How to Develop as a Trader

 

11/10/2026 - In this series of posts, I'll highlight best practices for developing as a trader.  Many traders don't structure their development processes effectively and end up losing a good amount of their capital before they gain the skills needed to succeed.

Before launching into this topic, I'll mention that there will be another free trading psychology webinar a week from Wednesday (11/18/26) at 4:15 PM EST, shortly after the NYSE close.  Please bring questions about your development as a trader and I will do my best to answer and also to point you to valuable resources for your learning.  You can sign up for the webinar by emailing me at steenbab at aol dot com.  

Our development as traders is based upon our talents and interests, which we then leverage to build skills.  Talents are inborn abilities and often those help shape our interests.  The process of deliberate practice is the means by which we apply our talents to specific areas of performance and acquire skill.  The role of mentors is to guide this process, so that we learn the right skills for maximizing performance.  

Once you understand the above, you'll see why it's impossible to achieve trading success simply by watching videos and following influencers via social media.  The first step in developing as a trader is to follow many different markets and many different time frames and examine many different ways of making sense of markets.  Eventually you'll find something that grabs you--really strikes you as interesting--so that you look into it more deeply.  That is the beginning of finding *your* approach to markets.

For example, early in my development as a trader, I came across the quantitative work of John Ehlers, who described methods for identifying cycles in markets.  The idea that every market is a combination of a trend component and one or more cyclical components immediately resonated with me.  To this day, I find it fascinating to track the cycles within trends and use those to help with timing and managing risk/reward.

The greatest mistake developing traders make is being too quick to start trading.  It takes a while to explore and experience and figure out *your* particular niche in markets.  But once you find that, the learning process--and all its mistakes!--will give you energy, because it taps into your deepest talents and interests.