Often, the time it takes to become a hugely successful trader seems like it’s too much.
Learning to trade and applying what you learn to generating a respectable monthly return will only take you 5 years, maybe less. The first few years are very slow and can be quite frustrating. This will pass as you become more proficient and more consistent.
Too many new traders-to-be want to become hugely successful as Forex traders, but they do a lot of the wrong things. Too much time is wasted on futile endeavors, too much money is lost in live accounts that are being traded prematurely. These are normal to do in the beginning, but continuing on with these novice mistakes is like spinning your wheels in the mud.
New traders take so much of their valuable time looking for the Holy Grail. I think that some time should be devoted to this quest initially, but only in the sense that you prove to yourself that is doesn’t exist. Once you have realized that, and you will at some point realize it, it’s then time to focus on the core principles that build a trader into a success.
Perhaps you have been in this game for the last 5 years already and there is a strong likelihood that you are not much further ahead than when you started. If this is the case, what will the next 5 years look like for you? Are you going to decide to get focused and learn the fundamentals?
You need to learn the basics, about money management, about preserving capital, about letting your winners run, about taking your losses as they happen, about patience. You need to learn about greed, about fear, about hesitation and how to conquer these things.
I want you to promise me that over the next 2 years you will focus less on hocus-pocus and more on trading. Learn about a trading system you are comfortable with. I don’t care if it’s mine or not, just learn a good system and stick to it. Learn the ins and outs of your system. Become familiar with the win to loss ratio, the risk to reward ratios, become intimately familiar with everything about your trading system. This will give you the courage and confidence to trade through the bad stretches as you will know that they are temporary as it has been proven to you.
The following 3 years will include the final tweaking of your emotional hang-ups and some consistent gains. At the end of year 5 you should be on the verge of your Forex dreams come true if they haven’t already happened.
Best regards
Russ
