"Let me tell you the trouble with trading. There is no career in trading. You are only as good as your last trade, and that is it. You build nothing; you just trade. The day you stop trading, it’s gone. So what you have spent doing for X hours every working day of your life has ended, and there is nothing left to show for it, except for money. You have to keep trading because you don’t want to stop and look back. Because what have you done? You have built nothing. You have achieved nothing. You get to the end of it and look back and wonder, What have I accomplished? I have a very nihilistic view of it, but that is the way I feel. I am still back at that point where I am a 17-year-old trying to decide what I want to do."
Steve Clark
Probably my favorite quote from 'Hedge Fund Market Wizards', one that tells you everything you need to know about business. It's a game of high stakes with expiration date. After a while highs are not that high anymore, but lows can still sting. You push yourself to be one step ahead of competition every single day, one trade at the time. Best traders I know are very disciplined, like elite athletes, taking unnecessary things out of their lives to have that laser sharp focus. They want to be world champions, like pro boxers getting to the top one opponent at the time. And like in boxing it's very hard to gracefully retire and know when to get off the stage.
