Stocks, Forex and Other Money Matters

Goal setting in trading and investing, and indeed in any area of your life, has two vital items involved in goal setting and goal attainment: i) perceived difficulty of the goal; and ii) how specific your goal is.

The more perceived difficulty in the goal and more specific the goal is, the more likely you will raise your level of performance to achieve your goal. This is because with these two elements of challenge and focus, people are more likely to try harder, achieving a higher performance which produces better overall results.

So with a trading/investing goal example to earn $50,000 for the year, a more difficult and specific goal may be $51,600. If your brain perceives $51,600 yearly earning as a more specific goal than $50,000 yearly earning then you are more likely to raise your performance to achieve your goal of $51,600.

A lot of people think you should set easy goals. Not so. The best goals are difficult goals that are specific. Goals should be difficult and specific. So if you believe that your trading goal of $51,600 is easily achievable then raise it to a level that you believe will be more challenging, perhaps $72,400.

But your goal has to be realistic to be achievable. You need to believe your goal is attainable through your past experience, knowledge, training and/or skills that you can make it happen. So to perform against your goal make it realistic.

As you work towards achieving your goal, your belief in the importance of achieving your goal will make you more committed to your goal. As you assess your progress you will be reinforcing your commitment when seeing results. This will strengthen your performance to achieving your goal.

Seeing progress in share trading can be from something as straight forward as a running tally of your earnings year to date. You want to earn $72,400 from your trading this year. You see yourself at $38,100 in July and you know you are well on your way based upon simple arithmetic.

Most people who start trading shares or investing in shares do not have goals. When asked about what their trading goals are, they don’t know and they don’t worry about it. The most common response is “to make some money”. This is neither specific nor difficult nor does it have a big “Why is this goal important” nor is it measurable.

So, why not think through your trading or investing goals. Set yourself an attainable, but difficult specific challenge and measure your progress. You will be amazed how you feel about your results.

Kevin Hogan discusses in his textbook “The Psychology of Persuasion”, the idea of “the least acceptable result” and how this is the goal that most people will achieve from any activity. What is your trading or investing least acceptable result? Don’t let this be your goal, set your trading/investing goal today and raise your performance and watch the results.

Want to find out more about share trading education then visit Just Shares’ site on how to trade shares successfully with Just Shares Share Trading Course.

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