But isn’t that what becoming your own coach is all about? It doesn’t matter if the focus is trading, sales, parenting, or athletics: the goal is to make a work of art of your life by becoming the best you can possibly be.
The great disease that afflicts most people is their inability to think greatly of themselves. It’s not about narcissism (which reflects an absence of self, not authentic greatness), and it’s not about new-age self-esteem palliatives. Rather, thinking greatly of oneself is charting a path in life that makes a difference. It’s living a goal-oriented life, not a life of drifting from day to day. It’s remaining true to values and purposes, so that life has worth and meaning. It’s about making such a profound impact that someone, somewhere will want to conclude their book with a dedication to you.
Your life is a partially finished work of art.
There’s an old saw that we tend to marry people like our parents. In my younger days, I would have been horrified at the prospect. Looking back on my mother’s impact on her family and my wife Margie’s impact on hers, I know that the rule holds true for me. Margie’s greatest talent is that she is secure enough within herself to help others feel special about themselves. When one of our children went through a difficult marriage, I never once worried. I knew that she would eventually find happiness, because she had the experience of being special to her mother. When you have that deep feeling of not being ordinary, you ultimately gravitate toward the best within you, the best for you.
If you are going to be successful as your own coach, you will need to be like Connie and Margie; you’ll need to sustain a relationship with yourself in which you are always special, no matter how daunting immediate obstacles may seem. You’ll need to focus on your successes every bit as much—if not more—than your failures. You’ll need to structure specific goals and concrete activities designed to achieve those, so that every day is an affirmation of drive and competence. Self-coaching is not about keeping journals or tracking your profits and losses. It’s about forging a relationship with yourself that is as empowering as a mother’s with a family.
At the end of all of this, you may decide that trading is not your path in life. Have the courage to embrace that and find the work that truly captures who you are and what you do best. I love trading—the intellectual challenge, the endless opportunities for improvement, and the immediacy of the feedback. You know when you’ve done well; you know when you’ve let yourself down. While trading has made me money, it’s not truly what I do best. I once tried to be a full-time trader and quickly felt a large hole in my life where psychology—and working with people—had vanished. So now I trade markets on the side, work as a coach to professional traders, apply my greatest interests and talents in the most challenging settings, and write books that maybe, just maybe, will help others find what is special within them.
Let your strengths define your path.
Know what you do best. Build on strengths. Never stop working on yourself. Never stop improving. Every so often, upset the apple cart and pursue wholly new challenges. The enemy of greatness is not evil; it’s mediocrity. Don’t settle for the mediocre. You don’t have to be an artist and art teacher to make a work of art out of your life. And if trading is your path, learn from those who have blazed the trail ahead of you. Your final assignment is to absorb the resources from the various chapters of this book and select the few that will best support your self-coaching. They will provide the brushes and paint with which you’ll create your life’s artwork.
FOR MORE ON SELF-COACHING
The contributors to Chapter 9 have assembled their own mentoring resources, all linked on the Trading Coach site: http://becomeyourowntradingcoach.blogspot.com/2008/08/contributors-to-daily-trading-coach.html
My latest project is a free electronic book on trading theory and technique entitled Introduction to Trading that I am writing one blog post at a time: http://becomeyourowntradingcoach.blogspot.com/2008/09/introduction-to-trading.html
The TraderFeed blog covers a range of topics, from the psychology of traders to the psychology of markets: www.traderfeed.blogspot.com
I’ll be adding coaching resources to the Trading Coach site over time; if you have questions or particular interests, by all means feel free to leave a question or comment on one of the blog posts: http://becomeyourowntradingcoach.blogspot.com. Also feel free to contact me at the e-mail address specific to this book: [email protected]
For my books on trading psychology and trader performance, as well as related materials, check out the Amazon site: www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_b?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=Brett+Steen barger&x=8&y=18
About the Author
Brett N. Steenbarger, PhD is clinical associate professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at State University of New York Upstate Medical University in Syracuse, NY. As a clinical psychologist, Dr. Steenbarger has co-authored a training text and written numerous book chapters and peer-reviewed journal articles on the topic of brief therapy. Dr. Steenbarger has traded equity markets since the late 1970s; he works as a trading coach for hedge funds, investment banks, and proprietary trading firms in the U.S., U.K., and Asia. He is also the author of two books on trading psychology (The Psychology of Trading, John Wiley, 2003; Enhancing Trader Performance, John Wiley, 2006), and writes a daily blog on trader and market psychology (www.traderfeed.blogspot.com).
Index
A Dash of Insight blog
acceptance
addiction
Adler, David
Afraid to Trade blog
Alcoholics Anonymous
Alpha Trends blog
anxiety
Aronson, David
automatic thoughts
Bandura, Albert
Barchart.com
Barros, Ray
behavioral coaching
conditioning and
contingencies and. See also reinforcement
exposure
incompatible states and
positive associations and
shaping and
social learning and
worry and
Become Your Own Trading Coach blog
Bellafiore, Mike
biofeedback
boredom
breathing
brief therapy
burnout
business plans
Carstens, Henry
Carter, John
catastrophizing
change
emotion in
environment and
focused
readiness for
routine and
chart review
cognitive coaching techniques . See also schemas.
challenging thought patterns
cognitive journal
disrupting thought patterns
emotion in
experiments
imagery and
positive thought patterns and
reframing
collaboration
communication
concentration
conditioning
confidence
contextualism
contingencies
Cooper, Jeff
coping
core competencies
core needs
corrective emotional experiences
correlations of returns
creativity
Csikszentmihalyi, Mihalyi
Czirnich, Chris
Dalton, Jim
defenses
despair
Decision Point
Devon Principle
discipline
discrepancy
diversification
psychological
Douglas, Mark
Dow TICK (TICKI)
drawdowns
Duryea, Bill
Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE)
e-Signal
Edenbridge
ego alien
elitetrader.com
emotio
n . See also mood.
changing
behavioral coaching and
cognitive coaching and
fear
imagery and
journaling and
niche and
perception and
positive
psychodynamic coaching and ,
repetitive patterns of
states
transforming
energy
Excel
basics
coding data in
sorting data in
visualizing data in
execution
expectations
expertise development
exposure
external observer
fatigue
fear
Fisher, Larry
flow. See also zone
forecasting P/L
Forman, John
Frankl, Viktor
frustration
generalization
Globetrader blog
goals
emotion in
process
Goepfert, Jason
Goldberg, Elkonon
greatness
Gurdjieff, G. I.
habit
Hanna, Rob
happiness
Harnett, Trevor
hate
honesty
imagery . See also visualization
Institute of Auction Market Theory
integrity
intentionality
intuition
Kirk, Charles
lbrgroup.com
Liberman, Terry
Luborsky, Lester
Mabe, Dave
Market Delta
Market Profile
Market Tells
Marketsinprofile.com
Maslow, Abraham
meditation
Meichenbaum, Donald
mental checklist
Miller, Jeff
mirroring
mood. See also emotion
motivation
suppression of
niche. See trading niche
Niederhoffer, Victor
novelty
NYSE TICK
O’Neil, William
overconfidence
patterns of behavior
extinguishing
problem
repetitive
solution
thinking. See also schemas
Pennebaker, James
Pepper, Stephen
perception
emotion and
fear and
performance anxiety
Perruna, Chris
personality
physical tension
Piaget, Jean
Pinnacle Data
play
position size
positive psychology
positive thinking
pressing
price targets
procrastination
proprietary trading
psychodynamic coaching
challenging defenses
coaching relationship and
discomfort and
discrepancy and
emotion and
past relationships and
positive relationships
repetitive patterns
transference and
working through
qualitative data
Quantifiable Edges blog
Rand, Ayn
Raschke, Linda Bradford
Real Tick
reframing
reinforcement
relapse
relationships
with self
repetition
research
resilience
responsibility
review
risk
adjusted returns
allocation
aversion
excessive
increasing
management
measuring
reducing
reward and
rules and
tolerance
roles
rules
SMB Capital
SMB Training blog
schemas
self awareness
self confidence
self efficacy
self esteem
self mastery
self monitoring
self talk
self understanding
Seneadza, Michael
Senters, Hubert
Sentimentrader.com
serenity
Shannon, Brian
shaping
shoulds
Simonton, Dean Keith
simulation trading
slumps
social learning
Spencer, Steve
startup capital
state
incompatible
stimulus-response
Stock Tickr
stop loss . See also risk
strengths
stress . See also coping
distress and
inoculation
perception and
tenacity
tension
The Essentials of Trading blog
The Kirk Report blog
thought stopping
Tick Data
Trade Ideas
trade2win.com
trade management
TradeStation
tradethemarkets.com
Trader DNA
TraderFeed blog
Trader Mike blog
trading,
affirmations
automated
business
concepts
edge
environment
historical patterns
journal
metrics
niche
partner
plans
records
size, see position size
statistics. See also trading metrics
target
themes
volume
Trading RM
Trading Success blog
transference
trauma
triggers
trust
Twitter
Valfer, Reid
variables, independent and dependent
variability of returns
video recording
virtual trading groups
visualization
of data
VIX
volatility
well being. See also happiness
working through
worry
Yang, Rennie
Zone
The Daily Trading Coach Page 46
