Forex trading is a business. You need capital. You need to have the tools of the trade. You need to have the expertise the use your Forex trading capital and Forex trading tools and you need the patience and good judgment to apply what you know to trade the Forex market successfully.
In Tom Wright’s book The Right Stuff the author shows us the heroic risks that the early test pilots and astronauts were willing to take. The combination of skills, knowledge, and guts required of these individuals is referred to as “the right stuff.”
Forex trading is, like test flying, a solitary business. There is lots of technology involved in trading the Forex market and Forex trading takes a level of skill to be successful. Like test flying, Forex trading is done alone. Only one person sits at the trading station, you.
In The Right Stuff the author notes that Chuck Yeager, the prototype of test pilots often cautioned others regarding the dangers of a given airplane maneuver and then would comment, “But, it can be done.” Left unspoken was that you need “the right stuff” to accomplish the task.
The heroic aspect of test pilot work drives them to take the risks involved. However, a large part of “the right stuff” is years of learning, practice, testing, and retesting.
Forex trading takes “the right stuff.” Trading the Forex market, developing and staying true to a Forex strategy, and getting up at 2 AM to trade the London market when most of the rest of the USA is sound asleep takes “the right stuff.”
As heroic as Yeager and the rest were, they were engaged in the business of being test pilots. Those who did not do their homework, did not hone their skills, did not keep up with new information, ended up memorialized as photos on the wall of the bar outside Edwards Air Force Base.
“Past performance is not indicative of future results.” Does this look familiar? “Forex trading involves substantial risk of loss and it is not suitable for all investors,” is another Forex market caution. “Leveraged trading magnifies profits and losses,” they say regarding Forex trading.
You may not crash in the desert in Forex trading but you can lose your life savings in an afternoon. It takes the right stuff to develop, maintain, and improve your Forex strategy. It takes the right stuff to sit alone at four in the morning trading the London Forex market. If you have a successful Forex trading session in the Forex market, no one is going to take your photo next to your airplane. Forex trading, like being a test pilot or astronaut, is a business, and the more you learn, the better your judgment, and the more successful you will be.
In the end remember that having the right stuff requires that you earn it by learning, practicing, and changing course when conditions warrant. Then, when you have a successful session when others lost their shirts you can say that you would not necessarily recommend Forex trading to everyone but, with the right stuff, it can be done.