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Change is a common theme of my Lessons From the Pros articles. That’s because too many traders are not getting the results that they want, and they need to change something (thoughts, emotions, behaviors) in order to get different results. We have talked about tools, techniques and concepts that are designed to help you to think, feel and do differently. In today’s article, we will take a closer look at the thought process and the importance of not only what you say, but how you say it. In other words, what are you using to carry the load of what you’re describing has a lot to do with the impact of that thought on your emotions and, of course, your behavior. The language that you use to describe what happened in a particular financial instrument, what you are doing while managing a trade, the results you got from a trade, etc. has a huge influence on your feelings and your subsequent actions. Actually, every result that you get is determined first by what and how you think. Thinking determines how you feel. And how you feel will drive how you respond. So, it is imperative that you hold your thoughts close to your vest and monitor how you are saying what you say. This is how you begin to first make sense of, and afterword, effectively manage the swirl and sway of all those trading variables. Now, if you haven’t figured it out already, we are talking about metaphor.

Metaphor is a literary figure of speech where we use an image, object or story to represent or explain an idea, and the reference helps us understand. When the markets are described, they are often referred to as a fight between the bulls and the bears to explain their adversarial nature. Or, when a loss is incurred, some might talk about how it is eating away at them as a way to illustrate the emotions that they feel about that loss. Or, what about trying to hit a home run when entering into a trade – this would define your extreme intentions regarding the kind of profit you were pressing for. Each of these examples is an image or symbol and tells a story to represent the situation that you want to convey. Even though each example is only a brief phrase, they convey a lot of information.

Metaphors can be really inspiring, supportive, motivating and uplifting, or they can be daunting, disturbing, unnerving and destructive to your performance. You see, they are often closely connected to your core paradigms and mental models about life. They would present as a mental structure that embodies your rules for living, and rules for trading. Take a look at this statement: The market’s out to get me. This brief phrase can be highly toxic to how you envision the markets, and more importantly, to how you react and/or respond to situations in your trading; for example, when someone says something like, the market’s out to get me, they are setting themselves up for failure and accepting a notion that they have very little power to perform. What you tell yourself determines how you feel and how you feel drives what you do. Going further, when you use a powerful image rich phrase that is connected to your inner most limiting beliefs about your ability or inability to succeed, you are creating a barrier between you and the results that you want. In order to create substantive change, it’s important to identify and reconstruct the underlying metaphors that drive your stories about you, your abilities and the markets. For example, let’s take the metaphor, I am as dumb as a rock because I lost on this trade. If you said that to yourself, what kinds of emotions would you probably feel? Most would feel a level of anxiety and anger. Negative emotions like these don’t promote positive actions. They rob you of stamina and the ability to follow-through with your rules while focusing on what matters most in the trade, meaning that they rob you of getting the results that you want. On the other hand, if you use positive metaphors that are motivating, they will help to establish rock-solid responses to trading situations through uplifting images and symbols that are connected to core beliefs. What about the metaphor example, I am trading with the courage of a lion? As you consider this metaphor, take a look at how you feel. Your emotions are probably much different from the metaphor, I am as dumb as a rock because I lost on this trade. This is how you ratchet up your ability to create changes in your thinking. By uncovering negative metaphors and changing them, you put yourself on a fast-track of doing things differently, and therefore, getting different results.

Change comes from facing fears and doing things differently. But, you can’t do differently without thinking differently. Becoming self-aware is crucial to your development as a trader. You must monitor your thoughts, feelings and actions in order to begin to modify those that aren’t working for you – especially metaphor. Bringing your A Game to the platform and doing what it takes to keep it there is what will make the difference in your performance. This is what we teach in Mastering the Mental Game courses. Ask your Education Counselors for more information.