'Worrying is like a rocking chair -- it gives you something to do but it doesn't get you anywhere.'
- Van Wilder.

Look, this is hard advice to give, and much harder to take, but if you are regretting a trade that went bad or you are regretting a good trade that you missed (i.e., the BIDU IPO), then you are being unproductive. There is so much to know and so much to do in the market that if you have enough time or energy to regret what has already happened, you are missing out on what is happening now.

Most good traders stuggled at one point. What separates the best from the rest is courage and confidence -- read any investing biography (Reminiscences of a Stock Operator, Stock Market Wizards, etc) and you will see that most of these successful traders had to learn some lessons the hard way. Their success is in the ability to find encouragement in failure, learning from the mistake and moving on a better trader.

'Patience is passion tamed.'
- Lyman Abbott.

Learning to have patience is perhaps the hardest investing lesson to learn...at least it has been for me. Money is an extremely emotional subject for most people, so if you lack conviction in your trade or investment and it moves against you, panic is the natural reaction.

It also happens when there appear to be buy opportunities that you don't want to miss out on. On many occasions I have rushed into a trade that didn't fit my buy criteria perfectly. I have reviewed my record, and it is overwhelmingly clear that my best trades were the ones that I had no doubts about going into.

How do we combat our natural inclinations to learn patience? Research. Preparation.

The concept of patience goes hand-in-hand with Investing Technique #1 and my posting on August 7, 2005. Do research, prepare yourself with a predefined entry point and target price or holding period, and have faith in your ideas. The more prepared you are, the easier it is to exercise patience.