KNOWING YOURSELF IS IMPORTANT FOR YOUR TRADING AND INVESTING IN THE FINANCIAL MARKET

Knowing yourself is important for your trading and investing in the financial market

An essential variable of trading and investing in the forex, futures, and stock market is the awareness of things about yourself that affect focus and follow-through. A few of these things are associated with your ability to prepare and analyze data, process information, stay committed, and also your quality of thoughts. These are a few of the elements of having good discipline. However, it is almost impossible to be stably disciplined if you do not identify your distraction. Besides, changing things about your trading process that is stuck in out-of-awareness, feeling, doing, and thinking patterns may be quite impossible.
 

For instance, let us consider a trader – Sam. Sam day-trades Futures and has been trading actively for many years. He records undependable and erratic profits, which often fluctuates dramatically in the same session. When Sam makes money, his confidence is over the roof, feeling like a power trader. However, when losing money, he is often overwhelmed by the feelings of failure, being stupid, and being a loser. Unfortunately, Sam loses more than he makes profits. Usually, Sam often wonders why he cannot be consistently successful and why his losses are higher than his profits. He wonders this despite not having a trading plan; neither does he document his trades consistently. Even though he has plenty of rules, he almost always violates them regularly. Sam has no clue, yet he wonders why it seems impossible for him to record different outcomes despite continuing with his behavioral pattern. Technically, Sam has lost control, and unless he changes, he is headed towards rocky financial places. Are you Sam?
 

To change your behavior, first, you need to change the way you think. But then, your thoughts are mostly driven by your subconscious/unconscious; hence, the reason you must be aware of your underlying self-sabotaging beliefs that drive emotions, behaviors, and thoughts. Arguably, trading in the financial market is the most difficult venture worldwide. And this is because trading forex, futures, and stocks involve money; for every movement while trading, you are either winning or losing money. However, it is often more than that. Our society doesn’t revolve around only money; it is tied up in your identity. When winning money, you often feel competent, powerful, and intelligent.
 

On the contrary, when losing, you may feel stupid, incompetent, or impotent. Factually, when you visit the market, you are invariably expressing yourself; it doesn’t matter if you either try to, want to, or feel the need to. What matters is that you express yourself. However, when expressing yourself, your behavior is mostly connected to the subconscious or unconscious beliefs. Actually, the character flaws in your personality, and overall weaknesses will be challenged and tested when you are in the market. But then, do not think this it’s the market that does that for you. Typically, the market has zero intention for you, despite often wondering how the market knew that you just went long on trade, and the markets chose that particular moment to reverse.
 

Similarly, the forex, futures, and stock market doesn’t reward nor punish; neither does it inflict pains or pose a risk; instead, it only offers consequences – the consequences of your actions. Technically, you are the one who provides the rest. And to change yourself, you need to provide all the condiments for that too.

It is impossible to change what you do not know or cannot confront. That is, awareness is essential. The more you are aware of your underlying self-sabotaging beliefs, the higher your chances of positioning yourself appropriately to tackle the issue.

At this juncture, you may be wondering how to do this. That is, how to improve your awareness of these underlying limiting beliefs. This is good! Awareness starts by asking yourself questions – by introspection and personal observations while going through market observation. When you check yourself and the market, you will start gaining awareness of why you don’t follow your trading plan or why you outrightly don’t have one at all. You will identify why you have no trade journal or why you have but don’t use it for documentation. You will discover why you still do the things you say you won’t do and not doing things you say you must do. The identification of these underlying self-sabotaging data gives you an edge that makes you start dealing with them – one issue at a time.
 

So, trading and investing in all asset classes is a journey in self-discovery. And now is the time to eliminate unconsciousness, one at a time, and start identifying and recognizing the motivation behind engaging in behaviors that do not produce your desired results.

Typically, there are two types of trading data: mechanical data and internal data. Most forex, futures, and stock traders do not know this, consequently missing an essential set of variables that have a high impact on their trading. Mechanical data comprises everything that concerns the market, including technical analysis, the news, indicators, financial instruments, etc. It is external data. On the contrary, internal data concerns your thoughts, behaviors, and emotions. That is the equation that influences all your outcomes. To manage your results, you must manage this equation.
 

Trading and investing in the trading arena is an emotional and mental game. When trading forex, futures, and stocks, you are either analyzing, preparing, processing, or executing. And all of these demands emotional and mental tools. If you lack emotional and mental tools, it’s like driving a car without its steering – not only will you lose your way, but you’ll crash and burn. Similarly, it is impossible to steer when you are blindfolded. That is, you must know what is between you and staying committed and consistent follow-through. In our live trading classes and online courses, we teach techniques and tools that you need to trade with steering while simultaneously helping you remove your blindfolds to enjoy a self-fulfilling and joyful journey. Remember, it is impossible to change what you can’t face; similarly, it is impossible to face what you do not know. For more information, ask your Online Trading Campus representative.
 

If you want to learn more about professional trading and investing across multiple asset classes such as forex, futures, and stocks, please sign up HERE for free at our online trading academy www.onlinetradingcampus.com and get access to a free three-hour introductory course.

Happy trading!

Author Bio: Bernd Skorupinski teaches the undiluted truth about trading and investing at Online Trading Campus and takes you through what it takes to be a consistently successful trader. His favorite moment as a trading mentor is the way peoples’ eyes light up with excitement and confidence when they understand how Supply and Demand trading strategy works and how it can help win in the trading arena. He believes in building core values and discipline that ensures his students do not succumb to the pressures and temptations of the market. He very much believes in following plans and strategy through. If you want to know more about the author Bernd Skorupinski please read HERE