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10 Minute Toughness

  
  Education
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If you’re looking for a simple program to develop the mental skills necessary to be a successful trader, then check out 10 Minute Toughness – The Mental Training Program for Winning Before the Game Begins. Jason Selk works with many of the worlds top athletes to develop the mental toughness needed for sports success and his program translates perfectly to trading. I’ve been working with the book for a few months now -its easy to read, easy to implement and the program is excellent! As the book says “No psychobabble, no self-help cliches, no touchy feely theories. 10 Minute Toughness is the simple and effective mental-training program to help you get focused, stay on target and find a competitive edge.” The program contains short impactful exercises to help you

  • calm your heart-rate and maintain a relaxed state of mind
  • stay focused on the aspects of your trading that will most help you succeed
  • build confidence
  • perform mental run-throughs that prepare you for the market day

What I particularly find helpful is the emphasis on process goals.  Many of us focus on goal setting in terms of performance goals like making so many points a week. A process goal shifts the focus to concentrate on the specific aspects of trading that will help you achieve the performance you are looking for. It helps you keep your attention each day on the one or two things that will improved your trading. The book is very consistent with what Brett Steenbarger teaches and yet somehow I found it more accessible and easy to implement.  The detailed examples of top athletes, baseball, basketball and football players makes the book fun to read and easy to get. This book will make a great addition to every traders library

The psychophysiology of trading

  
  Education
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The paper is old (2002) but still interesting. Andrew W. Lo and Dmitry V. Repin in “The Psychophysiology of Real-Time Financial Risk Processing” report the results of their experiment to measure the emotional responses of ten traders—five highly experienced and five with low to moderate experience. They wired up these traders to plot real-time changes in their skin conductance, blood volume pulse, heart rate, electromyographical signals, respiration, and body temperature.

Although the sample is very small and hence just a first stab, the authors noted some significant differences between the two types of traders. The less experienced traders, for instance, seem to be more sensitive to short-term changes in such market variables as deviations and trend reversals. Both sets of traders, however, saw spikes in their blood volume pulse in the face of volatility events.

Lo and Repin conclude that “emotion is a significant determinant of the evolutionary fitness of financial traders.”

Traders needs High level of Catecholamines, acetylcholine, and vasopressin

  
  Education
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Catecholamines, acetylcholine, and vasopressin, are three [among many] of the beneficial hormones and other helpful neuropeptides that are produced in specific brain frequencies. Studies have shown that acetylcholine is vital for long term memory. They have also found that when acetylcholine production [in the brain] is high, we experience boosts in our long-term memory. Individuals who have lower levels of acetylcholine usually struggle with tasks involving learning and memory. At the end of your day listening to Traders Mindset produces the neuropeptide vasopressin – a neuropeptide which improves reaction time, ability to learn, and ability to remember. 
It is not only our production of neuropeptides that allows us to learn more effectively we experience decreased blood pressure, heart rate, and our entire body feels relaxed. This boosts the overall oxygen level in our brains and maximizes blood flow to our cortex. This naturally boosts our attention span and level of alertness. Boosted attention and alertness makes it much easier to memorize and learn new things.

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