[0:00]Look, before I hit record on this video, I was literally starting my competitors, trying to research content. And then I caught myself. I was like, nah, screw that. Because if you do what everyone else does, you get the same average results. And it's the exact same thing in trading. If you keep copying the advice that's available to 95% of people on YouTube. You're going to end up exactly where 95% of traders end up, which is losing, unprofitable. And the worst part is that, if you look at the trading industry right now, it's a copy and paste sess full. Everybody's using the same thumbnails, the same titles, the same opinions, same secrets, same scripts that sound like they were written by chat GPT, which I believe they are. So I'm done with that. Today I'm going to do the exact opposite. I'm not going to be trying to be safe. I'm not going to try to be liked. I'm just going to speak from the heart. Because I genuinely want you to win. And if you're actually want to win, it's time to wake up. In this video, I'll be sharing with you my most controversial belief after almost eight years of trading. And if you get triggered, good. My name is Brad Goh, and I've been trading for seven years. Last year alone, I made over 2.2 million dollars in trading profits, and every single trade is documented live on my second channel, Brad Trades. Which just crossed 100k subscribers. So yeah. And I'm also the founder of EdgeFlo, a disciplined first trading platform that helps traders execute cleaner with God rails, journaling, and performance tracking. So quite simply put, I don't want your money. I just want you to become a better trader. Let's dive in. Ah, okay, the the T is so good, man. Anyways, when I first started trading, I did something that every responsible trader on YouTube told me not to do. After about three months of studying YouTube videos, I went straight into a live account. And everyone was telling me, bro, don't do that, man. Just wait six months, wait 12 months, you know, do more back testing, study more courses. But come on, man, I was excited. I wanted to start. And honestly, I didn't wanted to pay for some back testing software just to feel productive. And now looking back in retrospect, that decision taught me more in a few weeks than months of studying ever could. So, here's controversial belief number one. You don't master trading by studying, by reading or by back testing. You master it by doing. You master it by live trading, by failing, by losing money, by blowing accounts, by getting your teeth kicked in a little bit, and then adjusting and then doing it again. Naval Ravikant said, life is lived in the arena. Trading is no different. Books do not give you emotional control. YouTube videos will not give you execution. Back testing doesn't teach you what it feels like to take a loss, hesitate on an entry, move a stop loss, revenge trade, or freeze when price comes near a level. Because you are not trading with your hard earned money when you are back testing. And I believe that experience is the tuition that the market charges for wisdom. So that tuition is pain, it's losing money, it's blowing accounts, it's failing funded challenges. It's not additional information. Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not saying don't study courses, don't back test. I'm saying that most of you right now are just using studying as procrastination. You're stuck in preparation mode for months and years because it feels safe, right? You don't have to get out of your comfort zone and go out there and hunt for food. No, you can just sit at home and order Uber eats. You know, it feels safe, you don't have to do anything. But wishing that you will make money from trading doesn't actually move you forward. Doing does. In markets and in life, effort compounds, not wishes. That is why I define learning as not just memorizing information. To me, learning is about applying knowledge and changing your behavior. Most people just skip that second part. They study the information, they synthesize the information, they memorize the candlestick buttons, but they don't apply them. And without application, knowledge is useless. And since they don't apply knowledge, they stay incompetent. And right now, if you're thinking, hm, maybe I'm just not good at this, right? Maybe I'm just not good at trading because I, I tried, you know, I tried taking a bunch of trades on a demo account and I lose. Or like, you know, when I actually start trading on a funded account, I I feel the funding challenge in like one month. Now listen, buddy, you're not bad at trading. You just haven't traded enough. Think about that for a minute. You're not bad at reading the charts, you just haven't analyzed enough charts. Similarly, you are not bad at managing risk. You just haven't taken enough trades where risk management was the difference between surviving and blowing up. Because nobody is born a good trader. I'm not born a good trader, John is not born a good trader, everybody starts out from square one, everybody starts out as trash. The only difference is reps. Doing it over and over again until your brain rewires and the skill becomes second nature. So if you want a better use of your time rather than binging books and YouTube videos, do this. Stop consuming content and start doing. Take small live trades. You know, start like a hundred dollars to 200 dollars account. Or try to attempt a funding challenge. And then make mistakes. And then when you do, review the mistakes that you have committed and try to fix them. And then just repeat that entire cycle over and over again for the rest of the trading career. That's how you actually get good, not by doing more studying, but by doing more reps and then reviewing those reps, extracting the information from those reps, and using that feedback to improve your strategy. And like I said, you just do that for the rest of your life. That's it. That's the Holy Grail right there. Now, here's my second belief. This is going to sound really boring, but it's actually the truth. If you keep switching strategies, assets, and trading styles, you will never hit mastery. Most traders do not lose because their strategy is bad. They lose because they never stick with one long enough to build real pattern recognition. You can't build deep intuition if you're trading a different asset class every single day. One day you're trading crypto, one day you're trading forex, one day you're trading stocks. You can't develop execution skill if you're using a different strategy every week. One day you are trading price action, one day you are using indicators, one day you are using ICT concepts. Mastery requires depth, not breadth. It requires going an inch wide and a mile deep until you know one thing so well that you can trade it in your sleep. And listen, it took me so long to actually understand this. But the grass is never greener on the other side. Every market has its own features and bugs. Every trading style has its own pros and cons. Every single strategy is hard to master.
[7:40]So you might as well pick one market, one trading style, one trading strategy. And just endure the pain that comes with it, because that's the price of admission. If you try to master everything at once, your brain just can't lock in on to anything. And what happens is that you start spreading yourself too thin, and the more you rush the process, the longer it's going to take. So you might as well just focus on one market long enough that it becomes a language. Because when you do that, what happens next is that you start seeing the tiny details. You start seeing the nuance, the timing, the context, the traps that tends to occur on this particular asset class. You start to gain a deep understanding of that asset class. And that's how you actually win. Not by trying to become a Jack of all trades, by becoming a master of one. Now, here's the part that's really going to mess with you. Because belief number three is going to sound like it contradicts belief number two. But it really isn't. Belief number two is what you must do in your first few years of trading. Belief number three is what you earn the right to do after you have built mastery. So, here's belief number three. Stick to one trading style is the worst advice I've ever heard. Now, before you clip this and say that, oh, Brad is telling beginners to do everything at once, just contradict himself. I'm not. In the beginning, yes, stick to one trading style. Master one lane, stay in your lane, right? Focus on doing things at your own pace, in your own lane. But once you've been trading for five years, 10 years, once you actually understand why price move. You shouldn't be trapped by a label that is imposed on yourself by yourself. Because market conditions will change. So if you tell yourself that, oh, I'm just a scalpel, then you will not be able to capitalize on the opportunities that can be seen by a swing trader. I'll give you some examples. A swing trader performs the best when the market is trending. But the market isn't always trending. In fact, 80% of the time the market is choppy, it's consolidating, it's messy, it's slow. Or another example is that, let's say volatility start spiking. And the intraday environment start changing. Once again, you're screwed because you only know one way to trade it. You don't know how to shot the market. Or the market cycle starts flipping from bullish to bearish, but you only know how to buy. You don't know how to shut the market. Basically, you get my point. Rigid traders die when the market changes. Adaptive traders evolve with structure, volatility, and even life itself. Because the season of your life have changed too. In your 20s when you are single, you might love scalping, right? Because you got the time, you got the energy, you got the obsession, you enjoy the adrenaline. But when you go into your 40s, you might just want to swing trade and chill. You might not want to stare at your charts all day long anymore. And here's the deeper part most people miss. The market is fractal, price is fractal, which means that whatever happens on higher time frame must first happen on the lower time frames. And whatever patterns that you encounter on the lower time frames will appear on the higher time frames itself. So, once you truly understand price action, you can expect the same understanding across different time frames. You can see the same patterns across different time horizon. So the rule is simple. Start rigid, start with one market, one trading style, one trading strategy, that's it. And then once you've earned the right to scale up, become more fluid. Not random, not scattered, not all over the place, but more fluid with structure. Experiment with the other trading stops. This way you will always have an edge, no matter what the market give you. Belief number four. Most of you don't have a trading problem. You have a work problem. The world doesn't care about your setup. The market doesn't care if you have three monitors or one. Your P&L will not improve just because you bought a standing desk. Your strategy doesn't magically become profitable overnight because you drink your matche late before you start trading. You're not going to find consistency because you bought some magic keys or some fancy micro keyboard. All that stuff is just procrastination, just dressed up as productivity. And and look, I get it. It feels good. It feels good. When you are like optimizing your deaths, optimizing your environment, just so that you can trade when you are reorganizing your notion, when you are tweaking your your little cute little templates, when you are watching day in the life of a trader YouTube videos. When you are chasing the perfect environment so that they can finally start trading. But let me be brutally honest. None of that shit matters if you're not doing the damn work. What matters here is, are you taking the trades? Are you reviewing your trades? Are you showing up every single day, even when it's uncomfortable, even when you don't feel ready? Because the people who win, aren't the ones with the cleanest set up or the perfect trading monitor. They are simply the ones who show up the most. So back when I was in the army, after an intense road march or a difficult mission in the jungle, we will return to the bunk and rest up. And most of my friends would be gaming on their mobile phones or gossiping about girls. But then I'll be over there, sitting in my underwear, hunch over a laptop just like this, chipping away on the charts. No perfect environment, no perfect routine, no perfect anything. Just reps. Just the willingness to outwork everybody else. Just consistency. So, if you're waiting for the perfect setup to finally get profitable, here's the truth. You don't need a better setup. You need a better standard. Stop using optimization as an excuse for procrastination. Stop waiting for the perfect environment to finally get started. Stop waiting for all the stars in the universe to align before you start trading. All you need is a chair, a laptop, stable Wi-Fi connection, and the willingness to outwork everybody else. Now, belief number five, this one is going to make some people mad, but I don't care. If your favorite trading guru is suddenly starting a prop firm or launching a broker, there's a good chance that he doesn't give a shit about you. Because think about it. When a mentor makes money only when you win, their incentives are aligned with you. But the moment they become a prop firm or a broker, the incentive start flipping. Now, they make money when you keep paying challenge fees. When you keep failing funding challenges, when you keep resetting your accounts, when you keep overtrading, when you keep churning, when you keep losing money. And that's the uncomfortable truth that nobody wants to say out loud. A lot of prop firms out there, they make money from failed attempts, then they do from successful traders. And a lot of brokers out there, make money from you trading more, you trading worse, not trading better. That's simply the business model. That's simply how a corporation work. They profit while you lose. Now, obviously, I'm not saying every single firm is evil. I'm saying that you need to wake up and understand incentive. Because incentive are what actually move the world. So, here's the filter that I use for everything in this industry. Follow the money. Ask one question. Do they win when I win or do they win when I lose? And that's exactly why I built EdgeFlo. I didn't build EdgeFlo to sell you another strategy or to sell your funding challenge or to promote my broker. I built it because most traders don't need more information. They need a system that forces discipline. They need to build structure and order into their trading system. And when they do that, they trade better, they make more money. If you can control your rates, control your behavior and actually review your trading data, you don't need to be saved by another trading guru. You just need to execute. Belief number six. Social media has completely distorted what trading is supposed to look like. Because the algorithm doesn't reward consistency. It rewards highlight reels. The biggest win, the highest arm multiple, trade screenshot, the 100% win rate month, the flashy rented cars in Dubai, the fake confidence, the perfect metatrader screenshots. And when you look at all of those highlight reels on Instagram or Tik Tok, that does something dangerous to your brain. It makes you think that trading is all about being a sniper who hits every single one of his shots. It makes you fantasize and think that every trade needs to be like a movie scene in The Big Short or like the Wolf of Wall Street. But in reality, none of that shit matters in the grand scheme of things. Consistency does. Nowadays, all of these traders are trying to flex and see who got the biggest win. You know, I caught this win, who's able to make the most amount of money in the shortest amount of time. But that's just not how professional trading works. Professional trading isn't about making the most amount of money as fast as humanly possible. Professional trading is about surviving in the game long enough so that you can actually win consistently. And another thing that really pleases me off is the fact that nowadays all of these traders are posting their trade screenshots on Instagram where they caught like a 1 is to 5 R trade, 1 is to 10 R, 1 is to 20 R trade, creating this unrealistic expectation about trading. And this unrealistic expectation causes most people to obsess over perfect entries. Not because it makes them profitable, but because if they catch it, they can screenshot it, they can post on their social media and then they can get social validation. It's virtue signaling, but in trading. Like, hey, look at me, I I caught this 1 is to 15 R trade. I'm a genius, I'm so much better than you, you got a 1 is to 2 R trade, that's embarrassing, bro. Bro, shut up. You don't need to catch high R trades all the time. You don't need to be a hero. You just need a proven system you can execute like a robot. Because the trader who quietly stacks 2 R, 3 R, who focus on protecting drawdown, and just shows up every single week for years, will always beat the guy who post one 10 R trade and then disappear for three weeks after he blows up. So if you're watching trading content and you feel this pressure to be perfect, to always catch the top, the bottom, to get in at the best price, to have the cleanest entry, that's not a strategy. That's simply your ego trying to perform. That's simply your need to impress other people. Listen, trading is not a performance sport. It's not F one, bro. It's a repetition sport. It's not about going the fastest. It's about surviving in the game longest. So if you want to actually make money in the long term, not here and there, stop chasing highlight reels and start chasing consistency. Because at the end of the day, consistency is the only flex that counts. Belief number seven. This is the one that nobody wants to hear. Scalping is the worst trading style for beginners.
[20:06]Yep, I said it. And the funny part is, it's also the trading style that most beginners run towards. Because it feels like it's the fastest way to make money. You know, you can get in and out within 30 minutes, you can take fast rates, you can get fast dopamine, adrenaline, you can get fast results. And this attracts this generation who's drawn to instant gratification, right? So we all want things fast, so I'm just going to start scalping. Yeah, cool. Those are the benefits of scalping, but nobody actually talks about the hidden cost of scalping. Firstly, the next five minutes in the market is almost impossible to predict consistently, especially when volatility starts spiking. One random spike in liquidity, one unexpected news candle, one liquidity sweep, and you're cooked. Right? So it's very difficult for you to always predict what price is going to do next in the next 30 minutes or so. The second thing is, more trades usually means more false trades. When you start scalping, the goal becomes frequency, not edge. The goal becomes, how can I take as many trades as possible so that I can win. Not, how can I execute my trade plan as often as possible. And what happens when you start scalping is that you start trading because you're bought. You start trading because you need action, you need the adrenaline, you are addicted to that feeling of, you know, just getting in and out fast. You start trading because you feel behind, because all the social media causes you to think that everybody is always catching wins every single damn day, right? So this causes you to feel fomo. And then when you overtrade, you take more trades, this means you incur more losses and you lose more money. That's it. Thirdly, scalping is mentally brutal. Because what happens when you're scalping is that you are expected to keep executing perfectly, even after you have incurred five losses in a row. And that's very difficult to do. You are not allowed to hesitate, you are not allowed to revenge trade, you are not allowed to trade with anger, you are not allowed to feel fear. You must continue executing your trade plan after you have lost ten trades in a row in just two days. And most people just can't do that, right? They start crumbling once they encounter three losses. They don't even have to say five losses, but three losses they are like, oh my God, this thing's a scam. And this is also why I genuinely respect profitable scalpers. Which is one of my coaches inside 1% Club, Jason, right? He's a high frequency trader, he's a scalper, and they are just a different beast. So, if you're beginner, I highly advise you to stay away from scalping, because scalping will really just magnify every weakness you have. Poor risk management, impatience, ego, overtrading, emotional swings. You will just cause these weaknesses to get even worse and cause you to lose more money. So, if you're new to trading and you're wondering why you're always feeling drained, anxious and inconsistent, it might not be because you are bad at trading. It might be because you chose the hardest lane with the smallest margin of error. So, start with a trading style that give you room to think, that give you space to actually make clear decisions. And then once you've built real discipline and a real trading system, if you still want to scalp, go and earn it. So, belief number eight is much deeper than trading. Listen, your P&L is simply a reflection of your character because the market is just a mirror. This means that if you don't like what you see in the mirror, then you should change the person that is in the mirror. A lot of traders think that the market is the enemy. No, wrong. The market is simply a reflection of your character. Because trading forces you to face your impulses, your fear, your ego, and your need for control. That is why you can have the best strategy in the entire world and still lose. Because when pressure start heating, your character takes over, your emotions cloud your judgment. And this is the part that most people don't want to hear. But successful trading requires the dissolution of the self. It's impossible to make money consistently if you're always trying to prove to the market and to the entire world that you are right. The moment trading becomes identity, you're finished. Because now you're not executing a system, you're protecting your ego. You're not trading the market, you are trading your mental wellbeing. And if you think about it, what's crazy is that the market rewards the same virtues that life rewards. Like it's not a coincidence that the best virtues in life, like patience, detachment, consistency, and discipline, are also the trades that you need to develop in order for you to win the game of day trading. So when people ask me, what trading really teaches you, it's this. If you can stay disciplined under pressure, you can stay disciplined anywhere else. That's why this game is so damn hard, and that's also why it can change your life. I view trading as the best self-development game in the entire world. So when you master trading, you can master life. Belief number nine. This is where trading stops being charts and start being your mind. Most people think that they are making logical decisions in the market. But the truth is, you are being driven by programming you don't even notice. You see, 95% of your life is run by your subconscious mind. Which is your inner operating system. And if that's true in life, it's definitely true in trading. 95% of the trades that you are taking is because of your subconscious mind, which has been programmed. Your emotions, your impulses, your fear, your need to be right, your need to feel in control. All of that is subconscious. That is why a lot of times you can literally know what you are supposed to do. You're supposed to follow the plan, you're supposed to journal, and you still do the opposite of it. So the question becomes, how do you change the programming? Now, this is my controversial take, but I believe that the only way to reprogram your subconscious mind is true deep consistent meditation. Not motivation, not doing more reps, not learning another strategy, not watching another YouTube video, but deep meditation done consistently for an extended period of time. Because when you meditate properly, you're not relaxing. You are training your awareness. You are training the ability to notice the urge without obeying the urge. You are opening up the gateway to your subconscious mind. And this is the part that most people don't understand. When you sit long enough to quiet the mind and your body starts relaxing, what happens is that your brain enters into a theta state. This is where the conscious mind steps aside and the door to the subconscious opens. And that's when things start changing. Because that's when you can start rehearsing a new way of thinking, acting, feeling, and leaving. So instead of being the guy who panics at drawdown, panics when price starts going against him. You start to reprogram your mind to becoming the person who is calm, the person who can execute his trade plan under pressure at all times. Instead of being the guy who needs to be right, you rehearse what it's like to detach from the trade outcome. And over time, you stop forcing it. You become the type of person who executes your trade plan consistently by default. Because now you have programmed your subconscious mind to do the right things. That's the real edge. It's to change your inner operating system. Now, the final belief is nobody is coming to save you. Not your mentor, not your trading guru, not the next shiny strategy, not the next market cycle, not the 10 X mim coin. So stop looking for a mentor. To me, I really believe that the best mentor is the market. The market has stopped me more about the market than any human could. Because at the end of the day, the market doesn't care about your story. It doesn't care about your excuses. It doesn't even care about how badly you want it. It doesn't even care about how hard you work. It just give you feedback. Every single day, it just teaches you the same lesson over and over again until you eventually learn it. And then it teaches you another lesson. So, if you're really being real with yourself, you don't even need more knowledge. You don't need signal groups, you don't need expert advisors, you might not even need mentorship. You know what exactly what you need to do to become profitable. You just choose not to do it. So you just want someone to keep you accountable, someone to baby sit you, someone to wipe your ass after you you shit. And if you're someone who's been doing this for like a longest time and you're still not profitable yet, then chances are, you probably know what to do. But you are just doing the wrong things. So in that case, you just need someone to tell you what you are doing wrong. The question isn't how do I find someone? But the real question is, why don't you be that someone? Because no matter who you follow, no matter who you pay, no matter who you watch, whether that's me or another trading guru, the greatest mentor can do no more than walk the talk and then point you in the right direction. You yourself must walk it for yourself. That's the part where everybody wants to skip, because everybody wants a shortcut. Everybody wants someone to carry them, someone to trade for them. Everybody wants certainty, you know, they want everything to be done for them. But the thing is, you you can't outsource trading. Like you just can't, like a trading indicator can tell you entries, but it cannot manage your emotions. A mentor can show you the path, but he can't walk it for you. And accountability partner cannot you. But he can't carry you. Simply put, you cannot outsource mastery. Ultimately, you still have to be the captain of your own ship and steer it in the direction you want it to go. So, if you want to win at trading, stop waiting to be safe. Take full responsibility. Start tracking your behavior, start reviewing your mistakes, start fixing one pattern at a time, one mistake at a time, and just show up every single day for years. Because trading is the most honest game on earth. It pays you based on who you are, not who you pretend to be. Now, listen, I'm not saying that mentorship is useless, because I still believe that the trader who needs real education, but haven't bought it yet, is already paying for it in the form of ignorance. What I am really saying is that you cannot outsource mastery. Remember, a mentor can point away, right there, but you still have to walk it. Alright, so that's it for the 10 controversial beliefs. I want you guys to comment down below which belief he held the hardest, belief 1, 2, 5, whatever, 6, 7, whatever. If this video hit like, I don't know, 5,000 likes, I'll make a part two. And I'll say the the shit that I didn't even got a chance to say in this YouTube video, because I've got like a lot more controversial ideas, but I just don't want to dump too much on you guys in one video. So now, you might be thinking, if 95% of trading advice is wrong, what are the top 5% of the advice that actually works? To help you out, I've compiled a series of videos that I've done personally to coach you how to trade like a professional trader, how to think, act and trade like one, so you can get the results of one. And it's all start in this free playlist right here. So go on, check out that free trading courses playlist right here. And as always, remember, you are just one trade away.
