You need to have a plan
When I first started trading, I was like a kid in the candy store. I had just been given an account with real money and was ready to start trading it. But that’s all it was, an account with real money. What I didn’t have was a plan or any idea of direction. During the first months of my trading career, my strategy amounted to placing random trades to see what happened (spoiler alert: I blew my accounts).
It took me quite some time to figure out that placing random trades without having a plan that provides me with clear entry and exit strategies, my trading career will never lead anywhere. The questions every beginning trader asks himself is which markets he should trades. Stocks, Futures, Forex, Options? And what timeframes fit best to my personality and lifestyle? Will I be trading purely off the charts, using price action or technical analysis? Scalping, swing trading or day trading?
Soon, I came to realise that even having a sound system is not enough in order to master the art of trading and become a consistently profitable trader. The mental aspect of trading is even more challenging than the technical part of trading.
It’s important for traders to become their own coaches as a way of developing self-reliance when learning this craft. In this article, we’ll explore what that means and share some tips on how you can build your own mentorship program without losing your shirt (or your soul) along the way
Look at yourself in the mirror
Take a look at your trading results. Look at the balance of your trading account. How much money is in there? Is this amount growing?
Take a look at your trading journal. What have you been doing with your time and energy that relates to trading? What are some of the things that stand out as “totally useless” or “didn’t really help me learn anything new or make any money”? Can you identify where your time is going, and how much time do you spend on each activity per week (or whatever other timeframe works for you)?
Look at your trading plan: Is it working for you? If not, why not? Do you need to make changes or tweak things slightly so that they fit better with who they are today rather than who they were when they were younger (or whenever they were last updated). Do some research on how others have gone about creating their own strategies before trying again yourself – there’s no need reinventing the wheel here!
Be a coach
You may be interested in becoming your own trading coach. If so, here are some tips to help you get started:
- Be a coach to yourself. You can’t expect someone else to do it for you (although it’s nice when they do). If no one else is around, then it’s up to you!
- Learn the basics of coaching. I recommend reading “Coaching For Performance” by Robert Eichinger and Michael Mirgaft because this book lays out all of the skills needed as a coach—and also how to apply them specifically in trading.
Be humble
The most important thing you can do for yourself is be humble. You don’t need to know everything, and you certainly don’t know what works for your trading style better than others who may have been doing this longer than you.
Be open to learning from others. Learn what they do right, how they do it, and why they do it that way. If a particular piece of advice doesn’t feel right or work well for you then just move on and try something else. Don’t be afraid to ask for help when needed either! Even the best traders make mistakes sometimes; there’s nothing wrong with asking someone if something looks off about your trading system or strategy after all!
Learn every day
- Learn from your mistakes: This is the most obvious way to make yourself a better trader. You will never learn if you don’t make mistakes. If a trade goes against you, learn from it. Understand why the trade went against you and then take steps to ensure that it never happens again.
- Learn from others’ mistakes: If someone else has made a mistake, ask them how they would have done things differently and why they think their approach was better than yours. In addition to learning what not to do, this also gives you an opportunity to hear about any successes that person has had as well – which can serve as inspiration when things get tough!
- Learn from your wins: Every win provides valuable information about how well your system works in practice because there’s nothing like real-world results for showing whether something is truly worth pursuing or not (and if so, in what ways). So pay attention when something goes right and try keeping track of what worked that time so you can use those same principles next time around!
Set goals and make a plan
The most important step in becoming your own trading coach is to set goals. Goals are what empower you to move forward with confidence and purpose, taking the necessary steps to achieve your ideal outcome. Without them, we are left wandering aimlessly without direction or purpose—instead of being able to focus our energy on achieving a specific result or outcome, we just end up spinning our wheels and not knowing where we’re headed.
There are many ways you can go about setting goals: some people like using SMART goals (specific, measurable, achievable/achievable within a time frame, relevant/relevant to my overall mission/vision), while others prefer goal-setting frameworks like Kelly Johnson’s pre-visualization system or Brian Tracy’s 8 Powers of Successful People (planning being one). Whichever method you choose is fine; what matters most is that it works for YOU so that you feel comfortable with the process and confident in its effectiveness!
Once your goals are set and written down somewhere visible where they can be seen every day (e.g., on the wall above your desk), take some time off from trading so that this becomes something more than just an idea floating around in your head—putting pen to paper helps solidify it as reality rather than simply “wishful thinking.”
Document what you do and why
- Write down what you did.
- Write down why you did it.
- Write down what you learned from the process.
- And finally, write down what you would do differently next time around to improve your trading performance.
You don’t need someone else to be your coach, you can do it yourself
There are many ways you can learn to trade. You can learn from yourself, other traders, books and videos. It’s up to you.
You may be wondering why would anyone want to be their own trading coach? If it isn’t obvious already I am going to tell you now: because it works! Learning from others is definitely helpful but there is no substitute for experience. You will learn more about yourself by being your own coach than anybody else could ever teach you in person or online. There are some obvious reasons why this is so:
- First off, we tend not to notice our mistakes or fail points until after we have made them during trading sessions (if then). This means that even if someone was coaching us they wouldn’t actually know what we did wrong until after the fact anyway; so having them sit there telling us what we did wrong while we were doing it wouldn’t help us improve much at all! Instead of making this mistake again next time around however it would be better if we could actually see ourselves making these mistakes first hand while they happen – because then when they happen again later on down the road maybe then will finally realize what went wrong before hand so that next time around things won’t go awry quite like before…
Conclusion
Most of us don’t have a trading coach to help us with our trading, but that doesn’t mean that we can be our own coach. All it takes is some self-awareness and an honest look at ourselves. But if you have the ability to see yourself honestly and to set goals and plans, then you will be able to better your trading by leaps and bounds.
