Home II Subscribe II Sitemap II Daily Updates II Forum II Privacy policy II Contact Us II  Member Login  

How Thanksgiving Can Make You a Better Trader - 11-30-2003

I love Thanksgiving. I think it is a great holiday. What better reason for a celebration than to take time to appreciate all your blessings. I’m not just talking about your possessions, but the greater blessings of health, family, and our own personal abilities as well.

Thanksgiving should be a year round holiday; however we only assign one day a year to being “thankful”. The rest of the time we’re busy with “getting” and acquiring more and more things. We get so busy working and “getting” that we often lose focus of why we are doing these things in the first place.

However, did you know that being thankful can not only make you happier, but improve your abilities as a trader as well?

Not to get into too much psycho-babble, but it is a well known truth that you tend to get what you focus your attention on. Therefore if you are always thinking about what is lacking in your life, you tend to experience even greater wants, yet if you concentrate on all the blessings you already have, you will tend to get even more blessings.

Ever notice how when things go right, almost everything goes right and when things go wrong, everything goes wrong? This is the same idea. When things go right you feel on top of the world. You can do no wrong. You make decisions with confidence and are not at all surprised when they turn out as you expected.

Yet when things go wrong, you have a tendency to concentrate on things going wrong, which only leads to more things going wrong. After a while this can become a vicious cycle which can eventually lead to depression and despair.

Now, it is only human nature to focus on what we need. In fact, if it is a serious need it is sometimes hard to think of anything else. This can be especially true when it comes to money.

It may be true that money can’t buy happiness, but a lack of money will sure bring you unhappiness. If you don’t have enough money to get by then it is hard to think of anything else. However concentrating on what you do not have will usually only make the situation worse. This, of course, is the exact opposite of what you want to happen.

The same is true of trading. If you are always afraid of losing money in your trades, then you are letting the emotions of fear and greed take over your thinking, and guess what is likely to be the result? Yep, you guessed it; you will be more likely to lose money trading.

Now this is not to say that you should not be prudent with your trades. You need to make certain decisions to protect your position and maximize your profits; however these decisions come from a different place than do the decisions based on the emotions of fear and greed.

So how do you get around fear and greed and the problem of getting what you do not want? Simple. By being thankful for what you already have.

How many times have you exited a trade with a small profit only to watch the market take off without you? Do you berate yourself for the money you “lost” instead of being thankful for the profit you earned? If you’re like most people you are thinking more about all the money you could have made instead of the money you did make. This is not having a thankful attitude.

You need to learn to be thankful for the profit you did make and to take the attitude of learning from your “mistake” so that you will not repeat it in the future (as an aside – you should know right here and now that you will repeat this mistake several times, so you may as well get used to it. No one ever catches every major move…me included).

Having this type of attitude will help take the pressure off of your trades and will hopefully allow you to become a better trader in the process. I can tell you from personal experience that it does help.

An attitude of thankfulness raises your emotions above those of fear and greed. Sometimes this is enough to help you see things more clearly and make better decisions. Other times, a thankful attitude will make you more aware of opportunities as they present themselves.

Either way, by being more thankful for all your blessings, not just your material ones, you will be concentrating your mind on bringing more good things into your life, instead of the bad things you do not really want.

Remember, when you focus on the good things in your life you will have a tendency to get more good things, and if you focus on the bad things in your life you will have a tendency to get more bad things.

In the end, the choice is yours to make. So why not try having an attitude of thankfulness year round, instead of just one day a year?

-Erich

Back to the Article Index

There are approximately
70 more articles
available in the Members Section!

Click here to Subscribe 

 To see Erich and Tom in action, in precise minute detail,
Test Drive the Premier Support and Resistance publication for free:

---

U.S. Government Required Disclaimer - Commodity Futures Trading Commission Futures and Options trading has large potential rewards, but also large potential risk. You must be aware of the risks and be willing to accept them in order to invest in the futures and options markets. Don't trade with money you can't afford to lose. This is neither a solicitation nor an offer to Buy/Sell futures or options. No representation is being made that any account will or is likely to achieve profits or losses similar to those discussed on this web site. The past performance of any trading system or methodology is not necessarily indicative of future results.

CFTC RULE 4.41 - HYPOTHETICAL OR SIMULATED PERFORMANCE RESULTS HAVE CERTAIN LIMITATIONS. UNLIKE AN ACTUAL PERFORMANCE RECORD, SIMULATED RESULTS DO NOT REPRESENT ACTUAL TRADING. ALSO, SINCE THE TRADES HAVE NOT BEEN EXECUTED, THE RESULTS MAY HAVE UNDER-OR-OVER COMPENSATED FOR THE IMPACT, IF ANY, OF CERTAIN MARKET FACTORS, SUCH AS LACK OF LIQUIDITY. SIMULATED TRADING PROGRAMS IN GENERAL ARE ALSO SUBJECT TO THE FACT THAT THEY ARE DESIGNED WITH THE BENEFIT OF HINDSIGHT. NO REPRESENTATION IS BEING MADE THAT ANY ACCOUNT WILL OR IS LIKELY TO ACHIEVE PROFIT OR LOSSES SIMILAR TO THOSE SHOWN.