The question seemed so simple, so easy to answer, yet something nagged at me to think about it before actually writing the answer down …
Ed, why do you trade?
Some 60 feet above me, I can see the ice plant hanging over the edge and blue sky . The blending colors of light brown and tan rise up, sandstone walls surrounding me on all sides. This horseshoe shaped cutout in the cliff is a place I have come to before, a serene spot where I can melt back to a place of calm.
The gentle sound of ocean waves crystallizes in here, sharp and focused, like headphones without a bit of hiss or unnatural background noise. The barely foamy water almost reaches my toes before giving up and sliding back into its home.
My first thoughts about the question pulled up the usual. I trade because I want to make my money work. I trade because I am a gambler. I trade because this is where my life’s path has brought me. Yet, none of these answers seems satisfactory anymore.
I can see the waves roll in, form up, break over, become soup, and then push their way onto the shore. One after the other, each wave completes its journey right here about 12 inches from my feet … Hmm … Is this the end of the journey for each wave? No, it is not. Each wave simply changes at this point, at this moment, from exerting power to not. Each wave simply transforms back into that which is was before it was a wave …
For the wave, it is all about the process, the journey itself, and so it is with me. Why do I trade? Funny, but the meaningful answer that has now rolled up in front of me has nothing to do with money, or gambling, or even that what I do is simply the place I have come to in life. And even though this moment of understanding has broken upon me as the wave breaks upon the shore, the only thing each has in common is the journey, the transformation …
No, my answer has nothing to do with anything I knew before. The clarity of the wave has brought me clarity about myself. The reason I do what I do is simple, but like so many things in life, the simplicity of a thing is often obscured by the structures around it. And my reason for risking my money day in and day out is the same reason I have done everything else in my life. And though the reason is simple, the underlying psychology is not so, which makes it, like the wave, available for viewing, but, like the wave as well, that reason comes from a deeper place, a place, if you don’t mind, I will explore a bit on Monday.
Trade in the day; invest in your life …
