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www.tradersonline-mag.com 04.2014
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calming effect on me. I also like to read and write, both
for my blog and also in my own journal, which helps me
to process and expand any thoughts or feelings that I may
be having. Lastly, I listen to guided visualisations that I
created for myself, which help to manage my emotional
state and also for goal-setting. Usually, I put them on
before I go to sleep and drift off to the sound of the
visualisation.
Richard Chignell: Have you always done this
Bower: Not all of those things. I have always been
quite active in keeping a trading journal, which has
been a critical resource for me from the beginning. The
other stuff, like praying, have just grown over time as
I found that they improved my overall life. The guided
visualisation I’ve learned as a result of some unique
training I’ve had.
Richard Chignell: If not, how have you learnt to deal with
the feelings that come up when trading
Bower: The first is just experience. As you go through
the ups and downs of the markets, you become gradually
de-sensitized. The second way was through conscious
training. I’ve actually studied two related psychology
fields, NLP and Hypnotherapy. What piqued my interest
was that if you read Market Wizards or New Market Wizards,
it’s worth noting that all of the trading psychologists that
they profiled had trained in those fields! And indeed
those tools are used widely in other demanding fields like
professional athletics. The third step was just learning to
trust my methodology. It’s like jumping out of a plane –
if you don’t believe in the parachute, you’re going to be
very anxious, but if you trust that the parachute will work
and focus on opening it properly, then you will be fine and
even enjoy the ride.
Richard Chignell: Can you describe a time in your trading
life which really rammed home the point that so much of
trading comes down to psychological factors
Bower: As I once documented in a popular blog post
called “What I Learned From the Best Trader at Citibank”,
I started out my working career in a great seat – as a
prop trader at a big bank. I sat next to a brilliant trader
and learned as much as I could. Unfortunately, I was
making lots of mistakes and lost money. By the end of
that experience, I was actually quite depressed, because
I knew that it was a golden opportunity and that I had
screwed it up. I swore to learn everything I could to
achieve complete mastery in this field, so as never to feel
that way again.
Richard Chignell: If you could give aspiring traders one
piece of advice about emotionally handling the market
what would it be
Bower: As Dr. Steenbarger likes to point out, most
trading psychology issues are actually trading issues.
For instance, if you take too much risk, then your P&L
will have big swings, leaving you more susceptible to
greed and fear. Similarly, if you don’t have a consistent
methodology, then you will end frustrated with trading.
As glib as it sounds, the solution is to trade better. Focus
on defining a methodology that works for you and to
keep your risk limited, so that you know you can execute
your methodology and you can’t blow yourself up. In
the process, you will learn to trust your system and your
emotions will naturally calm down.
We’d like to thank Bruce Bower for sharing about the
way he tackles the market from an emotional/mental side of
things and for his willingness to allow me to post this as a free
resource in the hope that traders who have been in the market
for less time or are thinking of entering can perhaps pick up
some A-HA’s.
If you are interested in finding more out about Bruce
Bower you can find him:
» On twitter: @HowofTrading
» At his website: www.howoftrading.com «
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