Last week, I responded to an idea Dr. Van Tharp presented in an article (There is no success or failure—only feedback.), and in my response, I said the following.
If you continually win, accept that as success, which will breed confidence and further success.
A reader wrote me with an interesting question regarding the statement above. Here is the question.
You mentioned that if you always win, you are successful. But, how do you define success?
Specifically, my reference was to trading or investing in the market. In my mind, if you continually end up making more money than you lose, you win. This is my definition of success for trading/investing. I suspect it is everyone else’s as well, at least is of those who trade/invest for a living, or who trade/invest to enhance their retirement, or who trade/invest to get money for their child’s college education, etc.
Although I reference what we do as a “game,” it is not a game. It is a “zero-sum” activity. Simply, there has to be losers in order to have winners. In this “game,” you can lose everything, but you can never win everything. Not even Warren Buffet can win it all. So, more precisely, “success” is not about winning everything, or most of it; success is, simply, making your money work for you; making your money grow.
Now, speaking of making money grow, I am so tired of our big bankers crying about the impending “onerous” global regulations that will keep them from making huge gobs of money. I am sick of the fat cats who brought the global financial house down whining about how the regulations will keep them from creating real shareholder value. Yes, I am really fed up with the Jamie Dimons of the world trying to protect their kingdoms.
Jamie Dimon, chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, said he was supportive of forcing banks to have more capital but argued that moves to impose an additional charge on the largest global banks went too far, particularly for U.S. lenders. “I’m very close to thinking the U.S. shouldn’t be in Basel anymore. I would not have agreed to rules that are blatantly anti-American,” he said in the interview.
Who cares what he would “have agreed to …?” Who is he to agree to anything? He doesn’t make the rules. We do through our collective global governments, and the rules are not about making life hard for the bankers; the rules are about protecting us from another greed-driven feeding frenzy. The rules are there to force banks to act like banks, not trading houses or investment firms. The main function of banks in society is to pay interest on savings and to provide affordable loans so everyday folks can be successful and live a decent life. That is it, no more no less. Behaving this way is American, all the way, red, white, and blue.
Trade in the day – Invest in your life …
