Saw the following at stockcharts.com. I thought it was interesting.
Seven Attributes To Give You The “Edge”
What do Wayne Gretsky, Coach Phil Jackson, Michael Jordan and
William O’Neil have in common? They all share the same unique blend of personal
attributes that have led to individual greatness in their careers. I’m a huge sports fan, but not in the classic
sense of religiously following team standings and statistics in the NBA, NFL or
NHL. Instead, I’ve been captivated by
the personalities of the superstars in each sport. In particular, I’ve tried to understand what
specifically has made certain athletes and coaches excel beyond the norm.
I’m an avid reader, and the fact is that some of the most insightful investor books I’ve read have nothing on the surface to do with trading. I’ve learned a lot about trading greatness from the books and biographies of these sports superstars. Interestingly, I’ve discovered that what it takes to excel in athletic competition is much like what it takes to excel in the markets.
Recently, I came across another similar fruitful avenue to
explore. I watched Robert Duvall’s 2011
movie Seven Days in Utopia about a
championship golfer who had lost his mojo and how he got it back. With pen and pad in hand (and a glass of 2008
Le’Ecole 41 Seven Hills cabernet at my side), I settled down to watch the movie
and see what a trader could learn from a golfer. I was not disappointed as it
reinforced so much about what great traders also must do to maintain their
mojo.
Here are the lessons I gleaned from the film – lessons that have
been loosely paraphrased through the mindset of a trader.I’m an avid reader, and the fact is that some of the most insightful investor books I’ve read have nothing on the surface to do with trading. I’ve learned a lot about trading greatness from the books and biographies of these sports superstars. Interestingly, I’ve discovered that what it takes to excel in athletic competition is much like what it takes to excel in the markets.
- You
don’t choose the stock market; it chooses you.
A little bit of early trading success can have a profound effect on a
person’s soul. If it does choose you,
you’ll have to accept that your life and investing will become forever
connected.
- Your methodology must provide an
unshakeable foundation that you believe in totally, and you must have the conviction
to trade based upon it. If your belief
is tentative or if you don’t have complete faith in your methodology, then a
few bad trades will destabilize and erode your confidence.
- A calm mindset that can focus on
the execution and not on the outcome is what produces profits. It takes total emotional control. You must maintain your balance, rhythm and
patience. You need all three to stay in
the game.
- The markets are always conniving
with ingenious techniques to get you to lose your patience, to get you
frustrated or mad, to bait you to do the wrong thing when you know you
shouldn’t. A champion doesn’t allow the
markets to get under his skin and take him out of his game.
- Like a great painting, all good
trades start with a blank canvas.
Winning traders first paint the trade in their mind’s eye so that their emotional
selves can reproduce it accurately with clarity and consistency, void of
emotions as they play it out in the markets.
- The “here and now” is all that
matters. You can’t think about the last
trade or the last shot or worry about the future. You need to put on your “amnesia hat” in
order to remain completely unfazed by what came before. Only by doing so can you be totally absorbed
in executing your present trade.
- Being prepared and having put in the work results in the bringing together of your intuition and confidence. The two go hand in hand. Extraordinary results can be expected when you are able to see it, feel it and trust it.
Trade well; trade with discipline!
-- Gatis Roze
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