The Procrastinator’s Road to Trading – Part Two
At the risk of sounding like a Saturday afternoon movie serial cliffhanger, “If you remember, in our last thrilling episode” (OK, “article”), we discussed the major pre-trading issues breeding procrastination and keeping the potential traders out of where they want to be – the trading room. Since you are back for “Part Two” of this article, it’s likely that your procrastination is still troubling you. With that thought in mind – given this might be a good time for more introspection – let’s look at some of the ways that you may be procrastinating even as you are reading this next paragraph.
First, you may be overestimating the difficulty of learning to trade and are therefore postponing the essential first step to making it happen. Well, I have some encouraging news for you! In the many years that I have talked with potential traders just like you, most took their first live trade within six weeks of finding a good mentor and trading program. Additionally, many of these were people having a full-time occupation concurrently with their trading education. I even talked with one person who had three jobs running simultaneously, and he still was equipped and trading profitability within three months of starting his education. This should certainly give you hope and encouragement!
Another area that could be causing you to procrastinate is the fact that you are selling your future performance short when it comes to the profitability you will be enabled to make. What is the base of your projection? Have you heard the quote: “Knowledge breeds success”? You are not going to major on “hope” or “guessing” or learning new definitions for “luck;” you are going to major on the tools that will give you “equipping,” “consistency,” “profitability,” “confidence,” and “stability.” Now those are the kinds of definitions that you can bank on – literally!
Last, you may be spending an inordinate amount of time researching information about trading – to the point that it has become a compulsion and a habit to postpone taking action. You follow through with this habit by asking e-mail questions by the hundreds, filing a myriad of trading web pages on your computer, cutting out ads from every trading magazine in the bookstore, and finding yourself spending many hours in the financial section of the local library. Research and due diligence is wise, but if it becomes nothing more than an excuse for procrastination, then it is time to move on.
You can change your behavior and become a successful trader. Often it takes nothing more than a combination of self assessment and a catalyst of motivation. May these last two articles serve as that motivation, and may you now take the next step. By the way, after that first step, the next step is easy. It leads directly through your trading room door. Great! I hope to see you there.
Recent Comments