4 Habits That Have Turned Traders Into Millionaires
von Andrew McGuinness Aug. 16, 2019
If you’ve seen a Hollywood movie based on the life of stock traders, Wall Street investment bankers or even a TV show about successful entrepreneurs, you will quickly notice that many of them seemingly achieve millionaire status in a few short weeks. This is, of course, not true as it’s extremely rare for someone to become a millionaire overnight or even within the span of a single year. A lot of people research Trading 101 in hopes of finding ways to become a millionaire quickly, but the truth of the matter is that the only thing that will make someone a millionaire is how they approach their work.
What they didn’t teach you in Trading 101 is how the millionaire works differently to the one who makes $100,000 a year, so let’s break down the 4 most common habits we see in successful millionaires.
1) Working hard all day, every day
There’s no denying that many people are lazy, even in the investing and trading profession. Even startups that achieve a valuation of over a million dollars does not mean that some founder thereof now has a million dollars sitting in the bank – he simply owns enough equity in a company that’s worth over a million dollars. If he wanted to have a million in cash, he’d have to sell that equity which comes with its own slew of problems, such as finding a buyer and selling it at the price it’s valued at.
Millionaires work hard – if they don’t, they inherited their money or got extremely lucky somehow. Millionaire mindset is all around achieving small wins and stringing them together to build towards a bigger win, which is something traders can adapt for their own mindset easily enough.
There are no secrets to becoming massively successful in a short period of time. It all boils down to being willing to work hard and eventually seeing fruits for the labor.
2) Setting clearly defined goals
If your aim is to just “get rich” then you’re going to have a hard time. Millionaires tend to be very good at thinking visually. They tend to visualize their success and set themselves very clear goals that they want to achieve.
Let’s say you want to buy a Lamborghini in the future. Instead of telling yourself that you’ll buy a nice luxury car when you’re rich, pick a specific model that you want. Make it your phone wallpaper, your desktop background – know exactly the model and how much it’ll cost.
Having that clearly defined of a goal is going to be crucial in motivating you down the road. It’s going to be the difference between pushing through adversity and overcoming challenges or giving up after the first loss. It doesn’t matter if your goals are shallow – what matters is that they motivate you and push you to succeed.
3) Fail fast, fail early, fail often
Failure is something so many people seem to be inherently afraid of. Being afraid of failure allows people to be far too cautious and miss opportunities. Millionaires see failures as an opportunity to learn from. It’s important to understand that you should never go out there with the intent to fail, especially if you’re a stock trader. But every now and then there might be an untested opportunity that presents itself to you – which could be the difference between a massive success or a small failure. This is how many ended up passing up on bitcoin when they had the chance.
Millionaires take smart risks and this is how you learn to take them.
4) Get a good mentor
Mentors can make all the difference on your path to becoming a millionaire. Having someone to help guide you through the rights and wrongs of either your industry or your decision making can be critical to success.
A great mentor can reduce your failure rate and learning curve by substantial amounts which might even save you a great deal of money down the road. There’s nothing wrong with admitting you need a mentor – in fact, it’s great character to be self-aware enough to look for help.