Compare the Act of Trading with a Leisure Activity.

[Mark Jansen 10]

If you ever had to describe and compare the act of trading, with which leisure activity would you compare it too? Chess, checkers?

[SIUYA 11]

fly fishing or golf.

neither is a team sport or has an opponent (and if you count a fish as an opponent then you best not try trading):doh:, and they are totally rigged against you.

[jpennybags 11]

I would have to go with golf too... because of the mental aspect.

 

edit: My broker would be very pleased if I took 120 strokes to get through a trading session.

Edited February 4, 2015 by jpennybags

[Mark Jansen 10]

Hey SIUYA, I see that you are a big fan of fly fishing or fishing in general. I can surely relate this leisure activity with Forex trading, indeed do not consider the fish as your opponent and do consider contemplate on the stop/loss when reeling a too large salmon. Yesterday, I came across this article, the CCO of Easy-Forex opines that tradins is just like boxing: Easy-Forex CCO: Forex trading is like boxing - AtoZ ForexAtoZ Forex

[zdo 20]

As our luck would have it, analogues to various aspects of trading can be found in almost ALL games and gaming. Monopoly, surfing, poker, sailing, stratego, martial ‘arts’, roulette, auctions, dot dot dot ... even this silly list is still applicable...

 

The ‘virtues’, traits and strengths needed for all the games and gaming that have emphasis on skills for the outcomes are very similar to the ‘virtues’, traits and strengths, etc. that mark high level performance in trading.

Mastering the management of sizing, exposure, risk, etc - is necessary for all the games and gaming that have emphasis on random (- like) outcomes... it’s an absolute requisite to exquisitely master similar ‘MM’* skills to have any chance of thriving at trading.

 

You can tell a lot about yourself and where you are at in your development as a trader by the ‘metaphors’ that emerge from your mind (with a charge on them). Fwiw, on the spontaneous list above, poker and martial arts were the only two that that I had ever considered before... and at various points in time they did have a ‘charge’ for me...

until I learned to

KILL THE METAPHORs !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

* (the misleading ‘voice of trading’ term for it)

[zdo 20]

Got a few more minutes for parallels

MULLEN PUMMELED HIS LEG WITH WRENCHES TO BREAK UP THE SCAR TISSUE THAT WAS STRANGLING HIS BONES.

 

... Now that he was no longer preoccupied with skating, Mullen focused on the finer points of Debian and openSUSE. He devoured how-to manuals and lurked in Linux user forums, where he came to admire the impish creativity of hackers.

“I was attracted to the excitement of it, the rogue nature of it,” he says. “I got the same highs from the Linux community that I used to get from skating.”

The more he immersed himself in the world of Linux, the more Mullen began to discern parallels between how hackers craft code and how skaters invent tricks. Both enterprises, he concluded, consist of using a painstaking trial-and-error process to sequence tiny chunks of information into coherent wholes. “Something as subtle as eye positioning affects a trick,” Mullen says. “You shift your eyes, you pull your head out of alignment, and that changes the math of the board's energy, its momentum...."

 

The bold in that last sentence is to harken you all back to my encouragements across time in this ‘forum’ that traders who would really thrive need to start at restoring body flow - and not start or even include any fkn trading ‘psychology’ bs. Although only 1 in 1000 who read this will blve it - this "compares"! in trading ... Something as subtle as eye positioning affects a trade...hth

 

The way that tricks are built is that you chunk them,” Mullen said as he gingerly paced about, clad in a white T-shirt depicting the English singer Morrissey's head on a skater's body. “You're taking these syllabic forms and you're fitting them together to create this bigger book.” By “syllabic forms,” Mullen meant the fine muscle movements that underpin each phase of a trick—the twitch of a foot, the turn of a shoulder a certain number of degrees. He contends that those movements must be practiced again and again until they become instinctual, at which point they can be strung together into complex series.

When the time came for questions, a freshman piped up to express concern that today's skaters are less innovative than their forebears. “Profoundly said,” an animated Mullen replied, before going on to declare that his beloved sport has become “sterilized” and filled with “teams of these monsters”

the Parallel in that last paragraph = ‘voice of trading’... yada yada

 

Ya’ll have fun

Silicon Valley Has Lost Its Way. Can Skateboarding Legend Rodney Mullen Help It? | WIRED

 

zdo

[jpennybags 11]

There is much to be said about "living in the moment" regardless of what game you are playing. Where your eyes go, your head goes too... it is a subtle difference that effects outcomes.

[Mark Jansen 10]

An anology can be found in most of daily activities and could be related back to any the trading traits for Forex. However it indeed depends at what stage you are in, since experience matters the most and determines how you view at trading decisions. Nonetheless, the emotional aspects is highly impacting making the anology of poker with trading a very interesting comparison.

[jpennybags 11]

A few words from the golf coach and instructor Harvey Pennick. I think most traders would relate to these wise words:

 

No matter how poorly you play, there is always someone you can beat. No matter how well you play, there is always someone who can beat you.

 

You can hook a drive into the tall grass and then turn it into a par if you dig it out with a lofted club and follow with a good pitch or chip and putt. But if you muff a pitch or chip, you have lost a stroke nearly every time.

 

Yoga is the study of breathing. As I grow older, I reflect on how we take breathing for granted. Proper deep breathing is a joy, it calms your mind. Deep breathing is wonderful on the golf course as a provider of oxygen and strength throughout your body. I’ll bet on a deep breather any time, over a player who just breathes to stay alive.

 

The point of the swing is to hit a spot. Harry Vardon was a master. He knew you must hit what you swing at.

 

If you have a good grip and you can see the shot clearly in your mind and use the muscles picture of Clip The Tee or Brush The Grass, your swing will work- unless you start to doubt it.

 

Good players have the power to think while they are competing. Most golfers are not thinking, even when they believe they are. They are only worrying. Rather than worry, be mindful of the shot at hand and go ahead and play it as if you are going to hit the best shot of your life. You really might do it.

 

Supreme concentration is the peak experience of the golf swing.

 

A good grip, good balance and a good attitude make you a winner.

 

Nobody ever promised you life would be fair. To change your life you have to change the way you think.

 

When I ask you to Take Dead Aim, I mean that for a few seconds, you should be calm but aware, putting all your best attention into the moment at hand. You make what I think of as the sweet calculations of the wind and weather and distance. See a sharp picture of your ball striking your target in your mind. Bobby Fischer, the chess champion, said that when it was his turn to play, he considered only one move- the right one. You take out the club your mind tells your muscles is the right one to swing. At this point your imagination is stronger than your willpower. Your body will do what your mind tells it to do. You have no doubt, no fear. For those few seconds you are what you think. That’s Taking Dead Aim. Trust yourself.

 

Practicing your short game will help your long game in every way, but practicing your long game won’t help your short game at all.

 

It seems to me that confidence is the feeling we want to have in playing golf. But we can’t dismiss the value of faith either. I think faith is in the heart, and confidence is in the mind.

 

The ability to concentrate is good, but thinking too much about how you are doing what you are doing is disastrous. Trust your muscles and hit the ball in the hole. Keep it simple.

 

You don’t lose your swing between the ninth green and the tenth tee, and you don’t lose your swing from one day to the next. If you think you do, something is going on that you don’t understand. A diary might help explain it to you.

 

Golf is played in the present. If you can wash your mind clean each time while walking to your next shot, you have the makings of a champion.

 

Unless you have a reasonably good grip and stance, anything you read about the golf swing is useless.

 

Golf has probably kept more people sane than psychiatrists have.

 

Life consists of a lot of minor annoyances and a few matters of real consequence.

 

Use the swing God had blessed you with, and go play golf.

 

Just let it happen. Don’t try and hit the ball far. Instead develop a feeling that the ball is going to go a long way without your really trying. And sure enough, it will. I call it The Feeling of Far.

 

Don’t listen too hard to the sound of the world. If I tell you to Take Dead Aim you might think I’m being simpleminded. But Taking Dead Aim means blanking out the sounds of the world. It can be an advantage to be a little deaf.

 

A golfer rarely needs to hit a spectacular shot unless the one that precedes it was pretty bad.

 

A tournament champion is a winner on the golf course. A person of honor is a winner everywhere.

[Mark Jansen 10]

jpenny's bag, thank you for sharing the great words from Harvey Pennick. Surely lots of traders an find reassurance in these moving teachings. Appreciated!

[nhn 10]

I would have to go with golf too... because of the mental aspect.

 

edit: My broker would be very pleased if I took 120 strokes to get through a trading session.

 

This is a very funny one. He sure would. And I think we have the same broker!

[Ammeo 10]

If you ever had to describe and compare the act of trading, with which leisure activity would you compare it too? Chess, checkers?

 

For me its definitely has to be like playing a Strategy game. I love strategy games and sitting in front of the PC having these trading softwares opened in front of me along with market news sites is just the same experience.

[Mariaoffw72 0]

I think it would be with the Ajedrés because the movements when we trade have to be very studied and precise, but it is only because of looking for a similarity since the trading involves much more effort naturally.

[CrazyCzarina 17]

Chess and trading have a lot of things in common including the fundamental fact that you can never predict the outcome in each. In both, your actions can result in consequences that aren’t in your hand. Both chess and trading, though polar in nature, are again similar in the fact that knowing the rules, the basics, or how to play won’t help when you actually get on the field. So, if you’re into trading and stock market and looking to make decent cash on trading, start by playing chess.