You Can’t Control the Markets

Keep in mind that you can’t physically control what the markets do; you can only learn to control your perception of the markets to share the highest degree of reality (the least amount of distortion) with everyone else who is participating or has the potential to participate.

The more sophisticated you become as a trader, the more you will realize that trading is completely mental. It isn’t you against the markets, it’s just you. All the other traders participating to make the market provide you with an opportunity to make money from their divergent beliefs about the future. If people didn’t disagree about the future value of any particular commodity or stock, then there would be nothing to compel them to either bid a price higher or offer it lower, and the opportunity to profit from these changes would cease to exist. So the markets just offer the individual trader opportunity. They don’t choose the data on which you focus your attention, and they certainly don’t interpret the data you perceive. Nor are the markets responsible for what you can’t perceive because of the distinctions you haven’t learned to make yet. They also don’t choose when you put on a trade, how long you stay in, when you get out, or how many contracts you buy or sell.