Brett N. Steenbarger Quotes

“Always take a break after a large trade, clear your head, and assess the opportunity set with fresh eyes.

It is just as important to reset after big wins as big losses. Both can lead to taking trades for the wrong reasons.”

“Balance in daily activities – and in life overall – ensures that no one setback in life will overwhelm us.”

“Big expectations lead to big frustrations.”

“By adopting a mindset that anticipates dry spells, the trader achieves a kind of psychological inoculation.”

“Every trade should be accompanied by a very specific idea of what would tell you you’re wrong and how much you’re willing to lose on the trade.

It’s when losses surprise us and become too large that they’re likely to create disruptions in our mindset.”

“If setbacks are treated as learning experiences, they are unlikely to generate stress and distress.

If we view setbacks as failures and reflections on our competence, then we generate our own stress.”

“If we make one decision after another without pause, our behavior becomes random.

It is during pauses that we can reflect, and it is reflection that enables us to make sense of markets and adapt our trading accordingly.”

“If you *need* to be profitable, that creates undue performance pressure and emotional distraction.”

“If you are not continuously keeping score and taking concrete action on the scores you receive, you can’t be continuously learning and improving.”

“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.”

“Loss of discipline is not the problem. Loss of discipline is the result of a problem, and we have to diagnose that problem to figure out how to address it.”

“Many times, when traders don’t follow their trading plans, it’s because those plans don’t truly fit who they are.”

“Many traders, surprisingly, are not competitive at all: they’re drawn to trading because of a perceived easy lifestyle. These are among the least resilient traders.

As soon as it becomes clear that trading out of a hole means real work, they lose motivation and interest.”

“Quite simply, normal human consciousness is optimized for normal human functioning, but is subnormal for achieving goals beyond the ordinary.”

“Show me how a trader utilizes their time outside of trading and I’ll show you the odds of their long-term success.”

“Successful traders spend as much time studying themselves and their trading as studying markets.

In the patterns of your best and worst trades is the information that can make you the best trader you can be.”

“The best traders sustain self-awareness. They know they have flaws and they want to be aware of those flaws, so that they can minimize those.

They are also aware of their strengths and seek to stay grounded in those.”

“The core problem, however, is the need to fit markets into a style of trading rather than finding ways to trade that fit with market behavior.”

“The flexible mindset also enables the resilient trader to not take slumps and losses personally.”

“The quality of our focus mediates the quality of our access to intuition and prior learning.”

“These are the three legs of the performance stool: (1) your talents and interests, (2) your trading style, and (3) markets and their personalities.

The meshing of your qualities with your trading style will help determine your ability to trade that style with consistency and discipline.”

“This is why so many traders who experience long-term success display unusual intellectual curiosity.

They are driven, not just by money, but by the process of discovery.”

“True deliberate practice is a significant predictor of success.”

“While the idea of planning your trade and trading your plan sounds wonderful as an ideal of discipline, what I find among successful traders is an ability to alter plans in real time as market conditions dictate.”

“Without focus, any thoughts and intentions are part of our ordinary flow and cannot transform us.”

“Writing in a journal is a great first step, but ultimately matters little if the journal entries don’t guide concrete goal setting and efforts at improvement.”

“Certainty of success leads to boredom, and doubt creates anxiety. Depression results from certain doubt: the assessment that the gap between real and ideal can never be bridged.”

“Many traders are so afraid of missing out on a potential market move that they don't dare take the time to refocus their trading plans.

They don't realize that a much bigger risk is losing sight of their plans and trading haphazardly.”

“Moods anchor messages.”

“The Journal is a business plan. The right plan, executed faithfully, can be the difference between success and failure in any endeavor.”