What kind of world has my coaching student created? When a trader first comes for coaching, I watch for the “meta-structures” he or she has in place. What do I mean? I ask myself:
* What “factual” world have they created? (Yes, facts are a creation.)
* What skills do they believe are critical for trading?
* How do they behave when trading?
* What beliefs do they have about themselves?
* What beliefs do they have about market dynamics?
Who are you as a trader? By asking myself these questions, I have a rough roadmap to invite the trader to gain awareness and understand of who they are as traders. This allows us to move from symptoms to foundational causes.
Your context protects itself. Most traders are enmeshed in a complex context of facts, skills, behaviors, and beliefs that create the ongoing struggle they experience. From that context, there is no solution. The context is self-reinforcing. Why do you keep repeating the same trading mistakes? Because there is no option within the complex context you live and trade from.
Traders struggle for years without consistent profits. I have reviewed over 2000 trader assessments and 95% of them have the highest commitment in spite of years of losses.
Now comes the reframe. To trade successfully you need to change contexts. If this is so simple, why aren’t most traders successful? Contexts protect themselves. I don’t expect you to believe what I am saying next, but I find this to be the case over and over again.
- Survival mechanisms know you can survive your current struggles.
- Survival mechanisms don’t know you can survive success.
- From our struggle context, we can’t even visualize another context of success.
- Will power can’t overcome context
- There is an unacknowledged loss when a trader steps into a new successful context (almost unbelievable)
- Our context sabotages our ability to step into a new context
Changing contexts requires a new level of self-awareness, self-acceptance, and the ability to expand our mindset menu of choices.
Most traders reading this blog will go “yeah, yeah”. And then look for another indicator, strategy, guru, or trading room. They will swear they won’t cancel another stop. They swear they won’t make an impulse trade and will follow the strategy. They commit to pulling the trigger when called for.
And from the current context of their identity, beliefs, behaviors, skills, and knowledge nothing will change.
Trading is one of the most challenging and rewarding careers on earth. It gives every trader an invitation to examine their mindset at its very foundation. Few take the invitation, but those that do reap the rewards.
Do you want to expand your context clarity? Do you want to create trading behaviors that manage risk and produce a consistent equity curve? If you are undercapitalized, no problem. We have an online course, Traders Compass – Lockdown Edition at ⅓ price. If you are well-capitalized and still struggling, please schedule a time to talk to me about the effectiveness of private coaching.
It takes courage to create a new context. Create the courage.