Many people find investing particularly difficult, with too many things to learn and a lot of clutter. But there is a seriously overlooked fact: compared to investment knowledge and skills, maintaining the right investment mindset is actually much more valuable.

Warren Buffett has long summarized that investing boils down to two lessons—learning to evaluate value and learning to view volatility. It sounds simple, but very few people can truly do it.

I find that reverse thinking is especially useful. Instead of obsessing over what to do right, it's better to first eliminate obviously wrong paths. The remaining options, even if not optimal, are still far from the essence.

Let's look at the 9 most common mistaken mindsets in investing:

**The first is Prediction Addiction.** Overestimating your ability to judge the market, fantasizing about precisely bottoming out or topping out, thinking every day about whether to get in early. The result? Frequent trades, frequent stop-losses, and ultimately just working for the exchange.

**The second is the swings of greed and fear.** When greedy, you hesitate to act, waiting for lower prices, waiting to buy cheap or sell at a profit, or vice versa—betting heavily on assets you don’t understand, leveraging, averaging down, ending up with a mess. When fear strikes, you panic-sell, dumping good assets at bottom prices, turning into a textbook example of "buy high, sell low."

**The third is Blind Following.** Buying just because others buy, selling just because others sell, with no independent thinking. Jumping into the market at the peak of a bull run, escaping at the bottom of a bear market—repeatedly hitting the wrong side.

**The fourth is Chasing Rises and Fearing Drops.** Buying recklessly when prices are rising to avoid missing out, selling hastily when prices fall to avoid big losses, with emotions swinging in sync with candlestick charts.

**The fifth is Loss Aversion and Self-Deception.** Feeling euphoric when making money, bitter and vengeful when losing. The fear of losses far exceeds the desire for gains, so many prefer to cling to the illusion of "as long as I don’t sell, I haven’t lost," refusing to face reality, hoping to break even someday.

**The sixth is Being Bound by Cost.** The purchase price becomes a thorn in the mind. Holding on after a loss, telling yourself you'll eventually break even; selling after a small profit, fearing profits will shrink. Completely shackled by past decisions, affecting current judgment.

**The seventh is Confirmation Bias.** Only listening to voices that support your views, ignoring opposing opinions, and not bothering to look at fundamentals. Becoming more and more stubborn, increasingly isolated.

**The eighth is Expecting to Get Rich Overnight.** Confusing investing with gambling, always thinking about doubling, hitting the daily limit, or making quick profits tomorrow. Frequent trading, thinking you're in control, but actually just paying commissions and ignoring long-term value.

**The ninth is Underestimating Risks.** Overconfident, believing bad things won’t happen to you, leveraging heavily, investing in high-risk assets, betting your entire net worth on a single trade. One wave passes, and it’s all gone.

Honestly, I’ve fallen into all these traps. They still spin in my mind because that’s human nature. That’s the hardest part—not learning knowledge, but overcoming oneself.

The good news is that I’ve learned to largely ignore these temptations because I know they’re wrong. But to fully do so? Honestly, it’s still very difficult. Going against human nature itself is a tough battle.

Knowledge can be learned, experience can be practiced, skills can be honed. But the investment mindset needs daily, every moment of refinement. This is "practicing in action"—knowing a principle isn’t hard, but actually doing it is very difficult. Treat every trade and decision as a whetstone, forging your character through real combat.

The essence of value investing is actually counter-human nature. It forces you to fight greed, suppress fear, abandon herd mentality, and restrain arrogance. Replace emotional drives with rational analysis, defeat short-term desires with long-term thinking, overcome herd psychology with independent thought, and use principles and discipline to restrain yourself.

This is a long-term lesson. If you’re also contemplating these pitfalls, let’s slowly understand what true investment mindset really is. Only by truly understanding what is wrong can you gradually move toward what is right.