Learning from someone else's losses saves you time, effort and money — and time is the part you never get back. Beginner mistakes in trading repeat almost exactly from one person to the next: hopping between strategies, buying ready-made trades, and going live before practising. Know them before you make them, and you skip years.
Why start with someone else's story?
Because you are probably at the same stage right now. In the episode Learn From Other People's Losses, Mohamad tells his start in full: an engineering graduate who couldn't find work in his field, then a job in a department he knew nothing about, then a search for a way to earn online — which led him to a video promising to turn a small sum into a fortune through trading.
The story isn't there for entertainment. It does two things: it shows you the missing piece before you fall, and it shows you that someone failed in exactly the same way and still got there. Failing early isn't a verdict on you. It's a stage most people in this field go through.
The smart one learns from other people's losses, not his own.
Mistake one: hopping between strategies
He started with support and resistance and indicators, and lost. He moved to another approach, and lost. Then wave counts, then things even further from anything you could call knowledge. Every video sounded convincing, every comment section was full of praise, and the account told the same story each time. The problem wasn't one particular method. It was that he took general information from everywhere and never built one coherent understanding.
- A tip from here and a tip from there is not a method.
- More strategies breed confusion, not experience.
- Pick an approach that respects your intelligence, then stay with it until you understand it.
He goes into this trap in more depth in Why You Should Ignore Trading Advice on Social Media.
Paid channels and people who promise to multiply your money
He joined a paid channel that posted big numbers every week, reasoning that there was no point studying when someone would simply hand him the trade. He lost, because he didn't understand what was being posted or why. Later he trusted someone who claimed to grow money for clients. That person took a deposit, then asked for a "tax", then a "transfer fee", then disappeared.
The lesson: a ready-made trade teaches you nothing, even when it wins. That is why Mohamad doesn't hand out trades or manage anyone's money. He teaches, and the decision is built by you. See also Why You Should Trade on Your Own Analysis.
Blaming the market instead of your own rush
After a big loss on a major news release, he said what most losing traders say: the market is rigged, it's all lies, there's no point. But the market wasn't the problem. He had traded money he couldn't afford to lose, in a tense state of mind, at a moment he didn't understand.
Then he asked the right question. If most people lose, who are they learning from? Mostly from other people who lose. So he decided to learn from how winning traders work, and then to build his own experience: studying the chart candle by candle and writing down every move, every open and every close in notebooks until they were full.
Don't blame what you know. Blame your rush and your greed.
Practice before money: the demo account and the mistakes log
He spent two years learning without putting a single dollar into a live account. It wasn't fear — it was a decision. Any money he put in was money he needed. So he practised on demo, and set the balance to the amount he would actually start with, not an imaginary sum he didn't have.
- Make the demo real
Set the balance to what you'll really start with, and trade to a plan: stop and targets set before you enter.
- Practise live
Backtesting only fixes an idea in your head. Real practice happens on price that is moving now.
- Log every mistake
Why did you enter? Why did you exit? Where should you have waited? The mistakes log is your first teacher.
- Don't move on until the mistakes thin out
Every demo account you blow is a free lesson. Blowing a live one is a paid lesson.
When he finally went live, he made a mistake on day one: he traded an interest-rate decision without a stop, and the account was gone. He didn't lack knowledge. He lacked discipline for one moment. So he started again with a small amount, small gains and complete patience. More on this in How to Use a Demo Account the Right Way.
Where do you start now?
Understand the road before you walk it. Watch the free awareness series first, and listen to the podcast episodes where Mohamad goes through his own mistakes and his students'. Then choose one method and learn it lesson by lesson at the Academy, practise on demo, and only put money in when your conditions are met.
Everyone's circumstances are hard. That's not a reason to rush; it's a reason to learn properly. Rush for money and you lose it. Be patient with learning and you build something that lasts.
Common questions
What are the most common beginner trading mistakes?
Jumping between strategies without understanding any of them, paying for ready-made trades, and going live before practising. The most dangerous one is trading a big news release without a stop-loss.
How do I learn from other traders' mistakes?
Listen to their whole story, not just their results. Ask where they went wrong, why, and what they changed afterwards — then write it down as a rule before you need it.
Can I learn to trade without losing money?
You can make most of your early mistakes on a demo account, if you treat it like real money. A loss on demo is a free lesson; the same loss on a live account is a paid one.
Why do so many beginners fail at trading?
Because they learn from people who are losing too, and they chase money before understanding. If you want to trade well, study how good traders work, not the noise around you.
