I've just read this great article written by Larry Connors (Trading Markets.com)

Be Lance and Magic…

And now I come to what I consider to be the single most important trait, not only to becoming a successful trader4, but to succeed in life. And it’s to stay mentally tough especially when adversity hits. It’s knowing when and how to dig in when things go wrong. I know people who become unglued simply because they have a toothache. Their day and everything around them becomes undone because of a minor inconvenience. And then you watch people like Lance Armstrong, who had fourth stage brain and testicular cancer overcome the disease and then win the Tour de France, one of the most difficult athletic events known to man….four times. He did this AFTER he had cancer, not before.

Then look at a person like Magic Johnson, who is diagnosed in 1991 with the HIV virus and should have been dead within a few years. Instead, he’s on the cover of Sports Illustrated 10 years later, healthy as can be and reportedly worth over a half of billion dollars because instead of crumbling from the diagnosis, he dug in and focused on achieving his childhood dream of building a business empire .When your father asked him at Trading Markets 2001 ( shortly after he cleaned the clocks of 100 Trading Markets members in one on one basket ball) what the attributed his sustained health to be , he looked me in the eye, took his finger to the side of his head and slowly tapped his right temple over and over.

Succeeding at trading may be important but being mentally tough in the worst hours in life is many times more important. People like Lance Armstrong and Magic Johnson should be your heroes.