Pipcrawler's Thoughts on Setting Newbie Expectations

[ThePhoenix]

Originally Posted by Shell25

I certainly do not feel Forex as an art, I am an artist myself, a real artist and when you are doing art is because somehow you are gifted, and I do not believe you have to have a gift to trade in Forex. As long as you read the news, become accustom to a good platform, understand the bid and ask, basically there are many things that can make a good trader. Also being disciplined and study as much as you can if you are willing to be a winner.

You may be artist but I don't think you understand the term, "art," and, "artist." Being an artist of any kind doesn't require a gift, it requires a drive to learn and patience enough to take what you've learned and apply it as your own artistry dictates.


I can sketch and draw and paint very well. I can do it because my mother did it and the only reason I started at 5 years old is because I wanted to do something with mom, and I happened to keep practiceing it. As far as drawing/painting I've witnessed many people who didn't really show much promise (IMO) and in a few years of art classes drew as good if not better than me.

The definition of art, really means that their are not strict rules you can follow to be just as good as someone else who is already considered great. The, "art," part of it, is where the person learns the basics and learns how to turn them into something special.

The same thing applies to martial arts. I started them when I was 15, now 38. when I started I was a skinny unathletic kid that who was very uncoordinated. But, again I really wanted to learn a MA, because I loved it. I now have a couple of black belts and belts of varying colors from other martial arts. I teach and quite frankly can kick the crapola out of the average joe in a fight hand to hand.

I would argue that there is no such thing as talented and as gifted, only the determination to learn and do what it takes to meet your goals. I think most people use the terms, "gifted, and, "talented," as an excuse not to try things they think they would fail at.

[Paythepipper]

Originally Posted by ThePhoenix

I would argue that there is no such thing as talented and as gifted, only the determination to learn and do what it takes to meet your goals. I think most people use the terms, "gifted, and, "talented," as an excuse not to try things they think they would fail at.

I agree to the excuse part, but not as to the definition of talented or gifted. Some people can naturally do things others can't without practice. I myself have somewhat of a photographic memory, and absorb information very well, while others may have to study material a few times to remember it.

This is not to say it can not be done, anyone can do anything with practice. But it may not be as easy as some as for others.

The fact of the matter is, if you want, strive to achieve it, and don't stop untill you have reached your goal. And don't let others tell you what you can and can not achieve.

[akeakamai]

My opinion is that the most valuable trader "talent" is commitment. As with any career pursuit, there is much learning to be done, and many failures to overcome. Even if you have all the skills to trade successfully, even if you have a proven winning system, if you are not committed to your goal of becoming a profitable trader, you will not survive long enough to realize your actual potential.

Now is commitment a talent? Some would argue yes, some would argue no. But if you unable to practice it, then that would give you a severe disadvantage compared to someone that could...

[Padawan Learner]

First Post Brand New,

It would appear that there are many factors, more than can be listed I suppose that will affect currency value on a second to second basis.

My question for today is can one of these factors have anything to do with the amount of currency or fed. reserve intrest rates that a country decides to to release through it's central banking system in the open market at any given time?

And if thats the case and if govts. are also involved in forex than to me that might give them an unfair advantage so to speak.

Padawan Learner

[gregsometimes]

Originally Posted by akeakamai

My opinion is that the most valuable trader "talent" is commitment. As with any career pursuit, there is much learning to be done, and many failures to overcome. Even if you have all the skills to trade successfully, even if you have a proven winning system, if you are not committed to your goal of becoming a profitable trader, you will not survive long enough to realize your actual potential.

Now is commitment a talent? Some would argue yes, some would argue no. But if you unable to practice it, then that would give you a severe disadvantage compared to someone that could...

akeakamai, talent exists in imagination of those who perceive hard, laborous work. talent is an excuse for not doing that job yourself, when you see someone else succeed - "They just have a talent I don't have". But talent is a suitcase word. it has no attachment to an object, or a practice. It is one of those words that exist in human imagination as an excuse.

A person who is a master of his craft, when asked: "how do you do it?", will never respond with something like "I just have a talent for it". What they will say is that they practiced, gained knowledge and experimented for a long period of time.

What you say is absolutely correct. Practice and knowledge put you above the crowd, exponentially so. And so, if this is indeed the way it works, why nobody just does what it takes to get there and become a master of Forex, or, for that matter, any other industry? Well, it is just people. They rarely want to work hard, and plenty of times they are just simply not smart enough. Intelligence plays a big role in being successful as well. But this isn't to say that "if you are stupid you won't succeed". It's not like that... it is not derogatory. It is true, however that every one of us has a different type of intelligence, knowledge and experience. As beginners of trading something as serious as the largest money market that has ever existed in the history of humanity, we are taking things too lightly. We think about it in terms of computerized trading, where the charts appear on the screen, and we can "click around and about" to make trades. This isn't serious. It takes a little more than that. Being focused on what you do is one of those things. The basic knowledge is a must.

You must know why a short position is called a short, or long called a long. You must know these reasons for how people initially made up this trading terminology. If you don't chances are you are taking other information not as seriously as you should. Forex is a job, like any other job. It is time consuming. It requires focus, dedication and love for what you do. Some people leave their day-time jobs to trade forex (or, for example, to start a blog in hopes to monetize it), because they want to avoid the hard work of having to wake up early in the morning, commute to work, deal with coworkers and bosses, and so forth... Don't you guys see that, when you start trading forex, that doesn't really change... you are looking for an easy way out. You are doing exactly the same thing, and that is why you are not succeeding. Because it doesn't take a person such as that to become successful. In a way, this is a lesson in personal development. If you lost $1 to $20 to $50 and more thousands of dollars in forex as a ruthless beginners, I don't feel bad for you. We all only ever learn the hard way.

Another significant reason for why we do not succeed, is because we have no immediate reward. If you know anything at all about the recent developments in the science of the human brain, you will know that the reward mechanism is a very important thing in our every day life. When we start trading forex, we are excited about it. But the more we do it, the more we start to feel that the slope of the hill we are walking is becoming steeper and steeper. We press harder, we struggle, we try to adapt, but it falls apart -- we lose big money. We feel no reward what-so-ever for our labourous work. Did I do something wrong? Am I just not smart enough? Is trading successfully just an illusion? Most other people probably don't really succeed in trading forex. . . These are the thoughts that start to enter our brain. We leave forex and never return to it again, making a justificatory excuse for what actually happened -- we were defeated. No reward for hard work, no inspiration. But what if I said that there is such thing as a reward when trading forex. We just need to think about it a little different this time around. How we are going to do it, I explain further on my forex blog: Forex Risk Management - The 2% and 6% Rules. that I just started.

Ask yourself, do you really enjoy trading? Or is this a power-trip for you where you are in command of thousands of dollars at the click of a mouse button? The latter is a dangerous thing.

Learn.

[mastroiani]

Babyips is the best site on Forex I've found so far. I'm an artist and in art anything that is complicated is not worthy. Simplicity is the key to everything in life. Even to life itself. I feel like the way knowledge is shared and also in the Education section of the site is very friendly and straightforward for anyone, especially people who dooesn't have techncial/business backgrounds.

I've been reading this thread and several others and they're very interesting. I think I'm beginning to learn something, although a lot of things are unclear to me... I think with time and dedication I will begin to see more clearly.

A very interesting thing happened to me. I came to Forex exactly 2 months ago. Never heard of it before. after reading about it for a month and playing on DEMO accounts I invested (Maybe foolishly) $2K into LIVE account.

I don't know if you guys know about the philosophy behind the Impressionist movement but they propagated the view that in order to see the world the way it is, you must be a newborn. Your eyes and mind should forget everything that they've seen. Sort of emptying your mind...

Well, that's how I came to Forex. Completely empty-headed and ignorant of what was going on here. Picking up mostly on impulses, bits and pieces of what I was reading everyday about the market (without any technical knowledge) and playing very very risky I was able to take my account to around $26K in less than a month ( have LIVE reports to prove). Don't ask me how, I don't know Everything was going fine until the post New YEar GBP/JPY bullish rally completely wiped out my account. Luckily I was able to withdraw 5K prior to that for my X-Mas needs. So basically even with my 20K account gone I still didn't loose my investment and made some profit.

Right now all I have left is the initial margin and I'm trading with it. But, now I'd like to really learn more even though it's difficult to comprehend all the technical side of it. Nevertheless it's very exciting. Thanks to everyone sharing their knowledge.

Oh, and one more thing. Don't be greedy like I was )))

[ed1881]

Originally Posted by bkr1969

I really like your post and just wanted to add a few things. I am new to forex myself, but I read as much as I could over the past year before I started to even ask questions. Maybe it's just me, but I like to try to learn everything I can before I start asking questions. This is not to say that questions are bad...I've seen some really good ones here, but I've also seen some that almost seem like someone is trying to make a joke by posting them. To continue with your analogy, it would be comparable to:

1. Someone wanting to be a basketball star but has never played asking, "What is the best basketball to buy? How do you beat the Lakers? If I shoot the ball 40 times will I win?"

2. A medical student asking, "What's the worst disease? What's the best suture to use when you do an appendectomy? Do white pills work better than red?"

3. A first-time music student asking, "What's the best note? Is it better to play a song in the key of D or A flat? Which do you think is better, Jazz or Classical?"

This is a great community and I know there are many people willing and eager to help people learn. As newbies, though, we need to try to ask relevant, meaningful (even answerable) questions. Just my opinion.

I imagine you're a very succesful trader but that you don't tolerate fools too well. My response to your statement is that a newbie could spend days trying to find out even how to express what they want to ask and frustration must be the biggest reason for most newbies giving up, which in a way might be the best thing for us. After all the fear of failure and ridicule for asking a seemingly silly question could be comparable to deciding on whether or not to making a good or bad trade. I've made the same mistake of asking absolutely rediculous questions only to be told afterward that the answer was in video 4 appendex xII etc which would have only have taken about a year to find. Anyway all I'm trying to say is all you clued up successful traders who want to help us newbies please give us benefit of the doubt if we do ask stupid questions.

Thank you for your patiance, we owe you one

[DonnieGA]

Im Donna Hudson from GA, I joined the comunity a few days ago and just wanted to say hi to all of you. so far I am just reading to get well informed about the Forex market. I wish to get tips or any advice you can share with all the new people joinig. wish us luck

[windtalker]

Hello.
I'm new to this Forum and delighted I found it.
I've been reading and searching for anything Forex related for close to a month now.
I'd like to respond to a few comments made if I may and my response isn't meant to be derogatory in any way.
I've taught in the past as well as present.
In the past it was work related and Martial Arts on the side.
The Martial Arts included the basic hand and foot techniques for the color belts.
The Black Belts, if interested were taught joint locks, pressure points and knife fighting.
I'm disabled now and admin at a Linux forum.
There we teach advanced techniques we call hacks.
We have a few sayings there.
One of them is, "There's no such thing as a stupid question, only stupid answers."
Just because something clicks for you as an individual doesn't mean it clicked for someone else.
There's no shame in asking a question no matter how trivial it may seem.
The shame should be with those who condemn others for asking what they feel are trivial questions.
When you limit what others may ask, you limit your own teaching abilities.

[fountainpenhouse]

I think before you can really be called a talented trader, you have passion for trading regardless of the profits or losses, you just love trading because you love it. As I usually say it, you must be machine minded (without emotions) before you can adopt the rules and make it.

Get a log book write down the reasons you enter trades, the eventual results etc. In my research I discovered that the market has a swinging mood so trading may not be for everyday. Hope you'll agree with me