Jun

2

Happier timesAn excellent trader once told me that relationships are like trades. "Paolo", he said, "If it does not work, it is time to close it and move to the next one…". It is the concept of stop loss, of having the strength to recognize failure and accept its consequences, of learning from our own mistakes without feeling frustrated and miserable. In two words, it means being mature and responsible.

As a trader, I tend not to close my losing positions; it is my main problem. I think this is common to many "wanna-be traders". I want to wait for prices to go back where they were, I do not easily accept taking a loss. Most of the times this works well especially in a choppy environment, but if you find yourself in a fast market you can be badly hit.

Similarily, in life I care much about the friendships and relationships I establish. I feel "betrayed" when I lose a friend who is important to me. It happened recently, when a dear friend decided to discontinue any type of contact with me. At the beginning with some justifications. Eventually not even answering phone calls and emails. I know that with every ending there is a new beginning, that maybe I didn't realize what kind of person this was in the first place, that I may have contributed to the situation, that I don't need this person to be happy. However, you are aware there is something of you that has gone away and will not come back. It is complicity what you miss the most. It is the awareness of having wasted emotional energies on a losing investment. "Paolo, it is a closed book. It is time for the next trade" he told me. I know this is right, but I miss this friend.

Chris Tucker advises:

Paolo, You are not a "wanna-be trader" any more than you are a "wanna-be friend". In both endeavors we are all learners all the time. Setbacks will occur in all facets of our lives and they can be painful, sometimes extremely so, but they are not a reason to condemn ourselves or to give up. It's normal to feel frustrated and miserable as long as you don't dwell there for too long. Nor do I believe that you have wasted your emotional energy. Energy that is put into something or someone you care about is never wasted, it's just that sometimes it fails to yield the benefits we expected. So I don't see you as a "wanna-be trader" but as a "trader in training", just like the rest of us, even the spectacular successes. I find that devoting my focus to finding the lessons to be learned from such things not only helps to assuage the pain associated with them, but also prepares me better for similar scenarios in the future. Perhaps you can ask yourself questions like "What can I learn from this?" or "What positive outcome can there be to this?" 


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