Decide to Succeed in Trading, feat. Becky
Becky and Kendra created this Market Mamas day trading psychology podcast to share all the growing pains and inner workings that developing traders experience. We are always looking to be of service in helping to guide traders and spread awareness of the amount of hard work and dedication it takes for success in this journey. In this episode/blog, Becky leads the discussion talking specifically about a topic she is so passionate about with life and especially regarding trading! It is our ability to channel our minds for creating our greatest lives.
A large part of Becky’s recent obsession with this topic has been due to to Kendra for her awesome book recommendation of the title Mindset Secrets for Winning: How to Bring Personal Power to Everything You Do. The author Mark Minervini is one of America’s most successful stock traders and this book is full of highly applicable inspiration, knowledge, real-life experiences, and logical and tested techniques for becoming a success at whatever you are pursuing. One of Becky’s favorite quotes from the book was naturally about a plant reference!! It goes: “A garden will only yield what gets planted. And that all starts with seeds. It’s the same with your mind, and your thoughts are the seeds. Whether your garden is lush and magnificent, or choked with damaging weeds, it reflects what was planted.” Oh yes, you see what we mean with this guy?!? If we control what we allow in our gardens, we get to design, plant and raise her up in our vision! It is easy to pick and choose what we take ownership of in our lives. And find reasons all over the place when things don’t go our way or we stumble. But, Becky is really coming around to the power and strength that comes with an alternative approach. The idea that we DO have control of what has influence and even a place at all in our lives and our daily outcomes and our relationships. We can choose to frame nearly everything in our lives for our betterment or our education. And if something is ultimately not serving us in the ways that we need for our health and goals, then we can prune it out. We have the power to shape our lives, just as we do a garden, in alignment with how we want her to fill out as she grows with sunlight, water, and proper nutrients. And we are all about that metaphor and the power that it retains for ourselves over our world!!
This book had many excellent parts. While we are not doing a comprehensive review of it here, there was a portion that was the most impactful for Becky and that is what has held her mind captive since she first read it. In fact, she re-listened to her favorite chapters several times since. And that portion is about belief and decision. First, let’s talk about belief. Minervini states “Becoming the person you want to become requires believing what a person like that would believe. If you’ve made some poor decisions, consider this, if what you believe created your current circumstances, then what you choose to believe going forward can create your future.” And then he later adds “If you believe strongly enough, think about it regularly, and make it the focus of your daily conversations, you will see a great amount of it in your life.” This relates to the significant power in our minds to build what we are obsessing over. To seek it out, find reasons to validate it for ourselves, observe examples of it around you and in your world, and normalize it in your realm of possibility.
We’ve all heard about the example of hunting for a new car, deciding on what you want and then searching for the best deal to buy said vehicle. Then as if by magic, you start seeing that make and model everywhere. Your mind becomes tasked with this mission you keep wondering about and then produces it in your actual life. So then, we love the idea of harnessing this power in our minds for our greatest goals!! Believing that what we desire and are putting forth the energy daily toward can indeed lead us to earn all of our biggest goals. And that mind focus that we are directing will then put us in circumstances that get us closer to those aims.
This can manifest in so many cool ways!! We can meet instrumental people for our growth and education, we can be tested in our work to gain opportunities to advance our skills, we can be assigned projects that test and challenge our status quo and direct necessary growth, we can deepen friendship with critical people that we are meant to collaborate with. We don’t have to necessarily believe specifically how it all will happen, but believing in the direction and our worthiness of achieving it all will get us on the path to encountering what is needed. Even if it is by way of setbacks and heartache at times. It doesn’t necessarily all have to be clear or pleasant in the moment to be effective for our growth. Becky loved how he explains it in the book that if you can hold the faith in your belief in the bigger picture, then often hindsight will provide clarity on what you learned from all kinds of interactions we go through along the way.
Intrigued? We get it!
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Becky loves the power of belief and she has undoubtedly seen its impact in her life in recent years. But a topic even more powerful for her in this book was the concept of Decision. The way this author covers this seemingly simple word from so many angles and experiences, really reinforced its power for us. The core of the concept and how Becky internalized it was that we all, most humans and herself included for nearly all of her life, we half-ass shit. We do! We say we are going to do something, be somewhere, follow a strict diet, sleep schedule, workout routine, or daily trading loss limit. But, on day 3 we are snacking, snoozing the alarm, picking a movie over a workout due to muscle soreness, or over trading like a lunatic on tilt. Is she right or is she wrong?
But what about when we freaking decide on something, like, for real. It IS different. And Becky, for one, is admitting right here and now that she hasn’t been all that consistent in this department for most of her life. She admits to having dabbled in the gray areas around a choice, a way of life, a commitment, way more than she has honored a hard decision without a single wavering slipup. This is real talk. And, more real talk, that behavior generally has not gotten her to a goal or desired outcome in that related area very quickly. Mark references in his book and directly relating to trading that after years of mediocre trading outcomes, HE had to decide. He saw the reason he was not yet significantly and consistently profitable was because of his loose risk management - he was dabbling in the gray commitment to his trade plan rules as Becky has just admitted to. He observed it, called himself out on his own crap, and committed to stopping the detrimental behaviors once and for all. And then he skyrocketed to success as a stock trader, becoming a US investing champion even (which we didn’t even know was a thing to be honest but it sounds amazing and we are very impressed for sure!). Ok then, we got it, roger that, message heard and intentions understood. Because that is us! Both Becky & Kendra know how to take a killer trade. We have an edge with our futures market and we understand risk management.
So then, what needs to give?!? We have to decide to stop OUR CRAP. It’s a decision to respect our personal trading systems and rules and allow our successful trader selves to rise without so much dang interruption! This. This part of the book haunted Becky. Haunted her day and night!! Because of its rudimentary and undeniable truth. So, Becky has been working diligently with many changes in her personal day to bring about the outcomes that go with that decision. And so far, this has been really positive for her!
After that concept of decision haunted Becky into sobering up to herself on an even deeper level, she needed to get to work even harder! And to further aid her, among many tips, Minervini specifically advised: “Change begins with mentally rehearsing a new way of being, and replacing your limiting beliefs with new empowering beliefs.” This was speaking our language! Becky has learned how to visualize. Her mentor Jermaine has provided resources and direct coaching on this, as have several key friends, especially her good friend Waji! Becky now spends time both early morning and late at night in her visualization exercises. She changes it up depending on time of day and what she wants to focus on, and sometimes uses an online guiding video or a personally recorded audio track from herself to help her direct her thoughts. She is getting better with using this killer tool to shape her mind’s eye on her life over time. Seeing herself in the outcomes that her daily decisions are getting her closer to. This is legit psychological work and it is powerful!
A part of what Kendra and Becky want to offer here at Market Mamas is a glimpse of the tools that we implement in our daily lives to work to leverage ourselves up and towards our goals in trading and in life. And visualization is a biggie. We actually have a couple Market Mamas visualization episodes if you haven’t watched them, so check those out (https://youtu.be/FTT_LOfnjA4?si=BALEwUSYFt1gZD3a and https://youtu.be/cF7bc2r4ioI?si=HhgBaIkn9mXTo6ux).
We love that this very successful author and trader educated on this tool in this book as well. Because it really is an easy practice but so impactful. And the more we channel our minds to see and feel our desired outcomes, the more she will nudge our daily choices and executions to stay in line with that self we are seeing in our quiet, focused moments. We don’t think it’s an overnight flip. But more like the turning of a cruise ship. Slow, easy, and with time and some rocking with the waves. Force is not the energy. Rather, focus, faith, clarity of goals, and consistency. At least, that’s how we understand it. But if any of our viewers/ readers have tips on decision honoring and/ or visualization techniques, please, reach out on our contact us page and tell us! We love a solid tip!
In trading, we LOVE when our setup has many confluences to support it. When much of our chart data is in agreement with our trade plan, it is the best situation and we then can often take the trade with less fear and potentially more leverage - makes it an A setup that we are more than happy to capitalize on. Well, this concept holds true for many things in life. When more people or factors that you understand and respect are in agreement with applicable advice, then it is likely something you should listen to! Check out this other quote from Mindset Secrets for Winning: “If you want to shape your destiny, you must first dictate your life’s narrative. By assuming control of how you think and communicate, you are rewriting your personal truth and rewiring your brain.” Sound familiar? This is neuroplasticity! It is the human ability to create the new you.
We’ve mentioned before how we love Dr. Joe Dispenza! Well, he studies and teaches this exact phenomena and there is absolutely science behind it. And Becky’s mentors Jermaine and Amy also both speak to, personally practice, and coach on neuroplasticity. You see Becky’s personal confluences here? And this fall Becky reads this book that additionally advises it in a well written and noteworthy frame as well. So then, her world is screaming that Becky needs to level up and own her ability to dictate her life’s narrative more fully and completely.
As an example for you all, daily Becky is doing just that with this statement script that she reads and listens too directly regarding her trading. It goes like this: “I am a highly skilled and consistently profitable day trader. I trust my own decision making. I am not extreme, I am consistent. I am an expert at trade management. My daily effort and dedication ensure that everything is going to work out for my best self.” Per the science of neuroplasticity and Becky’s faith in herself, these realities ARE her.
We need to keep the pressure on these topics. At least for all of our high achiever success seekers! They are powerful and keeping them, repetitively, in the forefront of our minds will matter. They will compound in terms of impact. The more we fixate on the daily behaviors that bring our biggest goals to fruition, the quicker they will manifest in real life. Obviously these have to be matched by a lot of time, studying, working, learning, self development, and patience too though. Belief, Visualization and Decision without action will definitely not work. But they are key pieces that we are absolutely seeing improvements in our personal lives and our equity curves by focusing on!
Because we seriously love this book so much, there is one last quote we have to leave you all with: “We will never experience what we are remotely capable of unless we believe that the heroes we admire are really role models showing us what’s possible. What we too can achieve and exceed.” Our role models are just people. Like you and me. And we can be role models too if we put in the work and earn that title in time. Join us in believing and deciding that our beautiful destinies are ours and now is simply the time and reps we need to dedicate ourselves to along that path.
Thank you to everyone who is subscribing to our podcast, reading our blogs, and providing us feedback! We are here to talk openly about everything that may help us all level up within our lives, be it day trading or otherwise. And this topic is a powerful one for us all as we push ourselves forward. Our best trading days are ahead! We wish you all the very best for your lives.