The Hardest Part of Trading :

Dealing with Uncertainty , Patience and Discipline

Seeking More information - When first introduced to markets, every beginner

immediately thinks he must learn the rules of the market in order to succeed. He
thinks he loses because he does not know enough. He initially believes there is a
"holy grail" a system, a leader, or a mathematical equation like Fibonacci levels.
He believes these will protect him in the market, and will lead him to a profit
once he understands them.
The problem is, there are no set rules which work consistently in the market. If
there were, the institutions and everyone else would simply use them. What
would happen then? Well, there would be no one or institution to take the
opposite trade, and the market would cease to exist altogether.

And so the new trader changes from one system to another, from one guru to
another, and constantly thinks he must learn more information in order to
succeed. What he believes to be preventing his success is a lack of knowledge, a
lack of information. But you see, the more information you have does not
necessarily lead to better decisions. There is a lot of evidence to support the
contrary, and suggests that too many choices actually impair decision making
skills.

On top of this, most of the information in the trading world is quite simply wrong.
There are 10 x more scam artists who claim to "know" and will take your money to
teach you how to trade than there are profitable traders. Beware of anyone who
claims to know anything. They are either fooling themselves, or fooling you. These
people do not understand markets or them selves, and cannot make money in the
market, so instead they prey on new market entrants.

Dealing with Uncertainty - The reason most traders seek new information is
because they are afraid of uncertainty and want certainty. They seek something to
protect them in the market. Something to protect them from themselves. A
system that will guarantee a profit. But there is no such thing. Markets constantly
change and evolve through the market cycle. And there is no system that works
across all three parts of the market cycle.
No matter how convinced you are of something happening in the market, there is
always at least a 30-40% chance of the exact opposite happening. This means even
the strongest edge has a failure rate. The sooner you realize and accept this, the
closer you will be to making a consistent profit.

It is very hard to learn how to deal with uncertainty. But certainty is an illusion.
There is no certainty in this life. The only certainty is... uncertainty!
Patience and Discipline ( Ability to Do Nothing) - Every profitable trader uses
these two terms (patience and discipline) when asked how they are profitable.
When a beginner hears this, he rarely understands what this means.
Patience means waiting for your turn, or waiting for something to happen.
Discipline means doing something even when you dont want to do it, or doing
something you dont want to do.
But we all want to trade right? Yes of course, that is what we do as traders. But
having discipline means not trading when the trading is not good, even though you
want to. And having patience means waiting for the good trading to return.
In other words, when the time is not right, you must do nothing.
If your edge is not present; there is no edge and no action to make. When the
market is not offering what you want, or is confusing, you must develop the ability
to wait, and do nothing until the time is right again.
On the other hand, when the time is right, you certainly must act!

This idea of "doing nothing" stokes a fear in most people, especially in todays give
me distractions, social media world. They say "Well what am i supposed to do if i
am doing nothing?" Doing nothing seems contrary to getting what you want,
getting somewhere. In and outside of the trading world everyone believes in order
to be a "trader" you must trade - constantly. This is why most traders lose money.
Because they do not understand that there is a time for doing absolutely nothing.
And that time is most of the time!