How I Got Rich Making Mistakes
I have a huge announcement to make next weekend- stay tuned.
” If you haven’t failed then you haven’t lived”
In 2004 I was attending a very large trader expo. In between the festivities I was sitting in their designated lounge area taking a break when this 71 year old silver haired man sits down right next to me. He looks at me and says “Hi my name is Alton”. What is your name.” Doug I replied. “What brings you to the Expo” he says. I’m usually not one to air my laundry to strangers but I had spent the last 4 years decimating my trading account, throwing countless temper tantrums and making a complete fool out of myself. I was so desperate for answers I thought in the back of my mind this old guy might be God like George Burns was in the 1977 film “Oh God” and bless me or something like that. Yea, I’m at a major low point.
George Burns in the 1977 film Oh God
So here I am just unloading my sob story on poor old Alton. Almost in tears after ranting to Alton about my sorry experience as a trader towards the end of the conversation I blurt out the words ” HOW DO YOU STOP LOSING!” I’ll never forget the look on Alton’s face as he says in laughter “You don’t”.
He said ” Life is full of loss and trading is no different” In 1972 I lost my 1st wife’s inheritance trading Crude Oil. In 1977 I went bankrupt trading commodities and in 1978 I lost 33,000 in one day and suffered a heart attack at the age of 45. I said ” wow losing 30 grand trading caused you to have a heart attack?” Alton said “no my second wife caused the heart attack when she took 30k of our money and ran off with my best friend” .Ouch!
Suddenly Alton said something that hit home with me he says ” But I made millions trading stocks and commodities from 1980 to now. I sent all my children to college, I traveled all over the world, meet my 3rd wife who I am still with and most important I lived life on my terms doing what I wanted when I wanted. Trading has given me everything. I got rich making mistakes It was from those mistakes that I learned what not to do both professionally and personally. In your life you will learn twice as much from your mistakes as you will from your victories.” Now I am in tears for real.
As we wrapped up our conversation Alton handed me a card with his phone number on it and said call me anytime you need to talk. Over the next 3 1/2 years Alton and I spoke several times a month about trading. He taught me how to manage my life as a trader, how to pace myself for the long term and how I should constantly critique my approach. Alton spent countless hours mentoring me and never charged me a cent for his advice, he did this out of the kindness of his heart. Sadly, Alton passed away in March of 2008.
While thinking of going to this years expo it brought up the memories of this conversation Alton and I had and how he always said mistakes make us stronger.Thinking of that I decided to pull up a quick report on my brokerage account from October of 2010 to now to see just how many losses I have had. Here is the screenshot
That is 1,247 losing trades in 2 years. That is 1,247 times I made a mistake. 1,247 times I was wrong and at least 1,247 bad words I said along the way. If you do the math that is an average of 624 losses a year . Over the course of my 13 year trading career that means I have been wrong a minimum of 8,112 times! I know many of you will immediately look at this and say ” Yea, but you have 2,725 wins to compensate for that”. That is true but all 2,725 of those wins were products of those 1200 mistakes. It was the lessons that I leaned from those thousands of mistakes that helped me create this strategy that made me and my subscribers over +10,000 last week alone and millions over the last 2 years.
Most of us are aware that we will lose and lose often. We tell ourselves we will not become emotional over trades and we will remain composed and disciplined. However,in real time we often find ourselves breaking these rules. It’s easier said than done. Only those that can keep it together and use those mistakes as learning experiences are the ones who win out in the long run.
I started TheLincolnList 2 years ago to the day. The reason I created TheLincolnList was to teach others not to make the same mistakes I made. So others wouldn’t have to take the 4 year long road that I did.So others could learn how I make over +200% annually as a day trader and how I’m up close to +600% this year in Lincoln Million swing service without having to decimate their account like I did. But above all it was a platform for me to pass on the life lessons Alton taught me to the masses. Am I a trading God? No, not even close. To this day I still make mistakes as a matter of fact I still make tons of them. But just like Alton I got rich making mistakes. Question is will you? Learn from your mistakes and trade with me live for only $1
P.S – A great video below on famous losers.