You can read all the financial books, scour every free website and attend countless seminars. Here is the truth. Until you have put your own hard-earned cash into a trade and stared at the screen while your portfolio does the samba, you do not really understand investing or trading.
Our show business runs on experience and years of it. No book, seminar or guru can give you that shortcut even though they will gladly charge you for trying.
All seasoned traders, advisors or money managers myself included agree on someday, you will be wrong. Not just “oops, a little off” wrong. I’m talking “oh no, hide under the desk” wrong. The trick is not to let being wrong break you. What matters is figuring out why you were wrong so you can avoid doing the same dumb thing again.
Let us talk about something many of us grapple with after finishing school – coming to terms with how little we actually know compared to what we thought. Graduates are funny like that and we come out thinking we have cracked the secrets of the universe only to discover we were, uh, adorably naive.
In the real world, investing is not easy. It is a long, messy journey that requires patience, discipline and a stomach strong enough to handle the roller coaster of emotions that come with market swings.
Nobody likes to lose money. I always view things from a positive perspective even when losses happen. I have often noticed that people who lean toward negativity tend to miss something in their analyses. By fixating on the downside, they fail to see the opportunities or worse, they put a negative spin on what is actually a positive. Markets reward clear thinking and balanced perspectives.