Tuesday Notes - The Circle of Life

Tonight's 6th (of 8) Jellie Webinars was interesting for a couple of reasons, perhaps the most important one being that I devoted half of tonight's content to my own decade-long journey with particular emphasis on the early years. And those are the stories that I enjoy telling.

Why? Simple. For while many have joined this trek in recent years amidst talk of records and streaks, it's often those early trading years that provide the real clues as to what makes us tick. And of all the public speeches and articles I've done over the years, it's the early "being brought to one's knees" stories that I most want people to hear ... and that people need to hear.

And oh, are there stories. The sacrificing of our dream custom executive home after becoming a trader and move to a modest family fixer-upper to save money. Driving ten & 15 year old vehicles until they died. The time I thought I'd sacrificed my young family's future for the dream of conquering the markets. The times in tears ... literally. Yes, they're all true. And for those that forever warn me of gaining an ego because of recent success, those powerful memories have a tendency to always keep me on at least one knee.

Someone asked tonight what I would have done differently to avoid those times. And while I initially half-jokingly responded with, "everything that I advocate now", I quickly explained that answering such a question was like reviewing a chart after the fact ... which is a difficult and often worthless exercise.

I say that because we usually have to go through life's pains to reap the benefits. Sure, we can work to minimize it through education and careful life management, but we can never eliminate it. In responding, I also said that perhaps I had to go through some of the sharp pain to better understand the recent years of success, or simply so I'd feel strongly enough about the experiences that I'd feel compelled to publicly share the painful stories that have to be heard, yet are so seldom told. Cuz they make for lousy marketing copy.

In Sunday's post, I touched on some of life's challenges that have stared me in the face, and tonight we did similarly from a trading perspective.

And wouldn't you know it, the "Circle of Life" isn't a perfect circle after all.

Perhaps that's the lesson we have to learn ... the hard way.

A reminder for Webinar folks that the session videos are now fully downloadable in zip file format, in addition to playing them directly from the server.