Andrew Away for Climbing: A Trading Lesson from Mountaineering

As some of you know, I have just come back from climbing Mt. Giluwe (4,368 m (14,331 ft)), the highest volcano in Oceania. Climbing has always been a source of energy for me; it is something that serves my soul. When I’m on an expedition, I feel connected to Nature and truly find myself. Again this time, it was a meditative experience and I learned much about myself. I strongly believe that everyone should have an activity in their life that they receive energy from and that serves their soul. Climbing does that for me.

In my experience, climbing is also related to trading. Just like a trader, a climber must be patient, respect the routes and process of the climb, and not break any safety rules. It is well known among the climbing community that a climbing expedition is a process and that the mountaineer should focus in on and enjoy every single moment of the entire journey. Reaching the summit, although obviously desirable, should not be the target of a successful and experienced climber. If a climber is too keen to reach the summit, bad weather or a bad route or bad climbing gear will expose them to great danger. This process resonates well with trading, as successful traders must focus on the process of trading and the making of good trades, one after the other, one step at a time. Although profit is not the target, profit is like thunder to the lightning of good trading, one will surely follow the other. You should not focus on the dollar value of your trades and the making of profit, you instead need to focus on the “process” of good trading.

Some time back I decided to complete a mountaineering challenge called the Volcanic Seven Summits: climbing the highest volcanoes on each of the seven continents! Less than 100 climbers have successfully completed it. I want to be the 100^th one! These summits are:

From this list, I have completed 3 climbs so far: Damavand (2014), Pico de Orizaba (2018) and Giluwe (2019). Let’s see which one comes next for me!

The Volcanic Seven Summits challenge is different from the Seven Summit challenge, which is climbing the highest peaks in all 7 continents. I intend to complete that challenge as well, and that is why I am going on an expedition to Aconcagua from February 20^th to March 8^th, 2019. Just in case you are interested, the list of the mountains which comprise the Seven Summit challenge follows. There’s a few different versions of this list circulating in the climbing community. This is the one that I have chosen to tackle:

Accordingly, I will be away for 3 weeks on an expedition to climb the highest mountain in the Western Hemisphere: Aconcagua (6,961 m (22,837 ft)) in Argentina. During this time, I will not have proper access to the Internet, and I definitely won’t be trading. But the good news is that our trading community is standing, and growing, and business is as usual.

When I started Bear Bull Traders back in 2016, it was only Brian and me. But now, three years later, we have many experienced traders and moderators that work hard to ensure the community runs smoothly for everyone.

Carlos and Brian moderate the pre-market and Open discussions, Robert is running the classes, and other moderators are available to review trades and to discuss trade ideas and anything and everything else that might be of interest to our members on any given trading day.

All the best to every single one of you. See you on March 8^th in the chat!

Andrew

If you would like to learn more about hiking mount Kilimanjaro, please check out the Mountain IQ Blog: https://www.mountainiq.com/guides/climb-kilimanjaro/