Why Traders Continue to Fail - When They Are Trying Hard Not to Lose

[Guest OILFXPRO]

I have been a professional trader for 8 years and I say this not to be argumentative but helpful. The reason most traders fail is not psychological. They fail because they dont have an edge, This whole notion of "just follow the rules and you will make money" makes it easy for people to sell worthless systems and claim "the system is the least important part, just follow it and all the riches in the world are yours, the system isnt broken you are"

 

I have been involved in the development of numerous trainee classes. Within 3-4 months their discipline is spot on. We have risk managers monitoring their positions, they have strict daily limits that the company wont let them breach and all manner of other tools to keep discipline and control in check. I know a lot of people trading from home dont have this, but that only proves my point further, that even with 100% perfect discipline some people still dont make money,

 

You need to have an edge in the market. It is as simple as that, You need to exploit an inefficiency and these inefficiencies are always changing. The reason why most people fail is trading is one of, if not, the most competitive industry in the world and there are programmers running every possible variable you can imagine to find patterns yielding profits.

 

I would love to be proven wrong an have someone show me they make consistent money month in month out with a simple moving average system or such like but my 8 years in this industry have resulted in me making money by constantly adapting and finding new edges and my bad periods have come when they stop working, not when i need some discipline check.

 

My advice to any trader going through a rough patch is do more research, start building new approaches and cut back size until you find your groove again. Dont just keep trading some gurus system and let him tell you "its your discipline"

 

There are plenty of professional traders cum trading educators in disguise.,running all sorts of educational training.The edge in trading is handed freely by the market in trend trading , this edge never disappears , it is the skill of the profitable traders to use this edge.There is no other edge. .What disappears regularly is discipline overcome by emotions.The trading industry has more educators than successful traders , because the phsyche is more important than anything else.

[Rande Howell 10]

Rande Howell

 

I want you to solve my problem , I am from a family of immense wealth , I have a set of systems that makes 500 % a year without compounding , add compounding and I am a billionaire or trillion in a few years.

 

I know how to make money in the markets , it took me over 15 years practice and to learn the skills .I can not sit in front of computers and screens ,and follow my money management /position size plans.

 

My systems involve multiple instruments indices and fx,So to eliminate or reduce Phsyche problems , I hired a few assistants to follow a system ,.they too had emotional problems to execute .

 

I am lost with these idiots that I hired .They do screw up with their phsyche.

 

How can I win?and how can I make idiots perform?

 

Look at what you have said here. And then look in the mirror. Who is hiring those "idiots". If you look there, rather than hold others responsible for your problems, you will be getting much closer to understanding the problem and how to solve it.

 

Being born into a problem of immense wealth, and its induction into blindness, is part of the problem you will need to re-organize and solve.

 

I wish you well. Bill Gates did his kids a favor by eliminating this pitfall.

 

Rande Howell

www.tradersstateofmind.com

[Rande Howell 10]

I am trying to detach emotions from trading execution , by employing 2 different assistants for two tasks in execution.One assistant looks for signals and passes them to the other assistant , the second enters the trades and manages the trade and exits.It becomes a mechanical execution , still with some emotions but less emotions and clearer minds.

 

Will it work?

 

Even mechanical solutions are created by minds with biases in their understanding of how to manage uncertainty. Read my first response. The problem does not lie with them, but with you. You solve the problem of "you" and the assistant's contribution to the problem clears up -- one way or the other.

 

Rande Howell

[72black 10]

Great article & discussion that has followed.

 

We live in an instant gratification society and expect the same of any endeavors we partake in our life time.

 

When we go to a paid for time job (3 letter dirty word) at the end of the week we are paid for our time, whereas trading we can sit in front of the screen for a week only to not be rewarded. No action no pay. In the back of our minds we expect to be rewarded for time so I believe we envisage what we want to see and make a move to get a reward of time spent. :missy:

 

This only part of what I experience daily in an attempt of detaching my emotions on the psychological roller coaster of trading.

[Rande Howell 10]

Great article & discussion that has followed.

 

We live in an instant gratification society and expect the same of any endeavors we partake in our life time.

 

When we go to a paid for time job (3 letter dirty word) at the end of the week we are paid for our time, whereas trading we can sit in front of the screen for a week only to not be rewarded. No action no pay. In the back of our minds we expect to be rewarded for time so I believe we envisage what we want to see and make a move to get a reward of time spent. :missy:

 

This only part of what I experience daily in an attempt of detaching my emotions on the psychological roller coaster of trading.

 

A trader's notion of work has to change from a sense of the urgency of doing to a notion where work is the effective coordination of action -- mostly by observing. Until you get beyond believing you have to be doing something to trade, the work of trading remains elusive to the trader.

 

Also, I don't see any way of detaching from emotions. Our very bodies are the embodiment of emotion. The key is something zdo once stated -- It is not freedom FROM emotion that the trader seeks. It is freedom OF emotion that is sought. The dispassion that most traders covet is, in fact, an emotional state. It's not the absence of emotion.

 

Rande Howell

[Guest OILFXPRO]

Then, as you become more mindful of whether your notions of work are effective for trading, start to recognize patient observation as the key to effective work in trading. And realize that success in one domain does not generalize mindlessly into another domain, such as trading.

If this is your career, you are going to need to develop the mind that trades right alongside the knowledge base of knowing how to trade. It takes both. Developing the mind you bring to the performance of trading is not an option to a successful career in trading – it is a necessity. And it is going to have to be re-invented for you to be effective in trading.

 

The problems arise after a bit of experience of live trading , the mind needs to be retrained constantly after draw down and losing periods..After this experience , the mind has memories of these periods and tries every way to avoid any more harm , by avoiding and missing trades as a precaution to avoid losses .The mind even suffers analysis /paralysis , it can not trigger more trade execution and freezes and it needs to constantly retrained.

 

There are other mindset issues like reward set mindsets , which try at any price to succeed and gain reward , even risking entire accounts.

 

Set ups materialize within minutes , the mind is unable to process these new changes quickly and adapt quickly , set ups also fail within minutes and mindsets are often too slow to exit trades.

[Rande Howell 10]

The problems arise after a bit of experience of live trading , the mind needs to be retrained constantly after draw down and losing periods..After this experience , the mind has memories of these periods and tries every way to avoid any more harm , by avoiding and missing trades as a precaution to avoid losses .The mind even suffers analysis /paralysis , it can not trigger more trade execution and freezes and it needs to constantly retrained.

 

There are other mindset issues like reward set mindsets , which try at any price to succeed and gain reward , even risking entire accounts.

 

Set ups materialize within minutes , the mind is unable to process these new changes quickly and adapt quickly , set ups also fail within minutes and mindsets are often too slow to exit trades.

 

Yes. I consider the rewiring of brain after painful event (losing, particular big, or continued losing) to be traumatic memory. The brain interprets as threat to biological system and not the discomfort of losing a trade. And you can bet the brain is going to become hyper-vigilent and produce avoidant responses to further possibility of loss.

 

Winning, as a reward mechanism, is also counterproductive to the brain/mind of a trader -- and it's a hard one. If you are ever looking at charts for a place to get in because you need to be in to be trading and making money, you have experience the dopamine rush of urgency to act. A serious problem for traders who have not developed patience as the most important emotional skill to master in the beginning.

 

Rande Howell

[steve46 12]

Yes. I consider the rewiring of brain after painful event (losing, particular big, or continued losing) to be traumatic memory. The brain interprets as threat to biological system and not the discomfort of losing a trade. And you can bet the brain is going to become hyper-vigilent and produce avoidant responses to further possibility of loss.

 

Winning, as a reward mechanism, is also counterproductive to the brain/mind of a trader -- and it's a hard one. If you are ever looking at charts for a place to get in because you need to be in to be trading and making money, you have experience the dopamine rush of urgency to act. A serious problem for traders who have not developed patience as the most important emotional skill to master in the beginning.

 

Rande Howell

 

We react to events around us, and in the process of reacting, we interpret each event and give it significance....within that (very short) time period we produce a cascade of chemical compounds that act on various parts of our brain.....and it is that chemistry that produces the "feelings" that we act on......this "chemical cascade" happens whether or not the event is positive or negative.....either way we are subject to a multi-stage process called "arousal".

 

In the course of my own classes, I watch carefully as students transition from sim to real trading and after a while you can see it, in their responses, in the "response time" and in the verbal communications from each student as the trade progresses from entry to the fill, to the first partial profit, and ultimately to the final exit at the profit target or when they are stopped out....

 

The bottom line for me, is that what I see....is a multi-stage process that has to be mastered before a person can consistently do this work....you have to A) have, or learn to create a system that has a mathematical edge.....B) You have to learn to manage your initial emotional response (arousal) long enough to recognize your system's profit opportunities and C) You need to understand how the nervous system reacts to stimulus and learn to manage that arousal process so that you can manage the trade efficiently and bring home a profit...and just as importantly you need to learn to manage your responses to the inevitable losses that are part of this profession.

 

For folks who understand this, you then start to see why so many fail....because in addition to the obvious challenges, there are hidden physiological issues that we all have to learn to deal with....

 

Good luck

Steve

Edited August 24, 2013 by steve46

[sergso 10]

"I’m about to pull out what little hair I have left. I keep running into the same brick wall over and again. I’ve been trading 5 years and I win consistently when "play money" is on the table. But the moment I move from paper money to real money and really risk my capital, things just go haywire. And I don’t know why."

 

The answer is easy. When you stop paper trading you leave dreamland and you enter reality.

 

The only way to learn how to trade is by risking money and doing real trades. Only then you face reality.

[steve46 12]

"I’m about to pull out what little hair I have left. I keep running into the same brick wall over and again. I’ve been trading 5 years and I win consistently when "play money" is on the table. But the moment I move from paper money to real money and really risk my capital, things just go haywire. And I don’t know why."

 

The answer is easy. When you stop paper trading you leave dreamland and you enter reality.

 

The only way to learn how to trade is by risking money and doing real trades. Only then you face reality.

 

If you read the above and think about it, the alternatives are relatively straightforward. There are two (2).....one is that you look for a resource like Rande, who understands what the obstacles are....the other is that you try the "do-it-yourself" route using your own money....either way the risks are about the same (assuming you trade a system that has a true mathematical edge).....

 

The more I read of Rande's approach, the more I respect his experience....the remaining problem I have with his (Jungian) orientation is related to the attachment of symbolism to what we now understand to be a physiological process.....from my point of view, attaching a symbol to a physiological process puts the trader at arms length from the real problem....I haven't decided yet whether that is a good thing (a "buffer" of sorts) or just one more obstacle to overcome...I also know that there are institutions that use simple "stress training" (military and police for example) to help their trainees to overcome issues related to arousal....it works pretty well

 

For my students I suggest they either A) go live with small size (2-3 contracts) or sim trade with at least 3 contracts. Either way I am able to observe how they act (and react) to conditions prior to, during and after each sequence. Because some folks seem to have a capacity to "handle" stress....not all folks need that help....as Clint Eastwood said in one of his movies...."a man's gotta know his limitations".....(or maybe it was "make my day punk")

Edited August 25, 2013 by steve46

[Rande Howell 10]

We react to events around us, and in the process of reacting, we interpret each event and give it significance....within that (very short) time period we produce a cascade of chemical compounds that act on various parts of our brain.....and it is that chemistry that produces the "feelings" that we act on......this "chemical cascade" happens whether or not the event is positive or negative.....either way we are subject to a multi-stage process called "arousal".

 

In the course of my own classes, I watch carefully as students transition from sim to real trading and after a while you can see it, in their responses, in the "response time" and in the verbal communications from each student as the trade progresses from entry to the fill, to the first partial profit, and ultimately to the final exit at the profit target or when they are stopped out....

 

The bottom line for me, is that what I see....is a multi-stage process that has to be mastered before a person can consistently do this work....you have to A) have, or learn to create a system that has a mathematical edge.....B) You have to learn to manage your initial emotional response (arousal) long enough to recognize your system's profit opportunities and C) You need to understand how the nervous system reacts to stimulus and learn to manage that arousal process so that you can manage the trade efficiently and bring home a profit...and just as importantly you need to learn to manage your responses to the inevitable losses that are part of this profession.

 

For folks who understand this, you then start to see why so many fail....because in addition to the obvious challenges, there are hidden physiological issues that we all have to learn to deal with....

 

Good luck

Steve

 

This is why I state that the mind that you bring to trading is not the mind that is going to bring success in trading. For most people, this reorganization of brain/mind can be taught, but, as you probably see on a daily basis, not everyone is willing to put in the heavy emotional training required to rebuild the circuitry of the brain. I see it happen all the time. I also see people back away from the challenge and look for another solution. Left brain and right brain really do have to fire together to produce success in trading.

 

When they are trained together, that's the shortest distance for the learning curve.

 

Rande Howell

[zdo 20]

...the mind that you bring to trading is not the mind that ...

 

Maybe everyone gets it except me ... but if you have time and energy, would you clarify / define how you are using the word mind here ? Many thanks.

[Rande Howell 10]

Maybe everyone gets it except me ... but if you have time and energy, would you clarify / define how you are using the word mind here ? Many thanks.

 

Mind is a term I use to describe the historical organization of Self produced as adaptation to circumstance and environment during the formative period of brain development. Mind emerges from that brain. A good example is the attitudes of success that proved successful in the past that many traders bring into trading from former careers and businesses. The urgency to act, to make things happen, is a killer in the trading environment.

 

To be more technical, it would be the organization of the community of emotional programs of the brain that give rise to the mind that people bring to trading.

 

Rande Howell

[SIUYA 11]

Hi Rande,

by chance i have been reading both Thinking fast and slow, (Kahneman) and AntiFragile (Taleb) at the same time. It interesting what you get from reading books together like this....

 

Anyways....

 

there is the halo effect - "The halo effect or halo error is a cognitive bias in which one's judgments of a person’s character can be influenced by one's overall impression of him or her"

 

but i think this refers more to the judgement by people on others....is there a self halo effect, or is it simply the normal optimistic view we have that ignores the realities of life and elevates ourselves above our real capabilities?

IMHO I think this is usually when trading hits home the most for many folks - the brutal honesty of it. They either face it, learn and move on, or deny, deny, deny.....

 

or do you think that there is more to it than that?

 

.............

slightly similar....

I am also renovating at present and its amazing how even in the building game and the fact that no matter what people think, things take longer, cost more and will reveal hidden problems. Shaking my head at the builders optimism - I am winning bets with him as I am simply being pessimistic abut his time frames.

[Rande Howell 10]

Hi Rande,

by chance i have been reading both Thinking fast and slow, (Kahneman) and AntiFragile (Taleb) at the same time. It interesting what you get from reading books together like this....

 

Anyways....

 

there is the halo effect - "The halo effect or halo error is a cognitive bias in which one's judgments of a person’s character can be influenced by one's overall impression of him or her"

 

but i think this refers more to the judgement by people on others....is there a self halo effect, or is it simply the normal optimistic view we have that ignores the realities of life and elevates ourselves above our real capabilities?

IMHO I think this is usually when trading hits home the most for many folks - the brutal honesty of it. They either face it, learn and move on, or deny, deny, deny.....

 

or do you think that there is more to it than that?

 

.............

slightly similar....

I am also renovating at present and its amazing how even in the building game and the fact that no matter what people think, things take longer, cost more and will reveal hidden problems. Shaking my head at the builders optimism - I am winning bets with him as I am simply being pessimistic abut his time frames.

 

SIUYA

 

I've found that the "halo effect" can also have a set of horns as well, depending on the person's history. We all project our "stuff" onto others, particularly in the beginning when there is no history to disrupt our automatic assessments. This is particular true of the delusional state called romantic love. We tend to see ourselves and others through the eyes of our ideal initially rather than waiting for the other to show up. Then we wake up from the ethers a disillusioned person -- until the next time.

 

Same as it is in trading. People really bring a highly biased view of themselves and what constitutes success into trading. It's a real halo effect -- I call it blindness. And no matter how much feedback to the contrary, they will maintain their notions of success until their capital is really dented. Then the wiser ones realize that the trick is in re-organizing the beliefs they are projecting upon market. The Buddha called this "Waking Up". Carl Jung said it another way -- Seeking enlightenment by turning toward the light ignores that you fear your shadow. Until you face and make peace with your shadow, enlightenment is illusionary. Trading simply forces the issue like few other occupations I've ever worked around.

 

As an aside, I've decided that older white American men who watch Fox News as their source of information about the world will never gain the humbled wisdom to stop projecting ineffective beliefs into the market and insist their perception is right despite negative feedback to the contrary. However, it sells an enormous amount of advertising and makes people rich pandering to these beliefs.

 

My history with builders is the same as yours. It goes with anything that you have to estimate time and materials. When I ran an advertising agency, we would multiply our best guess of the cost of a project by a factor of 3 to get at a better projection of final costs. We only saw the good news, maybe, hoped for news would be a better description

 

Rande

[johnw 10]

Good morning from St. Martin (French Side)

 

As always a very interesting thread.

If you wiki "List of cognitive biases" you may be as suprised as I am to see a seemingly never ending list ..how on earth is an Individual expected to work through this list I wonder.

 

My favourite cb is The Dunning-Kruger Effect ....we are surrounded by it and it is in play at a very serious level right now.

I wouldn't be at all suprised to wake up tomorrow morning (Sunday) to the news that the World has yet again lurched into another blunder.... blunder upon blunder

 

I do agree with you Rande that trading is very effective at bringing People to the point where they accept that they must re-organise themselves or retreat back into their world of make believe.

Short of putting your own life on the line, trading provides a brutal mirror into which we can gaze... what happens next is up to us.

 

And so this thread has brought together two keystones of trading.

Steve46 writes about having a proven mathematical edge ... this is essential and it must be complete and seamless (no gaps) ... and it must be doable in Real Time .... the mathematical edge will most probably be layered.... to take account of context, triggers and exits.... in other words it is probability upon probability upon probability etc

Each of these situations have a probability and when they are layered one on top of the other you have a trade. ... anything less than this and you do not have a trade... the market controls the game, but you control the trigger.

 

Rande, your simultaneous firing of left/right brain (what I call 'lining up all the troops')

maximises our potential ...and makes Simple Tasks (trading) that are very hard to do, become Simple.

 

As for the seemingly endless list cognitive biases .... the more you combine Rande's seamless combination of left/right brain and apply it to the mathematical edge that Steve46 talks about, then the more you will relax.

The more you relax, then the more the cog biases will melt away ... after all, we are trying to reclaim the life that is ours to live, just as other People are trying desperately to wrench away from us. sounds a lot like the Markets doesn't it.

 

Nice to hear Buddha andCarl Jung mentioned together, Rande.

Carl and I shared a birthday last month .... with one major difference ...and it was the same day that Mick Jagger turned 70 as it turned out.... he has a three year head start on me.

 

Good luck next week

 

PS. Rhythm... I forgot to mention rhythm.

I find it most important to put my self into the same rhythm for each trading day and the day starts on the previous evening.

I do not vary my routine of sleeping, waking time, exercise, breakfast etc ... the only thing that I want to see bouncing around is The Price .... this I believe is the third pillar.

Edited August 31, 2013 by johnw

[Guest OILFXPRO]

This is why I state that the mind that you bring to trading is not the mind that is going to bring success in trading. For most people, this reorganization of brain/mind can be taught, but, as you probably see on a daily basis, not everyone is willing to put in the heavy emotional training required to rebuild the circuitry of the brain. I see it happen all the time. I also see people back away from the challenge and look for another solution. Left brain and right brain really do have to fire together to produce success in trading.

 

When they are trained together, that's the shortest distance for the learning curve.

 

Rande Howell

 

The mind that you bring to trading was developed from books read and courses , books /courses which promised success and knowledge ,otherwise no point in buying the books /courses.The books are written by failed traders , these authors could not make money from trading , they rely on income from royalties and Amazon.Unfortunately the mind of most readers ,is stuffed with failed author trading crap and this mind is trained to fail.

 

The books created biases to behave in the beliefs of the authors , if the authors stated the truth , but the authors never told the ugly side of markets or how to react when what the authors promised turned out to be a lie.All the authors told was a rosy picture to sell a book.

 

The mind was not developed with information from George Sorros , but with misinformation from failures and failed trader gurus on internet and forums.

[steve46 12]

The mind that you bring to trading was developed from books read and courses , books /courses which promised success and knowledge ,otherwise no point in buying the books /courses.The books are written by failed traders , these authors could not make money from trading , they rely on income from royalties and Amazon.Unfortunately the mind of most readers ,is stuffed with failed author trading crap and this mind is trained to fail.

 

The books created biases to behave in the beliefs of the authors , if the authors stated the truth , but the authors never told the ugly side of markets or how to react when what the authors promised turned out to be a lie.All the authors told was a rosy picture to sell a book.

 

The mind was not developed with information from George Sorros , but with misinformation from failures and failed trader gurus on internet and forums.

 

As with so many things that people type into this website, there is truth to what you say, but it doesn't help the trader to move toward a productive goal (assumed to be making money).

 

Reading this post one gets the impression that people lack the ability to think independently about the world around them.....If that's the case, those folks aren't going to do well in this business....

 

As regards "failed" traders....I have no data to confirm that traders who write books are "failed" traders.....with regard to courses I always execute a due diligence process, so the responsibility for outcomes is on ME...this is how adults do it...and until someone else types in a better alternative that's what I suggest other adults do for themselves...if you think about it this business is about being paid to accept and manage risk. I think the sooner a person "gets that" the sooner they go out and get the tools they need to obtain success.

 

Finally, I notice that even when a person is "given" a valid system, quite often they cannot execute in a disciplined way....to me it doesn't matter why, its just a fact of life...some folks aren't cut out to trade successfully....Again it seems to come down to adult behavior....if you give it your best shot and it doesn't work out, then you move on to your next choice....eyes fully open all the time...

 

Good luck

[Guest OILFXPRO]

As with so many things that people type into this website, there is truth to what you say, but it doesn't help the trader to move toward a productive goal (assumed to be making money).

 

Reading this post one gets the impression that people lack the ability to think independently about the world around them.....If that's the case, those folks aren't going to do well in this business....

 

As regards "failed" traders....I have no data to confirm that traders who write books are "failed" traders.....with regard to courses I always execute a due diligence process, so the responsibility for outcomes is on ME...this is how adults do it...and until someone else types in a better alternative that's what I suggest other adults do for themselves...if you think about it this business is about being paid to accept and manage risk. I think the sooner a person "gets that" the sooner they go out and get the tools they need to obtain success.

 

Finally, I notice that even when a person is "given" a valid system, quite often they cannot execute in a disciplined way....to me it doesn't matter why, its just a fact of life...some folks aren't cut out to trade successfully....Again it seems to come down to adult behavior....if you give it your best shot and it doesn't work out, then you move on to your next choice....eyes fully open all the time...

 

Good luck

 

The only evidence we have is these failed traders make money from writing books , there is no evidence to suggest any consistent income from trading.Most of authors continued to fail , when they were trying hard not to lose , gave up trading and tried to recover losses from authoring and selling courses.

 

People trade their emotions and biases , most people find it difficult to follow rules and systems.The people giving out these systems are the the ones who can't trade their own systems , if they could they would not be selling them or giving them away.

 

A famous author who sells courses and trading education , wrote in his book , that he would not tell anyone if he had a profitable system.In effect his book was filled with garbage about lagging indicators on 15 minutes and all other misinformation about successful trading..

 

This misinformation comes out in live trading.

[steve46 12]

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Edited September 1, 2013 by steve46

[steve46 12]

Using the phrase "failed traders" doesn't make it so.....I know of several traders who write books and they all make money trading....Linda Raschke, Larry Williams, Larry Connors just off the top of my head....I have books from all three in my library.....I read the books....I saw some concepts that might work for me.....I tested them.....I used some, and discarded the rest......if instead I had simply "gone live" risking capital without verifying the data....whose fault would that have been?

 

The choices are straightforward....do your own thinking and be responsible for yourself or bring your mother to the bookstore with you.....

[Rande Howell 10]

Using the phrase "failed traders" doesn't make it so.....I know of several traders who write books and they all make money trading....Linda Raschke, Larry Williams, Larry Connors just off the top of my head....I have books from all three in my library.....I read the books....I saw some concepts that might work for me.....I tested them.....I used some, and discarded the rest......if instead I had simply "gone live" risking capital without verifying the data....whose fault would that have been?

 

The choices are straightforward....do your own thinking and be responsible for yourself or bring your mother to the bookstore with you.....

 

I'm with Steve on this. I work a number of traders who are successful traders (post their results), have written books (rarely a profit center for them), and train traders -- because they like working with people and making a difference in their lives and see this work as another profit center for their trading business. I'm hoping that this part of their business is successful because it takes a lot of effort and without compensation, they are not going to do it for long. Right off the top of my head, Larry Gaines, Scott Barkley, Jeff Killian, and Thomas Barman come to mind.. Scott even gives 10% of his earnings (tithes) to an orphanage in Easter Europe. Jeff and I have just finished a manuscript for a book together. The reason that they all have developed relationships with me is that they realize that KNOW HOW is only one part of success in trading. Eventually, the trader learns that the mind has to be developed to use the KNOW HOW. That's the Right and Left Brain integration.

 

The difference with Steve that I see is that he is more discriminating about the traders he will begin working with. Eventually a trader is going to have to reorganize the beliefs his holds about his capacity to manage uncertainty. The more he resists, the more cynical he becomes to support his world view.

 

I also run into traders who, when they get their heads together, do not produce successful results because they discover there are serious flaws in their trading systems. It cuts both ways. The first order of business is to become a discerning consumer of trader education.

 

Rande Howell

[Guest OILFXPRO]

Training the mind is not the only task that needs to make a successful trader , the trading job is several jobs put together and all these other skills need to be gained.These skills and jobs include the jobs of chartists , analyst , buddhist monk (meditation), trader , risk manager , researcher ,systems developer , tester , masochist , psychologist ,trainer , mathematician ,antagonist (fighting the trading gold rush merchants selling picks ,shovels and maps to the trading gold) ,emotional regulator ,hunter/stalker ,programmer and trade executor .

 

Go to Goldman Sachs and they will have different psychologists , chartists , traders , analysts , risk managers , researchers , trainers and coaches .Go to a hospital , you will see receptionist , nurse , registrar ,doctor , surgeon specialist , radiographer ,supervisor and other specialists.We are expecting a one man band to do all those jobs simultaneously .

 

Science facts: Our brains are bombarded by an estimated 2,000,000 bits of information every second. Processing such a huge amount of information would cause the brain to “freeze”. Therefore, we delete, distort and generalise most of it down to around 134 bits of information.What this means is that we choose only a tiny proportion of the total amount that is available to us, and those 134 bits of information we allow in to our brains are the things that determine what we call reality.Most traders will continue to fail , as we are not capable of doing several jobs at the same time , and react in nano seconds and execute trades perfectly with precise timing .In hindsight all patterns and all trading looked okay , in real time it does not work .

 

Trading requires experience and successful trading is learnt by intuition , because you need the experience to know when to be in the market and when not to , you need to avoid profitable set ups as the risk is greater in certain situations.

 

I made a person from outside the trading industry into a profitable trader within one month.He had absolutely no knowledge of trading , had never traded in his life and had no trading skills.He had a fresh mind and i built his mind for trading ,that person can produce 100 pips a week for me consistently.

 

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FnKdsnDa4kc]Lion cubs learn a lesson in stalking and hunting - BBC wildlife - YouTube[/ame]

[Guest OILFXPRO]

 

Go to Goldman Sachs and they will have different psychologists , chartists , traders , analysts , risk managers , researchers , trainers and coaches .Go to a hospital , you will see receptionist , nurse , registrar ,doctor , surgeon specialist , radiographer ,supervisor and other specialists.We are expecting a one man band to do all those jobs simultaneously .

 

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Multiple tasks and jobs create distractions and lack of clear focus , your mind is overloaded to work effectively.Overload creates fatigue and loss of focus.The demands of watching the screen hour after hour make it difficult to be sharp, creating fatigue effects that are well-known to pilots, car drivers, and soldiers

 

Most traders brains are overloaded ,

 

Mental Breakdown | Sweat2Shred

 

29 Dangerously Overloaded Vehicles | Fork Party