If you take a look at just about any profession, you’ll find that people evolve through three stages: novice, competent and expert. Let’s take a look at how this works in the stock trading profession.

A novice stock trader is a one trick pony. They have one trading style they cling to for dear life. When they perceive that it no longer works, they’ll find a new stock trading system and
believe with all their might that THIS is the way… until it too shows itself to be flawed.

They are also inflexible and easily become confused when the unexpected happens. And, sooner or later, the unexpected will happen. They have lots of misconceptions, such as “shorting is bad.”

After the novice has been bloodied and bruised enough, he has a decision to make. Perhaps “stock trading is not for him.” If he sticks with it long enough, he eventually develops the experience to become competent.

A competent trader has “enough tricks in his bag” that he can adapt to a range of situations. However, he knows he needs to keep learning, and that there is always more to know. The overconfidence of the novice is replaced by the experience to know
that uncertainty is a permanent fixture in his relationship with his chosen market.

As a trader matures, it gradually dawns on him that there is no “Holy Grail” of stock trading. There is no perfect indicator, system or money management approach that will GUARANTEE success. Usually, about the time the thankless search for the Holy Grail ends, a trader is competent enough to find his way without needing such an unrealistic psychological crutch.

A competent trader focuses on acquiring the right facts and making disciplined decisions based on these facts. He feels “safe” if he believes he “understands” the situation. For example, he may have a number of ways of picking stocks and a number of ways of playing his stock picks.

Eventually, a competent stock trader notices that he understands a situation even if the facts are not all in. This is because he can relate it to similar situations he has experienced in the past. He is then ready to graduate to expert.

An expert stock trader has enough tools, stock trading software and tactics under his belt that he can confidently take advantage of a trading situation without having to rely on detailed

systems. In a sense, this is the opposite of the novice approach, because the expert knows what he is doing on an intuitive level. Getting to this point takes lots of hard work, and, as the saying goes, “many are called but few are chosen.”

However, the financial rewards for being an expert trader are greater than in most professions. Being able to pull money out of the market almost at will means you will make a very nice living. However, there is one last hurdle to overcome. It’s a battle that will last a lifetime: always be humble. No matter how good you are, the market is willing to take it all back if you ever forget that it will always be much bigger than you are.

Trade well, with earned confidence, and you will prosper.

Doug Newberry is the Director and Founder of Investing Systems Network. He builds very reliable stock trading software so tens of thousands of all kinds of investors can trade with confidence. Investors in more than 25 countries enjoy his newsletter and his weekly online radio show.