I was organizing some photos on my computer yesterday, and was slowly flipping through a bunch that I took in Hawaii.

It was when my family and I spent a month out there.

Here’s a couple reasons why staying less than a month is tough

Any how, it reminded me of a trader I met, and the conversation I had with him.

He was telling me how he was part of a group of traders based in Hawaii. He goes on to tell me that the reason they stationed in Hawaii was so they could work from 3am till 9am, then spend the rest of the day enjoying the sand and the surf… (tough life

Any way, he explained how he was bought into their circle because designed software to profit from market imbalances, and if things went well, his software would bank profits for a few days to a few weeks before he had to redesign it or throw it out all together.

Now the idea of using computers to make money in the markets sounds awesome, but that wasn’t the cool part…

He segwayed onto a guy on his team that they referred to as the “Zen Trader”, and when he started talking about him he had a sound of awe in his voice…

He said they called the guy “The Zen Trader” because he was just so in tune with the market…

And he got even more animated when he explained that when things went wrong (with their trading), like if they had a bunch of positions open and the market started reacting strangely, or if a program messed up and initiated positions that they shouldn’t have, the Zen Trader would step in and work the positions.

He recounted how this guys ability to read the market and manage the trades were a sight to see.

What does this have to do with your trading?

While you may not be a computer programmer who designs trading software, and you may not be a zen trader who just becomes one with the market, there is an interesting lesson here…

You can spend your time and energy buying systems or strategies that are designed to take advantage of temporary opportunities in the market (that you’ll have to throw out in a few weeks) or you can spend that same time learning how to read the market itself, giving you a skill to profit from the market regardless of what its doing… the choice is yours…

Categories: Trading
No Comments »