No Requirements to Be Happy: Part II

I'd like to continue on last week's topics - that happiness just comes from your "beingness", not from things or what happens. Good traders are into simplicity and the joy of life. That's part of what makes them good traders. And when you can learn to "BE" these things, then you'll find that your trading will improve as a result of just being.

What most of us really want are mental states such as joy, love and freedom. To have those states, you need to merely step into them. They have nothing to do with what you have or do. Instead, they have everything to do with being. To raise the quality of your life, you need only look around you and rejoice. Are you having fun? Do you feel lighter? Are you experiencing more pleasure in the simplest things?

Reality, to take a quote from Laughing with God, is all possibilities. It is absolute possibility. In fact, God says, "All possibility is infinitely interesting, whereas some possibility is somewhat interesting, and one possibility is a problem." In life, we get upset when we think that our possibilities have been limited. Yet we also feel secure when we have certainty and possibilities are eliminated.

Someone asked me a question one day when they starting thinking about all of the bad news in the markets. It went something like, "What is going to happen to the markets with the potential bear market, the devaluation of the dollar, and everything else that is going on. I find it a little scary and it makes it hard to pull the trigger." What they want is one possibility - the markets going up. Yet the moment people feel that other possibilities are lost - for example, suppose someone says the markets will only go up - they act as if they've lost something or been robbed of something. What do you know? How can the markets only go up? We want that uncertainty that comes from not knowing.

A critical difference between good traders and the average trader is that good traders thrive on simplicity and not knowing. They come from being and simply go with the flow of the markets. If the markets tell them it's time to go up, then they buy. They might be wrong 60% of the time, but that is part of the game. They'll get out when the markets are no longer going up. They do this by simply observing what is happening, and are much more joyful because they are going with the flow. They allow themselves to let their profits run, because it's okay to be in the market when it is going up. They also allow themselves to get out, because it's okay to get out when the markets start to do something else.

What I've just described is pure trading. Its essence is simple. It doesn't require a lot of time. Instead, it gives you lots of time to play. It also involves seeing all possibilities and being in the flow of what is happening right now. You cannot do this if you are preoccupied with being right, doing hard work, or having money or profits. You can only do this when your mind is pure and you can be at one with what is going on around you.

Try some simple tips:

1. Give up being right and embrace every possibility. You'll find that by not predicting the markets and enjoying the uncertainty, you are more apt to be able to observe what the markets are doing right now.
2. Add novelty to your life. Find five habits that you have and break them. If you put your trousers on with your right leg first, start with the left leg. If you listen to the phone with your right ear, then pick it up with your left hand. Take two-plus hours to eat dinner and savor every bite. Go on a romantic holiday and make love in a new place every day in a different manner.
3. Pick several things that you do (especially in trading) and find a simpler way to do them. For example, if you are a day trader, open up a position and either take a loss or get out at the end of the day. When you do that you are not tied to the market all day. And you might find that you take small losses and get huge profits. Simplify your entry technique and concentrate on exits. Or simplify both your entry and exits and concentrate on position sizing.
4. Spend a full day doing absolutely nothing except meditating or walking outside.
5. Make a new friend and teach them how joyous life can be. Pick someone who needs this lesson.

No Requirements to Be Happy

I'm going to write the next few tips on topics that might press your buttons. They'll help you find your hotspots and help you discover how you sabotage yourself. I've been reading a wonderful little book by Jerry Stalking entitled, Laughing with God. In that book the following dilemma is brought up, and here I'm going to rewrite the conversation to make it pertinent to trading/investing.

I'm going to do the next few tips on topics that might press your buttons - find your hotspots and help you discover how you sabotage yourself.

Imagine that you are "Infinitely Wealthy." That means that if you stopped working today, your passive income would be enough to live on for the rest of your life at your current lifestyle. What would you do? Would you continue to do the same work? Would you work to earn more passive income so that you could raise your lifestyle? Well, suppose you did that and your lifestyle was now ten times as affluent as it is now. Now what would you do? More of the same? Perhaps you'd now work to give to others or to charity?

Once again let's look at the wonderful little book by Jerry Stalking entitled, Laughing With God. Once again, I have no idea whether God was involved in writing the material. However, the statements made are quite useful and stimulating, so that's enough for me. In that book, God mentions, "If you cannot be perfectly content with nothing, you obviously cannot be content with anything."

While this might sound satirical to some of you, remember what we've said before about having, doing, and being. Most people want to have what the good trader has (i.e., the money and success). Some are actually willing to do what the good trader does, taking a bigger step in the right direction. But the real secret is to "be" what the good trader is. And if you want to be happy or content or satisfied with your trading success, then you have to be able to step into those states first. Thus, the statement from God is perfectly logical. If you cannot be happy with nothing (i.e., just BE happy), then you'll have trouble being happy as a result of some sort of doing or some sort of having.

God then goes on to say that, "the moment you focus on anything that you did not have at birth, you are buying into the line that you are somehow incomplete and can be fulfilled from outside of yourself." Later, he goes on to say, "I put you in paradise and thus far you have been expending mass quantities of effort attempting to improve on it." This sort of approach does not work for the reasons I've just described.

God also says that our priorities are backward. That's probably nothing new and it's easy to see in other people, although it's not always so easy to see in yourself. We tend to value what is rare. The fewer people have something, the more valuable it tends to become. In contrast, God suggests that everything worth having is available in abundance. Everything we need is available in the proportion that we need it - things like air, water, light, sunshine, beauty, etc. The most abundant thing we have is uncertainty - and we already talked about how important it is in last month's update. The markets would not be any fun at all if all that existed was certainty. In fact, most people would stop playing. And perhaps I should put playing in italics because playing is what children do that gives them joy. As adults, we're taught to take life seriously and stop the joy.

Children take joy in the simplest things, walking through the woods, taking a deep breath of fresh air, being with someone who is fun, seeing a sunset, or splashing in the rain. Adults tend to ignore all of that wonderment. Instead, we work for money and security and an improved lifestyle.

A long time ago, I had a major goal - to accumulate enough money to pay off my house. At that point, I felt, I wouldn't have to work any more. I knew I still would work, but it would be nice to be in a position in which I didn't have to work. In November 1997, I fully understood the concept of infinite wealth as I explained it earlier in this tip. My passive income was greater than my expenses. Within six months I had became infinitely wealthy. Am I still doing the same things? Yes. Do I feel any different? Not really, except to the extent that I changed a lot about who I was "being" in order to become infinitely wealthy.

In the book Laughing with God, God says, "You have set up a world of false standards which most people cannot attain. Those who do reach the top will readily admit that there is nothing there worth attaining."

Here is an example of this logic that is worth thinking about:

You have a brand new $250,000 car and your neighbors do not have such a car. As a result, you must be more important than they are. Right? You must be good, successful, and important. Yet you don't spend much time joy riding in your $250,000 car because you don't want it to get dirty or damaged - mostly you just drive it a little to show people how important you are.

One day you decide to really get in your car and take it for a long drive. You'll drive 500 miles to a different state. However, when you're driving your new expensive car, you notice that you are tense and upset. Other drivers bother you. High speed driving makes you tense. And during the trip you are in a minor accident. Your car is badly dented and you are miserable. Rather than laugh at the chance occurrence, you act as if it is you who was dented. Your value was in something else - your car. As a result, you've become vulnerable. You've confused yourself with your car, your boat, your house, or whatever.

We have developed a value system in which we feel we earn something through hard work. We don't appreciate "things" unless we have suffered enough to obtain them. Making a difficult sale to an irate customer seems much more valuable than making an easy sale to a happy customer. We might celebrate the former and not think anything at all of the latter. All these values do is lead to hard work and irritation. We work overtime to get it done. Then we must spend time unwinding, usually watching the television with a beer or a cigarette. What happened to simply enjoying life?

We invent substances that the average child would never consume or drink without being told it was "adult" to do so. Substances that I'm talking about include beer, wine, whiskey, coffee, tea, cigarettes, cigars, etc. We then invent "refined" tastes around these substances. Thus, people spend years learning about what a good wine is or what a great cigar tastes like or what's good coffee and what's not. Part of our enjoyment of life seems to be in developing a refined sense of these substances (substances that the average child would never want to consume on their own because they taste awful) and yet we consume them to unwind. Does it make sense to you?

This column, you might begin to wonder, is on peak performance trading tips. What I'm saying might be true, but what does it have to do with good trading? Part of the reason I'm bringing these ideas to your attention is that most good traders that I know of can identify with what I'm talking about. They are into simplicity and the joy of life. That's part of what makes them good traders. And when you can learn to "BE" these things, then you'll find that your trading will improve as a result of just being.

Does Failure Motivate You?

I'm going to write the next few tips on topics that might press your buttons. They'll help you find your hotspots and help you discover how you sabotage yourself. I've been reading a wonderful little book by Jerry Stalking entitled, Laughing with God. In that book the following dilemma is brought up, and here I'm going to rewrite the conversation to make it pertinent to trading/investing.

God: Do you want to win without losing?

Trader: Of course.

God: If you win, you must lose as well. But you lied to me. You said that you'd like to just win. If that were the case, you'd win much more often. The possibility of failure motivates you much more than the possibility of success. Your whole culture, with few exceptions, is dependent upon failure or at least the fear of failure. If there were not the possibility of failure, you could not take any credit for success. You wouldn't feel so good about winning.

Think about it. How many times would you watch a football game if you knew the outcome? It is the uncertainty of the outcome that keeps your attention.

What if you always knew what was going to happen before it does? As a matter of fact, you already have that ability, but you do not use it because everything you presently call fun in your life would be lost. You would lose the uncertainty that you thrive on, feed on, and yet attempt to diminish.

The last statement may "get to" some of you. But what if it's true? Ed Seykota said in Market Wizards that people get what they want out of the market - excitement, punishment, and a justification for their emotions. I've certainly seen plenty of evidence to suggest that his observation is true. But the conversation gets even more interesting:

God: I am saying that you already can know the future. Remember that future and past are both illusions. The fact that you ignore this ability makes it more obvious that you do not want to know the future or that you love wanting to know the future while believing that you cannot know it.

There is no time - just present. You use the uncertainty (mock uncertainty) of the past and the uncertainty (mock uncertainty) of the future to keep yourself suspended in the illusion of time while calling the whole process life.

Just to make this conversation more meaningful, imagine that you are 100% accurate on every trade. You know every top and every bottom on every stock. You are never wrong about a trade. Suppose you just entered the market and made $10 billion in a year. Would you keep going if it were that easy? Would ten billion be enough? Would you honestly keep trading?

Perhaps your response is, "Sure I would! I'd get all the money in the world." Well, would that be interesting? I tend to doubt it. Trading is only interesting because of the possibility of losing. You are now in a position where you can buy anything; do anything, etc., because you will never lose money on a trade. Would you still trade? Why or why not?

Everything in this tip may be made up. Nothing may be true, but I'd like you to assume (act as if) it is true. Just pretend that it's true. When you do so, what happens to you inside? How do you feel about trading? Would you keep on trading? If so, how often? If not, why not? What does that tell you about yourself? Is it the uncertainty that keeps you in the game? Would you keep trading if you had all the money in the world? Why? What do your answers tell you about yourself?

I would encourage you to do this exercise and notice what comes up for you. How many trades would you take if you had no uncertainty in the outcome? What do your answers tell you about yourself?

A note for your consideration:

There are many books that claim that the text "came from God" and I simply don't know whether such books come from God or not, but if they give me new ideas to ponder then I find them very exciting. If it stretches your beliefs to think it came from God, then just assume that someone made it up. But at the same time imagine that it might be true. This one gave me a lot of new ideas, and if you open yourself enough to do the same, you might find the ideas quite expansive.