On... Working Hard(er)

I told my friend that I don’t how to improve my investing by working harder. What does working harder even mean in investing?

In any other field, if you want to improve yourself, you just have to spend more time and effort. If you want to be a good musician, more hours of practice will improve your skills. If you want to be fit, more hours at the gym will give you a better physique. If you want to be good in maths or science, spend more time reading and learning. If you want to swim faster, swim more. Almost anything can be improved if only you work harder!

How about investing though? Can I spend more time to improve my investing skills? What do I need to do? Trade more? Look at more charts? Investing is a very interesting skill, in which, you cant improve your skills by throwing time or effort at it. Well, eventhough you can (and in my opinion, you should), there is no way to prove it. There is no way to see the results immediately. Go to the gym, you look more fit in a matter of months. Practice your guitar and you can play harder songs in a couple of month. Trade more? Do you think your profit improves in a few months time? 

That is why I told my friend that I don’t know how to improve my trading. Investing or trading is a long term game in which you can’t prove yourself. Not immediately that is. But if you do the “right thing”, you should be able to have better profits in the long term. That is what I believe. And how do I improve myself? I do that by reading more books, listening to more podcasts, journalling, watching charts, watching social media and to keep my eye out for opportunities.  

There is no way to prove that the time I and effort spend is useful, but I believe that is what the successful investors do. It is a leap of faith nonetheless and I hope to be proven right in the long term.