20. Loneliness is the most valuable trait of successful traders…

You can be a novice, but you must not be a leek. You can “be cut once”, but you must not be cut multiple times. Of course, you absolutely must not be eternally cut… So, there is also one thing you must do:

Be a lonesome trader.

Experts don’t attach great important to “correctness”, because anyone can be correct. It’s not that hard. What is really hard is to not just be correct, but to be correct in a way that is different from the masses. Only being "unconventional and correct” can produce huge trading value.

When people weren’t optimistic about bitcoin, you bought; later, over the long period when people announced on different types of media that bitcoin was dead, you held… You were right, and you were right in a way that was different from the masses, so you could make returns that were unimaginable to others. In September of 2017, when the Chinese language media was condemning EOS, saying “EOS is trafficking 5 billion USD of vaporware", you were actually quietly adding to your position; and in June of 2018, when the EOS main net went online, you still held it. Well, you were right., and compared to the market you were right in an unconventional way. And even when the people who came later saw the price “rising and falling rapidly", you were still holding nearly 10x returns… So, once the whole world is going crazy for something, and they all have reached the correct conclusion, or even an overly correct conclusion, then correctness isn’t that valuable, either for you or for others. Isn’t this the case?

“Consensus” might bring about price (actually not necessarily value) — this is something that old and new leeks in the blockchain industry always say. However, you must understand that this refers to a conclusion that can be drawn from the market trading price. That is to say, it’s a partially correct conclusion — if you change a perspective, you might reach a completely opposite conclusion. Just as the shape of a mountain can look different depending on which side you view it from. The vast majority of “consensus” is actually not valuable.

I just stated above that “at the beginning you can temporarily let go of your own intelligence”. What I am now describing is the situation in which, after a period of time, you have already developed your own ability to think, research, and make judgements.

A friend once shared with me his principles of judgement:

Listen to what most people say

Consult the advice of a few

Make his own decision

The meaning of “listen to what most people say” is not “listen” in the sense of doing what they say, but “listen” as in “hear”. When surviving in the market, just forget this item. It’s tiring and noisy to “listen to what most people say”, and there are no new ideas. “Most people” say repetitive things over and over, again and again. One group leaves and is replaced by another, and they say the same thing… It’s not even that meaningful to waste time with news, since most writers are business laymen, and, after all, fields have specialization.

So sooner or later you will understand that using these two items is enough:

Consult the advice of a few

Make your own decision

As time passes, your thinking will become deeper and deeper, and the final result is that “a few” no longer exist, and there is no one around you to discuss with, and no one worth your consulting — if you go further and further down a path, in the end you will definitely be alone, there is no way around this. So you are only left with one item:

Make your own decision

By this point, I suppose that you must have already grasped many judgements and methods, and of course you have accumulated not a small amount of wealth. When you first started you felt very lonely, but later you didn’t have that type of experience. It’s as if you had lived in a small village before, but now you have made your home somewhere in the forest; even though your house is not large, it’s as if the whole forest is your courtyard. You are way from the hubbub, but you can start to hear other sounds, like the calls of the birds and animals…

Later on, you will derive your own methodology for life and work. For instance, in trading you keep to yourself, but in life you never keep to yourself, you build many good relationships and you constantly think of ways to make your life more colorful. So you will understand that being lonely in one small area of your life is not only not that bad, it’s actually quite enjoyable…

In fact, if you want to reach the highest level of achievement at what you are doing in any area, you must learn to be alone. Each person has their own way of being alone. I like to drive around the city. Why? I’m not that crazy about that so-called feeling of driving, but driving is truly a context in which I like to “be alone”. The car is a relatively clean and quiet closed environment, and when driving there is a sufficient reason to reject all phone calls (it’s past time that phone manufacturers should have phones sense when they are moving at the speed of a car and automatically reject all calls or automatically send a message saying, “the number you have called may be driving”)… It’s even better with the Tesla auto-drive feature. Many of my judgements, ideas, and decision were made in the car, because “being alone” is one of the best ways to boost productivity.

You must take good care of your loneliness. This is important.

In the trading markets, this point is obvious: you must — and can only — take responsibility for your decisions. If you made it, it's yours, and if you lost it, then it's also on you, because it was your decision and you used your money to make trades. All of the resultant experience and lessons are yours, and they are hard to spread to others, because others are not you. They are different from you, with their own histories, their own preferences, and their own ability to bear things…

In the end, you will understand that your final returns and the extent of your loneliness will definitely increase in proportion to each other to the same level.. If you are afraid of loneliness in this area, then don’t even be a leek. Directly leave the world of trading, because if you are like that then it’s really very unsafe for you here…