Plan and study.
To succeed in trading, starting with the right attitude and personal objectives, is critical. Your personality will play the larger role in this exercise, while your technical knowledge will grow over time.
It’s been said that the failure rate for traders is around 95%, but don’t let that scare you. Most of the failures are the result of poor discipline, lack of concentration, and uncontrolled emotions. All problems that are fixable if you’re willing to work at it.
To avoid the crowd at 95%, it helps to be serious about personal objectives. This approach will allow you to break your goals into manageable parts. You will learn to control being overwhelmed and discouraged, and you will be able to measure and monitor your progress.
Start by establishing your level of knowledge and experience, and then think about where you want to end up. Write your thoughts and ideas down on paper, and date it. Peter Drucker, a well known business teacher and writer coined the S.M.A.R.T. acronym in 1954, where
S= Specific: clear and concise. Weed out the vague objectives.
M= Measureable: make sure you have a time line. Don’t use money earned or projected money to be earned from trading. Stick with training and learning objectives.
A= Attainable: be realistic, make it feasible. Don’t start with anything other than basic training.
R=Results Oriented: focus on results rather than specific objectives. Relevant: are the objectives doable in the time frame?
T=Time: establish deadlines and work to reach them.
Trading is a journey that requires committment, and a good work ethic, mixed with clearly defined personal objectives. It is a source of constant learning, and will reward you with a very real depth of satisfaction and accomplishment. You will be in a special minority of people who have transitioned from the ordinary, everyday variety, to a group who control their financial world with confidence. They have acquired the unique talent and experience that make them private traders.
Are you ready?