David Goggins – if you’re into motivation, you’ve probably come across the name. If you’re a trader, you know the constant discomfort that comes with trading. This post relates Goggins’ “Calloused Mind” concept from his book, Can’t Hurt Me: Master Your Mind and Defy the Odds, to how you can improve and put the odds of trading success in your favor. Sounds interesting? Please read on.
The Book:
This book is a memoir and a self-improvement guide detailing David Goggins’ transformation from a childhood which involved trauma, obesity, and depression into a Navy SEAL and an ultra-endurance athlete.
The core message is that most people quit at only a portion of their true potential. He shares his journey and outlines the mental strategies—such as the “Calloused Mind”—needed to push past your self-imposed limits, embrace suffering, and achieve self-mastery.
This book is well worth the read for anyone who’s interested in self-improvement.
What is a Calloused Mind?
The concept of Goggins’ “Calloused Mind” refers to developing mental toughness and resilience through intentionally seeking out and enduring hardship, challenges and discomfort.
It draws from the physical world… just as repeated friction and hard work on the hands create callouses that make the skin tougher and less sensitive to pain, repeated exposure to mental and emotional stress can make the mind stronger and more capable of handling adversity.
“Callousing your Mind” and Trading:
Trading provides it all: constant challenges, discomfort, and it will test your resilience. It is the perfect place to “Callous your Mind”.
Lets use a component of trading that most traders struggle with as an example – sticking to stop losses.
Taking a loss is never easy. When this happens, it brings up all sorts of negative feelings, creates doubt about our strategy and our ability to trade. Because of this we often widen our stops when price gets close or we cut trades too soon – both sabotages strategy performance. Not being able to take a loss also often causes us to abandon our strategy, often way too soon.
When it comes to “Callousing the Mind” and trading, it means going through the discomfort of taking losses over and over while sticking to your strategy through all its ups and downs, i.e. being resilient. The only thing that will make taking losses easier, is taking more losses. As long as you know you are doing the right thing, which is following your strategy, taking losses will callous your mind.
Over time, your strategy will start proving itself (provided it has an edge). This adds fuel to the fire by removing doubt, reducing the fear of losses, and building more confidence.
Building a “Calloused Mind” requires discipline and patience: discipline for the times you don’t feel like doing what is required, and patience with your eventual results.
Finally:
Trading is often promoted as an easy way to make money. The truth is, it’s hard. The only way it gets easier is by consistently doing the hard things—sticking to your strategy, stops and targets, no matter what.
Thanks so much for reading. I hope you enjoyed this post. All the best with your trading.
Thanks and Regards,
Trading SOS SOS
