How do you see trading - Do you see it as a means to an end?

What does trading for a living mean to you ?
Do you do it just for the sake of "making money" ?

And how do full time traders deal with loneliness and lack of social interaction ?

Do you have something that you do or pursue outside of trading that's unrelated to trading ?

Do you have something else planned ? like a business venture or charity work ? (say if you made lots of money with trading)

Does trading in itself provided that you make good money fulfill you ? (sure making good money doesn't sound like a bad deal by all no means, you can take a holiday whenever you want to wherever you please to, money sure does fulfill your needs but)

If you're in your 20s and haven't figured out what you want to do with your life, and know with absolute certainty that trading is for you. Are you comfortable with spending a good half of your waking hours all by yourself without any company ?

I realize that even if you hold full time position at a regular job the likelihood of getting along with colleagues is pretty slim. Nevertheless trading can get lonely. How do you guys deal with that ?

So many pros and cons. All questions answered in different threads numerous time. Why don't you use search button ?

I'm not a full time trader quite yet but I can answer some of these.


-What does trading for a living mean to you?
It means I don't have to rely on someone being able to keep their business going for me to still have a job.
It means I don't have to rely on anybody but myself.
It means I can work from home and make a decent living (if I succeed)
It means I don't have a cap to my income and can always increase how much I make over time.

-Do you do it just for the sake of "making money"?
My main reason for getting into Forex trading is because I needed something I could do from home. (I have my reasons)
Money was not the main reason.

-How do full time traders deal with loneliness and lack of social interaction?
I may not be a full time trader but there are communities that you can become part of.
There are trader meetups all over the place so you can google them to see if any are near you.
There are also a bunch of facebook groups, live rooms etc. Some cost money and some don't.
You can always find like minded people.

-Do you have something that you do or pursue outside of trading that's unrelated to trading?
I'm sure everybody has their goals set out for them that might not directly tie into trading.

-Do you have something else planned? like a business venture or charity work? (say if you made lots of money with trading)
Nothing planned atm.

-Does trading in itself provided that you make good money fulfill you?
Money isn't everything.

-If you're in your 20s and haven't figured out what you want to do with your life, and know with absolute certainty that trading is for you. Are you comfortable with spending a good half of your waking hours all by yourself without any company?
If you want to make it you have to work for it.

-I realize that even if you hold full time position at a regular job the likelihood of getting along with colleagues is pretty slim. Nevertheless trading can get lonely. How do you guys deal with that?
See question 3

Haha, what?!? I hope you get along with others because that is like 90% of life. Also don't get why people want to quit jobs so much... why not just use the salary as jet fuel for FX and other investments?

Trying to just trade for a living can be described by one thing: it starts with "risky" and ends with "as fu%k." Why put all that pressure on yourself? I suppose that is for another/other conversations though.

Full time trader here. First of all in my opinion it is impossible to do trading mainly for money. If you don't have the passion for it, just want the money, then it is a dead idea. You really have to ask yourself first, if I'm enjoying trading or not. For example I tried online poker before. I like to play with friends, but when I had to be serious about it, I hated it. Gave it up after 3 months. With trading my mind was always on it analyzing the situation, since I started, never felt it as a burden. Note that I wrote my mind was on it, and not that I sat in front of the screen every day 8-10-12 hours.

What does trading for a living mean to you?
The absolute control over my time and finances. There are so many opportunities it can give you, both trading, or the money and time you get through trading. You can come and go wherever you want. You can go out during the week and wake up late, you can rent an AirBnB in Tokyo and live there, you can book a trip to Greenland and spend 2 weeks there snowmobiling, and so on, the list is endless (these are actually some of my future plans). Sure you can do these next to a full time job as well, but your hands are much more tied timewise and moneywise.

Do you do it just for the sake of "making money"?
This is kind of explained in the previous answer.

And how do full time traders deal with loneliness and lack of social interaction?
I never really understood the connection between trading and loneliness. These are two separate issues. If you are an extroverted peson who has friends and also goes out between people, why would you feel lonely? Actually I like those couple hours of alone time, when I'm sitting at the screen. But again, I'm not trading 8-10-12 hours a day. I used to do that in my first two years, then slowly it started to taper off. I'd say though, it is not bad to push it at the beginning, because you'll gain the reference experiences faster (chart time). Now I know my setups so well, I usually see them at least 1-2 hours before, that they might appear soon. Makes time management a lot easier.

Do you have something that you do or pursue outside of trading that's unrelated to trading?
Yes, and if you trade full time, you definitely need more stuff to do. And if you trade well, it can actually be an expensive hobby. Another positive next to trading.

Do you have something else planned? like a business venture or charity work? (say if you made lots of money with trading)
Yes, I plan to expand into some kind of venture capitalism. This is a medium term plan though, like 5-10 years from now. But I think I have a talent to feel about something if it's going to turn out well in the future or not. It happened with trading and also with some other ventures in the past.

Does trading in itself provided that you make good money fulfill you?
This question makes me believe you don't actually enjoy trading and want to do it solely for the money. Otherwise I explained this earlier, money is a tool for fulfilling myself, and also I love trading.

If you're in your 20s and haven't figured out what you want to do with your life, and know with absolute certainty that trading is for you. Are you comfortable with spending a good half of your waking hours all by yourself without any company?
I'm 26 now, and still don't understand the correlation between loneliness and trading. Sure as I said in the beginning immersion in trading can speed up the learning, but as you gain experience you should actually be able to foresee if something good will come or not, and don't spend that much time at the screen. I have to say I don't scalp though, either daytrades which last couple hours or swingtrades lasting couple days.

Also get into other stuff than trading and be open to others. And probably you have other friends too. Like I seriously don't understand this loneliness problem. What is the point of having freedom if you keep sitting 8 or more hours at the screen?

I realize that even if you hold full time position at a regular job the likelihood of getting along with colleagues is pretty slim. Nevertheless trading can get lonely. How do you guys deal with that?
Same. I never really had problem of getting along with at least some of the people around me. This is not trading's problem actually but a personality problem.

Somehow lonely and introverted people may become better traders. As every trader that had some success already knows, trading requires so much time and dedication. People that are naturally extroverted, people that consantly "get along with friends" etc.., go to the coffee, to the club, go out for 3 hours to see some friends, then spend 30 minutes in the evening after dinner to have a chat on the phone with another friend, constantly need to travel or go out somewhere, talk to someone, those people almost surely lack the time and dedication to make it in trading, even if they have the intelligence and trading interests them. Becoming a successful trader requires great personal sacrifice, you have to take time and energy from other aspects of life and reallocate it to your trading business. Problem with us people is that we just do not have enough time to do everything well.
Those are my arguments, they seem to be valid from my experience, you judge for yourself. I am not saying that you have to become extremely introverted or even a psychopat, but you also cannot get best from all worlds. The above is true for any business and not specifically forex trading. Professionals in many fields of life have sacrificed social interactions to some extent for the knowledge and experience that they have. Trading just exaggerates it a bit further, because you most probably do not need to meet someone in order to do your business, while in other fields you interact with some people through the day as part of regular business. That does not mean you have more friends or a better social life. You can talk to 100 people to day and still be the loneliest person ever.

Trading for a living is just that. It's income just like any business or job

Thanks Darastonius for writing out such a detailed answer, as Feline mentioned in his post I think what I meant by "feeling of loneliness" was that with other professions you go out and interact with people throughout the day but with trading from home, all you have is you and the screen, I think it's often the case with traders like us the family don't quite understand what we do and have little to zero interest in knowing whats it all about. Not complaining though. I'm used it. I don't need to explain to family or friends what I do, like I used to in the beginning. I guess it's just what we have to deal with as traders. Feline put forward a really good point saying that you can interact with 100 people a day and still be the loneliest person - so maybe the root of my problem is meaningful interaction ? I think that was what I was looking for. I don't have a lot of friends btw. Done a bit of moving back and forth, and where I currently reside the only friends I had was back from secondary school - we've drifted apart - it happens - such is life. I also often thought traveling and trading from anywhere was "the deal" but I don't know, would you be lonely without a meaningful interaction in an unfamiliar space all by yourself. I'm sure it'll be good for a while until the novelty wears off and your start to feel like you have no home, but I'm also planning on traveling to places I haven't been before for a while definitely not permanently moving around so much leaves you feeling like you don't belong anywhere, maybe that was the another dimension of loneliness that I was trying to get it out. I apologize if I bored you with all of this nonsense. But I had to get it out there. Thanks for you and the others for chiming in, really appreciate that.

How long did it take to become consistent ?

This rings so true!

I don't hate trading by all no means, been at it for 4 years non stop, if I hated it I would have abandoned it long time ago. It's just that with trading especially at the initial stages whether you like it or not you'll have to distance yourself from outside interference. All I think about is I would have done and this - analysis even if I'm not trading. When I'm too drained I'll have to do something else to regain my energy. But nevertheless this is the sacrifice we'll have to make in order to succeed. But like Darastonius said it gets easier as you get the hang of it therefore the time spent on trading and analyzing will be minimal leaving you with space to do other things explore different venues. I think giving yourself a chance to do other things besides trading is a must especially if you're still in your 20s.

Its hard to say because it happened over a longer time, but the first signs of consistency appeared around 2 years. But I was studying and practicing trading full time as well, like those two years were pretty much trading only, both theory and practice.

It matters a lot what you study though, like you can easily burn years with the wrong stuff.

I like Darastonius reply, if you are only about getting the money, money will always run away from you. Not only in the context of trading. Money can not be the purpose, it is just a tool. I have always liked trading for what it is. Haven't got rich or something and I still love to do it. I learned a lot about myself by chasing the trading dreams, took some serious lessons, not only financial, that hopefuly made me a little better and showed me some things about life. However, I think the price, the personal sacrifice that is paid in forex, it is quite big. Yes, at the end stages of the journey you can potentially start to learn a much more efortless and happy life, getting paid massively for your working time by the market, having a lot of free time and energy to dedicate to the things you love, chasing higher goals than just working for someone and waiting to pay the bills. But on average, your chances of achieving that are slim. So its a big gamble. Betting on good education, social network, getting proficient at a regular job or business model, those things will give you for sure higher chance of success. Trading is a huge risk that you take in your life. Maybe if you start at a young age say the late teens, it is not that bad, because by the time you hit your 30s you will know for sure where it is starting to lead you and if you have some potential or not. But if you start in later stages of life, I think you can turn your life into a miserable mess, don't want to offend anyone here, as I am sure there are older successful traders. Maybe I am biased because of my experience. I got interested in trading at a young age and still probably not enough. But if I had to read now what I have read and go again the whole run, it will be impossible, given the current circumstances. And that is how I understand why trading is so hard to learn, not because it is so extremely complicated, but because it hardly fits into a regular lifestyle of a full grown up person, having the family, the job, the responsibilities etc. There is just less time and energy and flexibility to learn new concepts. It becomes much harder to risk as you grow older. And trading is a huge risk.

It's a great meditation tool, just be sure to invest money that you can afford to lose, then everything is fine.

haha.
there's some truth to that !