what didn't work. Rande Howell

gosu No one can stop you from having your opinions. This is actually something that folks at TL and I have discussed in the past and I decided that I would like to make this offer. One of the reasons is because of something zdo asked me after I had not participated in the psychology forums recently. My reply to him was that I did't see much psychology going on. He was surprized. And after reflection, I thought I'd make this offer. I personally haven't found these forums to be a great lead generating machine. My webinars with affiliates and my speaking at conferences are much more effective. My participation in the forums is more about keeping contact with people who are struggling with their psychology, but are not ready to commit to personal change. Learning more about the process of moving from hesitation to commitment to action is more of what I am after here. I truly don't see this as effective promotion for me. But I do see the struggle in people and wanted to contribute. If I want promotion, I'll keep my webinars with MetaStock and ForexClub, have them recorded so they can be viewed on their websites or on utube. So... there you go. Rande Howell