The start of September, growing up in the Northeast, always brings on a back-to-school feeling. Whether that season has already begun in your neck of the woods or not, there’s something important that I think can help you better navigate trading and life as we transition out of the easy days of summer into fast-paced autumn and beyond.
What I Call the Brain Dump
If you’re like me, you end your day, including your trading day, by doing something to decompress your nervous system. For me, that’s usually a Netflix TV show with my husband, making sure I have dinner before 7 PM so that I digest well since I like to sleep early, and maybe a family or friend phone call.
But the one thing I’ve noticed that vastly improves my ability to recharge overnight is what I call the brain dump.
There are benefits to doing this handwritten, but I find it a lot faster and easier to narrate.
About 30 to 45 minutes before my intended sleep time, I open up my iPhone. I fire up the Voice Memos app because it makes this so easy, but you can use any sort of recording device.
Then I brain dump how my day went.
I don’t just go through the calendar and explain everything I did or everywhere I went. I have two main categories.
Start With the Gains
The first one is gains today.
This is inspired by the book The Gap and the Gain by Dan Sullivan. I talk about things that went well, things I observed that I could take away from the day, things I did despite the challenges, etc.
It’s usually just talking about it for a minute or two. Because it happened that day, it’s all still fresh.
This involves things in trading as well as life and business, and I recommend you do the same. Don’t really think too much about what’s coming to mind. Just talk about it.
Then Look at the Gaps
I also make sure that, in a natural fashion, I talk about the gaps, specifically the gaps filled.
And no, I’m not talking about trading gaps on your chart where there are empty places in the price action.
I’m talking about gaps where you realize there was a disconnect between how that part of your day went versus how you’d like it to go in the future.
You identify it, and then you do one of two things. You simply observe it, or you enact some sort of action to prevent it in the future.
Again, this works well if it comes to some sort of misstep you may have made in your trading. Maybe you rushed. Maybe you were too slow to take action.
It happens, right? We’re human.
But if you capture it the day of, instead of just waiting for an end-of-week or end-of-month review, you’re much more likely to have that undesired behavior transition into something you actually want.
How Long Does This Take?
Now you might be wondering, “How long do you do this for, Hima?”
As long as it takes.
Sometimes it’s two minutes, especially on the days that my braces are hurting. I’m five months into these things and I’m still surprised by how they can sometimes limit my speaking ability.
Other days, my brain dump is eight or nine minutes.On those days, I just happen to have more to share.
Share with whom? Ah, that may be the best part.
Listen Back the Next Day
The brain dump isn’t just to get everything out of your mind and then let it go. I’ve found it very important and helpful to actually listen back the next day.
But you don’t listen to it over and over, and you don’t file it away.
You listen to it, take any notes you may want to, and then you delete it.
This practice has helped me reduce the situations where I make the same mistake over and over, whether it’s in trading or any other part of life.
It has also helped me have more restful sleep, I think, because it kind of lets me empty out what’s sitting on the front of my mind so that I can biologically decompress.
And it allows me to start the next day as a continuation point, but with room to grow and change. It’s like setting up the next day for your future self.
One Final Pro Tip
I really try, as much as I can, to start off the brain dump voice memo with a positive attitude, even if it was not a particularly great day.
I find that the next morning, listening back to my own voice with an upbeat, energetic tone really helps.
Even if I’m talking about things that didn’t go well, mistakes I made, or unfortunate or undesirable events, coming into the voice memo with that upbeat tone makes a difference when I listen back the next morning.
So this is something that, again, the beginning of September reminds me of, but it can be used any time.
I encourage you to give it a try and see how it helps you in life and in trading.
🚨 PS — Weekly Trading Show TODAY 🚨
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