Hey,
Today I want to discuss something critically important to your success: your trading is all about YOU.
When you stop and think about it, this makes perfect sense. As an independent retail trader, you're not hiring someone else to do this for you. You're the one making it happen, for your own purposes, with your own goals and objectives in mind.
You Are the Heart of Your Trading Operation
As a self-employed independent trader, you are unquestionably the most important part of your trading business. You're the one deciding:
- How much capital to start with
- What your profit goals are
- Which hours you'll trade
- Your short-term and long-term objectives
- What skills and knowledge you bring to the table
For almost every decision point in your trading operation, the answer to “Who decides this?” or “What's directing this?” is always the same: YOU.
The Many Hats You Wear
There are very few aspects of being an independent retail trader that aren't centered around you. Consider all the roles you play:
- You're the investor providing the capital
- You're the planner and organizer of your operation
- You're the day-to-day and long-term manager
- You're the trader executing positions
- You're the analyst reviewing market conditions
- You're the quality control ensuring proper execution
This isn't just “playing some trades” in any given moment. From a bigger perspective, trading is a business—an ongoing activity for profit. It's not passive income where you set your money aside and let it work while you walk away. This involves you actively. This is a job.
The Business Planning Lesson
One of the most important lessons from business planning surprised me when I first learned it, but it makes perfect sense: When you examine a traditional business plan, the first section is always the executive summary—detailing who will run the company and execute the plan.
This is logical because you can have:
- The best business plan on the planet
- The best trading system
- The most brilliant market ideas
But if the person executing the plan day-to-day isn't qualified—lacking the necessary experience, training, or transferable skills—the odds of success plummet dramatically.
From an investor's perspective, when someone presents a business plan, you immediately look at who will be making this business a reality. Do they know what they're doing? Do they have the required skills and experience? If not, what help will they need? What resources must be put in place?
Why Trading Is Challenging
If you jumped into trading without prior training, never ran a business before, and wonder why it's so challenging—this is probably why. Trading is a skill-based business with many components.
What you need to do is focus on YOU:
- Get yourself skilled up
- Get trained on running a business
- Learn how to select and execute a trading strategy
- Develop your trading plan, risk management, and money management
Most traders who struggle do so because their training was insufficient to properly prepare them for this occupation. You need to be able to walk in knowing what you're doing, confident in your plan and your ability to execute it.
Ready to Put Yourself at the Center of Your Success?
If this message resonates with you, I invite you to join my upcoming masterclass:
“Maximize Your Profits in 2025”
In this eye-opening session, you'll discover:
- 3 different ways you're leaving massive money on the table
- How to get out of the win-some, lose-some cycle and actually keep your profits
- How to win more and lose less
CLICK HERE TO REGISTER FOR THE MASTERCLASS
During this session, we'll focus on making trading what you always wanted it to be—a fulfilling and profitable business centered around YOU.
To your trading success,
Brian McAboy
Inside Out Trading
P.S. If you'd like to discuss your specific trading situation before the masterclass, you can book a personal call with me at InsideOutTrading.com. We'll talk about your experience, current challenges, and your best path forward.