Tending to a garden pt. 2

Why mastering one thing at a time is important

Remember last time how I talked about education and mastering of a specific setup being critical to your success?

Well, I started by talking about all the things I realized from my new found gardening love.

But here are all the things I’ve learned, and why that matters…

Picking up where I left off with the successful follow-up trip to Lowes: I used my weekends to de-stress from the market.

I bought tomatoes, cucumbers, blackberries, lavender, cantelope, watermelon, pumpkins, bell peppers, jalapenos, and more! I was determined that I’d have a giant, fruit and vegetables producing garden, and I wouldn’t even have to shop for produce! Hahaha.

And So, I Began Anew…

I didn’t need flowers (or so I thought), because I was trying to grow fruits and vegetables. Why waste the space? (Another fail in my decision making).

Leo and I slaved from sun up to sun down, with my husband looking on, wondering where I got all of this newfound gardening energy. 

From start to finish: the place I decided to plant cantaloupe, strawberries, garlic, squash, and more…

Darrell reminded me, “You know, just because you planted it, doesn’t mean it’s all done… now you’re going to actually have to take care of it.”

“Placing the trade is the easy part — it’s the management and the exit that makes you money.” – Henry Gambell

“Surely that won’t be too much work,” I told him. We have a sprinkler system after all. He just laughed…

Two Months In

As the weeks went by, we all loved watching the plants grow from the tiny, 6 inch tall versions we bought into actual vegetable plants.

We’d come home every day, checking the recent progress and rejoicing in our success. 

Does this ring a bell for anyone of the trading phenomenon, called the ‘High Five Trade…’ when you congratulate yourself on trading success, only to have the market immediately turn around and show you who’s boss?

I’ve always done things my own way. I never liked rules or structure. Hence, why I like to make my living in this crazy place, that is the stock market. 

So, naturally, with my gardening, I didn’t follow the rules. 

Of course, I din’t listen to the instructions on the tags. “Recommended to plant 4 feet apart.” They said. Me, looking at these tiny cucumbers, bell peppers, and jalapeno plants thought, “Surely these plants don’t actually need that much room.”

I wanted to plant as many as possible! And so, I planted them about a foot apart, and I thought I did a great job!

Overleveraged, anyone!?

I also never thought to actually research what a cucumber plant or cantaloupe plant actually looks like. “How hard could it be?!” I said to myself.

A nice reminder of every single time someone emails me to ask how they should manage trades they put on without understanding the setup or the strategy. 

So, if you have experience with any of these plants, you’ll know what happened…

A Turn For The Worse

Pictures of my bell peppers… pretty sure these aren’t edible. 

The cucumbers completely took over the garden. They swarmed the bell peppers and jalapeno, even the neighboring trees, completely suffocating them. They vined and of course they didn’t like my trellis, so instead, they grew all over my other plants. Which, of course, need water and light. So, they couldn’t grow.

Do you know how many emails I’ve gotten from traders, telling me the mass amount of positions, services, and trades they have. Yet they don’t know why they’re losing money or how to fix it? I equate this to when you have so many accounts and positions on at the same time — and you’re trying to go long but also hedge, and manage long calls, puts and butterflies all at the same time. 

My peppers didn’t grow, since they were suffocating. All of the plants were too close together, so they didn’t get enough sun. 

There’s nothing like being greedy! That always works (sarcasm).

So, when it rained, they would just stay soggy wet. Powdery mildew began to grow all over the leaves. P.S. this isn’t good for the plant!

By the way, I’ve learned so much about plant bacteria, mildew, and disease. I had no idea!

The amount of trading obstacles I’ve faced immediately comes to mind…

I ended up having to take out the cucumber, so the others could survive. This was probably my first intelligent gardening decision. Get rid of the leach, so that others can thrive.

However, this was just one spot in my garden. While this was happening on the left side of the house, I still had many more plants. 

Over in the back, I was so proud of my cantaloupes that were growing (which were also taking over my garlic, strawberries, squash, and cucumbers). 

They looked so perfect though, so I didn’t want to touch them. There were 10 baby cantaloupes growing, and we couldn’t wait to eat them! So, I allowed the cantaloupes to take over everything else….

When you know you have too much to manage, yet you continue allowing it to happen anyways. So you think to yourself hey, maybe one will work! 

I bet you’re guessing how this story ends. 

Well, just about when they were the right size, the whole plant started wilting and turning brown at the leaves. Panic went through me. “Seriously!?” I thought.

The one plant that was actually going to give me fruit is now dying, and I have no idea why. 

I discovered something called bacterial wilt, which is caused by cucumber and squash beetles.

Sure, I had seen the ‘cute’ green bugs that look like lady bugs. “Wow, I’ve never seen a green ladybug before!” 

That’s because it wasn’t a lady bug. It was a beetle that was spreading bacterial disease throughout the entire second section of the garden. The cucumber beetles, along with the squash vine borers, got that entire section of the garden. 

It was like when you have a delta .70 and your ticker looks like it is about to make the 1.272 extension target, then it immediately rolls over and dies. Didn’t you see it failing at the .618 retracement and key area of resistance!?

This was supposed to be a cucumber…. I don’t even know what those bugs are.

How did I know about this beetle? Well, I posted pictures of the evidence on gardening groups, in which the ‘experts’ quickly identified the issue, and told me, how I could have solved it from the beginning… I had just never asked. I had no idea what trials and tribulations I’d run into.

Of course, by the time I realized the problem this beetle causes, the entire back section of my garden was getting obliterated by bacterial wilt spread by cucumber beetles, it was too late to save it. 

If only I would have taken the time to look up this green beetle, and learned what to do to combat it! Instead, I ignored it … and it destroyed my garden.

That sinking feeling you get in your stomach when you know you’d have taken profits, and every day you’re considering cutting losses, it just gets worse and worse….

My beautiful pumpkin patch with sunflowers…before the caterpillars and squash bugs killed it. 

And so, this entire section of my garden died. I’m not sure how much that piece cost. But, I know how much blood sweat and tears I put into it. I also know, the lesson I learned (that darn cucumber beetle. I’ll make sure to battle that sucker next year).

My Point

I’m not sharing my many gardening woes to remind you of all your trading woes (although I’m consistently being reminded of mine as I write this) — I want to be like the ‘experts’ in the gardening groups for you in your trading journey.

That way your cucumbers don’t get destroyed by some bug (that I’ve still yet to identify).

I want to leave you with a total mastery of a setup, so once you’re done, you can go out and be a garden expert of your own!

That’s what my Stacked Profits Mastery is all about.

So if you want to have that opportunity to skip out on a lot of trading woes, you can grab all the details here.

What’s a trading woe you’ve experienced lately? I’d love to help!