Finding and Following Your Inner Voice

 

The recent post took a look at developing uniqueness as a trader, focusing on developing new sources of data and fresh ways of viewing markets.  In point of fact, however, there are many ways in which we can approach markets uniquely.  One successful money manager recently shared with me ways in which AI can improve the risk/reward of trading.  Another trader is making use of complex options structures to ride out market noise and take advantage of longer-term trends.  But one trader who wrote to me asked a unique question about uniqueness:  Can we find unique edge in how we approach our trading psychology?  Specifically, he asks, are there ways we could become better at listening to our inner voice?

This is a very tricky question and issue.  On one hand, we could view our negative self-talk as an inner voice and allow our worst emotional patterns to control our trading.  On the other hand, we know that the pattern recognition of intuition often manifests itself as an inner voice.  When do we listen to that voice?  When do we challenge that voice and replace it with one that is more helpful?  Consider the example of regret.  Is that a helpful prod that enables us to learn from our mistakes, or is it driving by the rear view mirror and interfering with what is happening here and now?

How can we innovate in tackling our trading psychology?

Consider the above quote from Craig Revel Horwood, choreographer and dance show judge.  What he is saying is not simply to follow your inner voice, but to listen to that voice if it comes while you are following your passion.  In other words, it is the absorption of being in the flow state during an activity we're passionate about that leads to the intuitions of the inner voice.  If we don't have a passion for something, we will not arrive at any meaningful intuitions about that thing.  Plumbing?  Growing watermelons?  Racing horses?  I've never been involved in any of those and guess what?  I have no intuitions whatsoever about how to do them well.

When we are absorbed in a passion, we experience things in new ways and generate fresh perspectives.  It is the depth of involvement that generates the breadth of vision.  Anything we do to more completely absorb ourselves in markets will enable us to see new things and innovate.  As the Radical Renewal online book suggests, we find our inner voice, not by listening to the chatter and self-talk of the ego, but by fully engaging what speaks to our soul.  The self talk of the ego is something we do on auto-pilot.  True intuition comes to us.

And feelings of regret?  When we're fully immersed in markets and feel regret, the odds are good that we can turn what we did wrong into a learning lesson and true growth.  Regret may not feel good, but, as Radical Renewal points out, it is a path to growth in just about every spiritual tradition.  The process of falling short and repenting is quite different from automatic, mindless self-criticism.  One is a path to growth; the other interferes with our performance.

We can find and follow our authentic inner voice only in the full involvement of an activity we're passionate about.  We find our uniqueness as traders when we are most absorbed in--and fascinated by--markets.

Additional Reading:

How We Can Improve Our Access to Intuition

The Role of Intuition in Trading Decisions

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