Be rigorous and demanding. Make your investment candidates pass as many tests as possible to get into your portfolio. If you want to buy individual securities, but scored low on your self-evaluation, make sure you stay diversified. Further, you should beware of industry or sector concentration. In other words, no matter how seemingly attractive a sector might be at a particular point in time, you should insure that no one industry is too overweighting vs its market weighting.
Concentrated portfolios can outperform only to really underperform later.
Try trading a paper portfolio and see how you perform and how you feel. While a simulated exercise, you should make the experience as real as possible and keep detailed records. Make sure you have a strong reason to buy, sell, hold, or short. The information presented in this site is for your informational, educational and entertainment purposes. Investing involves a great deal of risk, including the loss of all or a portion of your investment, as well as emotional distress.