How many years are necessary to consider yourself a successful trader?
More than how many years, it's
When you can identify the reasons for your losses.
When you don't look at the prices on the menu.
When you have more followers on ET than the number you follow.
When you feel you don't have to trade today.
When you no longer feel the market is rigged.
When you are happy to find manipulated stocks.
When you stop worrying about what they are doing.
When you have no need to hedge.
When you no longer dream of making it.
When love is the only emotion you can't control.
When you stop giving tips to your friends.
When, with the exception of a stop loss, you don't need risk management.
When you stop trying to copy what the banks and hedge funds are doing
When you stop trying to be like those you read about in Market Wizards.
When you don't give a rat's ass about the small loss you just took.
When you no longer fear or blame HFT, AI, algos and the like.
When the obvious is obvious.
When you no longer creep up to your computer.
When you've read 100 market books and feel you could write the best one ever.
When there are only a few on ET that you pay attention to.
When you don't get the urge to trade Bitcoin.
When you realize that there is still a lot left to learn.
When you stop looking for the best trading platform.
When you are really proud of your plan.
And last but not least,
When you have the time to write stuff like this on ET!!
(to be continued)
I got 13 Likes for the above! A new record for me.
Not all of the points above and below are based on personal experience. A number of them are points I've seen repeatedly mentioned on ET or observed in other traders during the 23 years I spent in brokers' boardrooms.
When you have a situation that deviates slightly/somewhat from your plan, but you
are able to do an
on the spot analysis as to whether the trade can safely be taken or not and your analysis most often proves to be correct.
When you ask the market and listen to what it's tellin' ya, but you don't hear what it ain't sayin'.
When you have a situation that,
looks like it will...,
should...,
shouldn't..., think it
most likely will..., think it
might..., feel it will..., and you
don't take the trade.
When the trade you just exited continues advancing and you don't consider that a loss, realizing that you can't lose what you never had.
When the trade you just exited continues advancing and you don't regret exiting, just as you didn't regret having not entered earlier.
When you know that the only type of bottom picking you should do is that which gives you a stinky finger.
When you no longer feel that the chart is bigger than you.
When you no longer look for or feel that you need to find a trading setup to fit every price movement under the sun.
When the setups in your plan have been reduced from 10,000 to 10.
When you no longer try to apply TA to all or any given charts, and instead find charts with TA factors that jump out at you like something coming out of a 3D movie.
When you realize that the farther the TA pattern etc. is out on the limb from the textbook version, the less likely it is that it will workout.
When you realize that there is a good way to trade, a bad way to trade, and there's
YOUR way to trade.
When you realize that the big banks and brokers, with all the information in the world at their fingertips, an analyst for everything, a room full of guys with a PhD and a BB, AI, algos galore etc., are not the Gods of trading.
(They should fire the analysts, cancel the BB, delete the algos, and just hire all the great traders here on ET!!)
(to be continued)
On a serious note, it all depends.