Is Trading Really All About Emotions?

Hi there, Brian McAvoy with Inside Out Trading. And today we're going to talk about a fun topic and let's see which side you sit on. I've heard some traders, professional traders, brokers, people who are not newbies, veterans, successful traders, and I've heard so many of them say, hey, trading is just an emotional activity. It's inherently emotional. Just learn how to control your emotions, just period. And that's their whole attitude is trading is emotional. Figure out how to control your emotions. And there are others like myself who say, no, trading does not have to be a big emotional ride. When you're trading properly and you're properly equipped for the job, it's actually almost boring. Well, not necessarily boring, but it's at least no more of an emotional ride than a regular job. Now, if you think about it, it really shouldn't be an emotional ride. And here's why. I mean, is there money on the line? Sure. If you're running your own business, which a lot of traders are, or you've had your own business, or you're at a level in your occupation, most traders are prefer professionals. So you're making good money. And so when you go in to do your job every day, is there a lot of money on the line or are the decisions that you make involving a lot of money and potentially risking if you're wrong? Is there a cost associated with it? Of course. And so for us to handle decisions that involve potential gain or loss in our jobs on a regular basis, we deal with that anyway. And the thing is, here's one thing I love bringing up to traders, especially guys that I'm talking to. And yes, most of them are guys. Not all like working with the ladies too. But here's the thing. The job that you do prior to trading or outside of trading very likely is much more sophisticated and complex and requires a greater depth of knowledge than trading does. But you handle that just fine. It's not a big emotional ride, right? I mean, seriously, most of the people that come to me for help are project managers. They own successful seven figure, eight figure businesses. They're making the half a million dollars or at least quarter million dollars a year. We're talking about successful people that deal with occupations that are demanding and they deal with it just fine. You deal with it just fine. Your day job, if you're a project manager, you're a software engineer, your day job is way more sophisticated and challenging and difficult than trading is. Seriously. And so the fact that you can handle that job without it being an Issue. I mean, is every day perfect? No, of course some days are better than others. But it's not this big emotional ride into the day. You go home and live your life, come back again, do it tomorrow. It's not, it's nothing that's keeping you up at night. And so the thing is with trading, when you're properly skilled up and your abilities are there so that you're trading well within your comfort zones because you can deal with whatever the markets might throw at you because you, you have a solid strategy, you've built a solid process on it, you've built all the skills that you need for this job. You know how to execute consistently, you've proven everything out. Yeah, trading, it gets really very matter of fact when you get to this point, trading has a certain level of skills and so long as you're down here, you're, you're trying to do a job that is beyond your skill level. So it's going to be emotional. I mean, consider this. You've seen this, I'm sure many times in your life, probably experienced the firsthand. At the very least, you've witnessed it. But if you take a person of reasonable intelligence and you throw them into an activity that requires skill, but you don't give them the proper preparation for the job and they don't have skills that they can immediately transfer over from something else that they've done, this is new. And you throw them into that job, it's probably going to be rough, probably they're not going to get great results. They might figure out how to get by and tread water, but they're not going to excel like they have in other things. It's going to be stressful, of course, because they're not prepared for the job and there's almost no way for it not to be an emotional experience. But if you take that same person and you give them proper training for the job and the full range of skills that they need so they can handle everything about that job and then you throw them in the job, they're just going to go do their thing. Trading is no different. So many of us and I made the same mistake, jumped and started trading with real money long before I had the skill set and the proficiency to be good at this. So what is it about trading? Well, yeah, the thing with trading, it looks very simple and that's deceptive in that regard. But if you think about it, it's really just as individuals and those pursuing a new business. A lot of businesses are easy to understand on the outside. And in basic structure, I mean it's like opening up a pizza chain or a pizza place or a restaurant very far to understand, you know, what it is. But when you get into the details of actually building it and running it and the whole nine yards. Yeah, there's more to it than it appears on the surface. And with trading. Yes, same thing. So the main thing is you want to get skilled up, get yourself properly prepared, properly trained on all that you need to know for this. Because the thing is until you're here's the where the skills that are required for the job, as long as you're down here, it's going to be an emotional ride because you're trying to do something you don't have the full skill set for. And only when you get up here and here, that's when things start getting easy and your emotions calm down because now you're properly equipped to deal with it. That's the main thing. When we're faced with a situation and we're not 100% prepared to deal with it, that's when it's stressful, that's when our emotions are running, that's when we're outside our comfort zones. Want to stay inside your comfort zones, which means within your capabilities and within your known capabilities where you know you're okay, you know you're solid, you know you're not, you know, at risk of failure and a ruin and all that kind of stuff. It's when we're trying to do things that are outside our comfort zones, that's when we're in emotional state. Going to stay in emotional state until we fix that. So I hope this has been helpful. Seriously, when you do get properly skilled up, when you have the full complement of skills, when you've been trained properly, trading is no more emotional than a regular day job. Seriously, it settles way down. And does it mean you stop enjoying it? No, of course. And the wins are enjoyable. The loss is not such a big deal and that's how it should be. And that's I'm sure how you want it to be. You don't want it to be a big emotional ride. You don't want to feel like for me my first year I felt like I was having a heart attack most of the time. Then I was too young for that. So anyway, I hope this been helpful. I really do. If it has, give me a like and a subscribe down below. Share this with your friends. If you'd like to swing by Inside Out Trading.com find out more about the resources that I have available for you. Have some paid, some free. Got several free resources, including trader scorecard. You can find out what you're doing right and what you may be missing. Gotta break the cycle. Report 10 things you can do in the next 19 minutes to interrupt the patterns of the past and stop handing back all your profits. So got a variety of free resources for you as well. But go and swing by InsideOutTrading.com I just want to help you get past whatever's holding you back right now and on to better trading so that it really is the positive addition to your life that you want it to be. So again, I hope it's been helpful. Talk to you soon. Cheers.