Wall Street Trader Reveals How to make Trading a Career

Summary

The speaker discusses the intense regimen and sacrifices he made to reach peak trading performance, like waking up at the same time daily, not socializing, and constantly reviewing and analyzing. He notes that this level of grit and determination is unsustainable long-term without burnout. Hence he now works with a psychologist to build an optimal trading environment and culture, manage stress, and explore self-actualization. Ultimately, becoming an elite trader requires self-improvement, finding happiness in the process, and applying the psychological disciplines to all aspects of life.

Takeaways

• 😀 Success requires sacrifice - Steven gave up a high paying job out of college to rigorously train as a trader
• 👨‍💻 Deliberate practice over many years led to elite performance for Steven
• 📈 Steven optimized every part of his life for peak trading ability - sleep, diet, exercise, etc
• 😴 Lack of sleep knowledge 10 years ago led to suboptimal routines
• 🧠 Psychology and self-actualization became critical to Steven's development
• 👥 Having a trading psychologist helped build an elite performance office culture
• 📉 Steven advises that general trading advice rarely helps since problems are individual
• ❤️ Modern traders are wiser about burnout, sickness and rest
• ⏰ Steven admits his previous machismo approach often backfired
• 😌 Trading psychology parallels broader life lessons on happiness and fulfillment

Q & A

What did Mike sacrifice in order to focus intensely on trading and reach peak performance?

Mike sacrificed going out, having much of a social life, and making a higher salary that he could have earned with another job. He was extremely regimented, working long hours focused only on trading with no distractions.

What mindset allowed Mike to maintain such intense focus and performance over years?

Mike had a one-track mind and saw the long-term potential of what trading success could mean for his life. He loved it, found it intellectually engaging, and was passionate about it.

Why does Mike say most people can't sustain the level of performance and intensity he maintained?

Mike says most people only sustain that level of focus and intensity for weeks or a couple months before burning out. But he kept it up for years because of his motivation and seeing the long-term benefits.

Where did Mike gain some of the knowledge about things like sleep, meditation, etc. that are common today but not 10 years ago?

Mike gained much of that knowledge through extensive reading and trying to learn concepts and apply them to his trading. There was no set rulebook, so he had to experiment and figure things out himself.

What does Mike say is an example of the evolution of trading psychology over the years?

Mike gives the example of previously pushing through sickness, sleep deprivation, etc. out of a kind of machismo attitude. Now it's accepted that you should rest when sick because it leads to better performance overall.

Why might a trader work with a psychology coach?

Reasons could include specific trading obstacles, stress/anxiety issues affecting life, going on tilt, hyper-competitiveness, being in a slump, optimizing their environment and culture, and exploring meaning/purpose beyond just making money.

How can the self-examination involved in trading psychology carry over to benefit other areas of life?

The skills of self-examination, discipline, systemization, and happiness from process over outcomes that make someone an excellent trader can lead to excellence and continual self-improvement in other areas of life as well.

What does Mike say is an indication that a trader has evolved to a more mature mindset?

Mike says a sign of a more mature trader is shifting from being motivated mostly by money, fame and fortune to finding deeper fulfillment from continual self-improvement, discipline, and happiness from the process itself.

Why does Mike continue to meet with a trading psychologist even though he is not actively trading now?

Mike continues to explore principles of self-actualization, fulfillment, and how to continually strive to be a better person, which boosts all areas of life including relationships and philanthropic pursuits beyond just trading.

What transferable skills make an excellent trader likely to succeed at most other jobs as well?

Skills like systemization, breaking complex tasks down, discipline, process optimization, and continual learning/adaptation can lead to excellence in many jobs beyond just trading.

Outlines

00:00

😆The struggle to succeed in day trading

The first paragraph discusses the common desire for an easy path to success in day trading through simple strategies and advice. It emphasizes the need for personal effort, learning, and journey to actually achieve sustainable success. The speaker highlights the immense opportunity cost and tradeoffs required to reach elite performance in trading over years of intense focus and sacrifice.

05:03

😕Searching for definitive trading answers

The second paragraph explores the challenge of finding definitive answers to many trading questions due to differences in individual learning styles, reasons for overtrading etc. It argues effective solutions need to be tailored to the specific person rather than based on generalities. The speaker reflects on the evolving understanding of concepts like burnout and sickness in trading performance over time.

10:03

😃The ongoing value of a trading psychologist

The third paragraph examines the speaker's long-term work with a trading psychologist. Initial goals included optimizing office culture and managing people, evolving towards self-actualization. The speaker emphasizes trading psychology helps with life improvement and discipline beyond just trading. A great trader can systematize and succeed in most jobs by applying similar psychological principles.

Keywords

💡performance

Refers to trading performance - executing trades profitably and consistently over time. The video discusses how the speaker optimized every aspect of his life to reach peak trading performance through discipline, routines and self-improvement. This high level of performance requires immense effort and sacrifice as illustrated in the video.

💡psychology

Trading psychology refers to the mental, emotional and behavioral factors that influence trading performance. The speaker works with a trading psychologist to optimize his trading environment, manage people better and evolve to higher levels like self-actualization. Psychology applies principles of human behavior to address obstacles, stresses and slumps.

💡rituals

Fixed set of habits and routines followed rigorously every day e.g. waking up, sleeping at same time. Over 5 years, speaker followed lifestyle rituals (fitness, diet etc) that most people can't sustain to compound gains from focus and consistency.

💡sacrifice

Giving up a lot personally and socially over years e.g. less money, fun, friends. Seen when speaker works long hours isolated instead of high paying job or social life. He made big sacrifices through intense discipline to become exceptionally good.

💡journey

Becoming a peak performing trader is an long personal journey requiring deep work on yourself. There are no shortcuts; you must go through the struggles to figure things out. This self-improvement journey enables learning about markets and life.

💡principles

Fundamental truths that drive behaviors e.g. having a growth mindset. Speaker applied principles like deliberate practice and emotional control to keep improving. Principles manifest through trading psychology techniques.

💡culture

Refers to the attitudes, values and work ethic that speaker tries to instill in his firm to create an environment of excellence. Optimizing culture relates to managing people better and bringing meaning to the job.

💡optimizing

Improving different aspects (in this case - trading performance, psychology, environment) in a methodical manner through evidence-based experimentation and measurement over long periods of time.

💡actualization

Process of fully realizing personal potential and seeking meaning in work and life. The speaker evolves from purely making money to wanting larger purpose and fulfillment.

💡microcosm

The financial markets represent a smaller system that mirrors the workings of larger systems like life itself. By mastering your behavior in trading, you indirectly master skills needed to succeed in other endeavors.

Highlights

Everyone wants the magic bullet, but you have to go through the journey yourself

I sacrificed social life to focus solely on trading

Most people can't sustain peak performance for years like I did

A decade ago concepts like sleep, meditation and working out for mental performance weren't mainstream

I learned by reading and trying to apply concepts to trade faster and better

People overtrade for different reasons - boredom, unclear edge, unset rules

I had a strict daily regimen - same wake up time, gym time, work hours

I slipped up at times but got back on track

Machismo attitude made me work when tired/sick instead of resting

Now people understand need to rest when exhausted/ill

I started working with a psychologist for office culture optimization

Psychology helps me explore life purpose beyond money

Applying trading psychology helps in all aspects of life

Initially made money but realized trading helps self-improvement

If you master trading psychology you can succeed at most jobs

Transcripts

nobody wants to do the work for

themselves everyone wants the Magic

Bullet oh give me the strategies give me

this give me all the advice I need point

and click on my mouse it's like no you

gotta go and go through the Journey

yourself and figure out on your own

I want to ask you more about just how

you're able to keep such a high level of

performance because I know it has to be

taxing and not only that but like what

do you do to maintain it too right not

only reach it but like maintain it yep

yep and it's it's like I often tweet

about like James Clear always says a lot

about this stuff like

everything in life is a trade-off

everything has an opportunity cost the

time you spend on trading you're not

spending elsewhere and so even we were

talking about my time in Princeton when

I first started and

right so while everyone was in the city

or like you know I could have gotten a

job that was like 60k 80k 100k out of

out of school and instead you take this

26k a year job and you're in Princeton

and you you're sacrificing all this

social life you're kind of living like a

small town you don't have any friends

out there and for me it was just like

this one-track mind where I just knew

like this is this is all I care about I

see what this could be in the future I

see what this could mean to my life and

like I I love this I'm passionate about

it I really find it intellectually

engaging and

so so many people like everybody wants

to succeed but it's like and they went

across like exactly could have made the

60 to 80 100 nobody wants to do the work

for themselves everyone wants the Magic

Bullet oh give me the strategies give me

this give me all the advice I need point

and click on my mouse and it's like no

you gotta go and go through the Journey

yourself and figure out on your own and

um

the cost of this stuff is is just

immense like especially

at the years when I was trying to just

reach Peak Performance like we were

talking about sleep and so during a

normal week right I was so regimented so

so regimented I would wake up at the

same exact time I would shower go to

work at the same exact time I would work

out at the same time and then even going

to bed I wasn't going out really during

the week right whereas most people would

would go out with friends or like have

have like this this social life going

out drinking happy hours for me it was

like after work you do the review you're

putting the time in you go to the gym

you eat dinner

then okay it's it's meditation it's the

the warm down for bed send out like my

evening review and everything and this

went on most people can sustain it for

like weeks or they do a couple months

and they burn out right I was doing this

for years and years and years and and it

was just like I mean the number of

Sundays I went in at least probably for

for five years straight of just look

unless I was traveling or had something

I was I was in there and people asked

like oh how did you get that good how do

you do all those things and it's like I

did I paid the dues that nobody else was

willing to pay and that stuff just

compounds right and how do you learn to

like to do like you you weren't just

like okay I'm gonna do all of this on

day one like or did you kind of like

acquire that knowledge and start to add

stuff to your regimen you know what I'm

saying how did you get all that

knowledge or did you already know and so

I think yeah I think a lot of that goes

back to the meta learning right and um

a lot of stuff that we take is obvious

today just really wasn't so obvious over

a decade ago right like even for sports

performance or any type of performance

like now there's sleep wearables and

people are tracking their sleep now

people know meditation can help focus

and like help emotional control people

know uh what working out can do for you

mentally as well and so there's all

these things

um like getting reps in like like the

concepts and talent is overrated

[Music]

um

back back in say say 2010 2011 that

stuff wasn't so obvious as it is now it

wasn't mainstream yeah and so a lot of

it was was just me just reading reading

reading and trying to learn and apply

and um

there there was no there was no rulebook

for how you do this in the in the

trading World there was no rule book for

how do you simulate reps and build up

these databases but it was just me just

taking these Concepts and thinking like

how can I apply this so that I can learn

faster or better and everything hey we

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a lot of times

people look for a right answer or but

sometimes they're just there is no known

answer to things and like people will

say like what strategy should I be

trading or on this sized account how

much how much should I be risking or how

long do I need to give trading and you

just can't speak in these generalities

because it's so many things are so

individual like people don't learn the

same way and

like like I once even tweeted about over

trading and when we go back to training

psychology and everything a lot of times

there just isn't one answer because not

everyone's over trading for the same

reason some people are over trading

because they're just bored and want

entertainment some people are over

trading because they don't know what

their Edge is some people don't have

their setups that are defined some

people are over trading uh because they

think they need to clear their expenses

every single you know every single day

you need to make x amount or else

they're not going to make it and you

can't try to give one answer when it's

not one problem right it's so um it's so

specific to the person well I want to

know like you know you had you did this

for five years or even more of just

constant like waking up at a certain

time going to bed a certain time getting

the right amount of sleep eating the

right kind of foods working out

meditating

did you ever slip and when you slip like

how did you treat like did you just like

get right back on course like the next

day like because I'm sure someone out

there is probably doing it right they're

doing something like this yeah maybe but

maybe they you know slip and they just

oh well I'm not gonna be able to do it

like did that ever happen totally yeah I

mean I was definitely human about it

like for sure I would definitely have

times where you're just demotivated or

you're just down on yourself you're just

totally totally burnt out so one thing

that I think most people are rising up

to over the last couple years especially

given kovid that again this stuff just

wasn't knowledge yeah a decade ago and I

think people are really really smart

about burnout and

I'm not saying all the work I was doing

was even optimal right there were

probably days where I should have just

been calling it quits and there were

days where I'd be sleep deprived or

tired or hungover or sick and I mean

take sickness right like nowadays

everybody knows hey if you're sick

you're not gonna perform well just don't

show up but like I would say over the

majority of my career so much of of

trading was this like machismo where

it's like

don't don't be a puss like if if you're

stuck you you go to work and you still

work hard if you're tired guess what

show up and still work hard and you

would do things that like at face value

it's like oh I I am gritty I am

determined I I'm not willing to just tap

out just because I'm tired but then

you're like wait a second like

this is this is counterproductive at

this point and and now everyone's

accepting that it's true but that's kind

of like the evolution of how being a

Trader has has changed even in those

ways you mentioned psychology just a

while ago

and I know prior to us recording and

meeting each other you mentioned when I

was coming out here fly out and meet you

that you had a meeting with your psych

uh coach yep so tell me about that like

I mean you're at such a high level right

and

why do you still do that like or did you

do that since the beginning and why is

it so important to you yep so why might

someone have a training psychologist I

think first of all for many reasons

right maybe there's some training

specific obstacles and hurdles they

can't get over

um maybe uh trading is giving them

stress or anxiety or it's affecting

their interpersonal uh relationships

maybe Traders are having issues with

fomo are going on tilt or being hyper

competitive

um or or you're in a slump and you and

you have a case of the yeps or you just

can't get back at it so I think there's

a lot of reasons why someone might use

one yeah um for me it was a lot about

really just it started off as just

office optimization right like what do I

what kind of culture do I want to build

what are the principles how can I convey

the right things to build an office of

just Elite Performance yep how can I

optimize that environment and I think a

lot of people might start working with

psychologists for reasons like that

especially a training psychologist but

then I think a lot of psychology

eventually goes towards your

self-actualization and you start to

explore what am I looking to get out of

trading what am I looking to get out of

life what am I looking to get out of my

relationships how can I just be a better

person that will all make me a better

Trader as well and and so really I

started using him to to explore just the

optimal office environment and how to

manage people and train people hiring

procedures interview questions and that

evolved into the the better question of

what am I looking for out of life and so

we still meet even though I'm not

actively trading and we explore like

like the thing things I do with

philanthropy the things I look do with

with giving back and helping Traders and

like I think most people especially as

he would say you have almost this

Evolution where initially you're you're

in it for for like the fame and fortune

maybe not the fame but at least at least

to make money and make a living out of

it and then people realize that like

trading is a microcosm just for life and

self-improvement and how can we always

strive to be better and adapt over time

and like you need discipline you need to

find happiness in the process and you

need all these really great

psychological analogies which just just

help you better for life like I think if

you can crush it as a Trader and explore

all those steps of yourself yep you put

that really good Trader at most other

jobs and they're probably going to be

able to systemize it and break that down

as well dude every time man every time

we got it I love this I love it thank

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