Wednesday, August 13, 2014

Want to succeed in investing? - Stop believing in God

Why only investing, if you want to succeed in anything you should stop relying on God for outcomes. Whether God exist or not, that's a controversial question but personally I started doing much better in all respect when I stopped praying for outcomes. 

My mother spends 4 hrs in prayer and since childhood I was also a strong believer in God and thought whatever is happening to me is because what god or fate has decided for me until one morning in 2000 when I went up at 4 A.M in the morning, just before my IIT entrance exam, for  a hawan (as suggested by my mother) to crack the exam. No wonder I couldn't secure even last rank in the prelim itself. Inside I knew I was not prepared and asked for support of god to help me pass the exam. I was blamed that without preparation even God doesen't help. I thought if I am fully prepared then why should I  ask the support of God. It's like asking  for wheel chair when your legs are absolutely fine.

When I started Investing in Stocks, my Mother started suggesting me the stones to wear, the days I should trade and above all the days I should not trade at all. I was even recommended stocks to buy based on my favorable stars. Though I occasionally followed her tip in the beginning out of self doubt but I was increasingly getting convinced that stocks in long terms move on fundamentals and in short term based on sentiments. 

During my initial period I lost quite a bit of my money in stocks and I was scolded beyond imagination for why I was investing in stocks. All my relatives started scaring my parents that I will soon destroy whatever they have created. My mother started relating the day's on which I incurred losses with the day's that are bad for me as per astrology. To not get scolded on another failure and continue to pursue my passion for investing in stocks, I started following her tips to some extent and I incurred even more losses. Some of my research based picks worked very well during first 3 years and eventually I became 100% sure that prayer cannot be the route to success here but proper homework can. 

9 years since I started, I still make losses in some of my bets but I take it whole heatedly and don't blame anyone. Over the years I have realized that we pray more when we have less conviction on the stuff we are doing or are not prepared to face the unfavorable outcome. You succeed when you have confidence in what you are doing and doesn't need nodding of your family/ friends / un-welcomed advisers and are prepared to take failure, learn from it and move on.

Now when I invest or trade, I watch the development in the company, industry related to it and price action like a hawk and don't wait for god to come and save me if there is any trouble in that bet. I take losses (failure), try to understand what went wrong, take a note of it so that it can be avoided next time and move on. This way I have multiplied my wealth many times over and also left my software developer job at Cognizant to pursue my career in what I love the most - picking stocks.

So next time something goes wrong take the ownership and move on instead of blaming your fate or god. Success is just round the corner.

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