I noticed "The 27 Rules of Conquering the Gym" by Jason Gay is the strongest trending article in the Wall Street Journal over the weekend. He offered some truths about making a gym work for you.
The "Most Popular" table ranks the articles that have been read the most. It's a popularity contest and it's a relative strength rank. As people click on or read an article more, it is evidence of higher demand for that article, so it gets pushed to the top of the rank. Those at the top have the highest demand - they are the most popular. We can think of ranking world markets and securities that same way. If you want to know which have the strongest trends or relative strength, we can sort them by an equation to define the trend strength. It could be as simple as a rate of change in price over a period like 3, 6, 9, or 12 months. If you manage a portfolio with the relative strength method, you want to have some basis behind why you would buy what has been going up in price and sell what is weakening. There are over 300 academic studies with evidence that relative price strength trends persist: what has been going up in the past 3-12 months tends to continue and what has been weak tends to continue for some time. Although, those studies alone aren't enough to provide a good basis for applying this method. I have about 15 different equations we can use to define "relative strength" and hundreds we can use to define the direction of a price trend. In fact, there is an infinite number of price "trends": now vs. a second ago, now vs. 10 years ago, etc. Keep in mind, the direction of a price trend isn't the same thing as relative strength. You can probably see why some people have good performance results using relative strength and others don't. Relative strength by itself isn't magic. If someone tells you they "use relative strength", don't forget to take a close look at their track record to see how well they've done it. As with anything in life, it requires skill.
Source: www.wsj.com JANUARY 5, 2012
We can say the same thing about training at the gym. There is a lot of wisdom that can help you make the best of it to get the results you want. If someone tells you they "use the gym" that doesn't mean anything. Jason Gay offered some wisdom that is true and some of them are very funny. I thought I would add to one. He says:
5. Bring your iPod. Don't borrow the disgusting gym headphones, or use the sad plastic radio attachment on the treadmill, which always sounds like it's playing Kenny Loggins from a sewer.
One of my favorite things is the treadmill or elliptical while listening to a good audio book. I have a subscription to Audible on my iPhone and Bose IE2 earplugs (that also work with the phone). You can listen to great audio books, getting your endorphins rocking physically and mentally. I'm currently listening to Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman. One of my favorites last year was Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol Dweck. If you want to learn about exploiting storng trends, The Little Book of Trading: Trend Following Strategy for Big Winnings by Michael Covel is on audio book. For me, this is my pathway to nirvana. I seem to take in new knowledge this way, and put it back out lounging on the chaise, or sitting by the fire on the patio or out on the boat.
