I recently wrote a blog post entitled “This Is A Big Problem,” in which I talked about how fear holds too many of my students back from achieving their full potential. While education, practice and experience all help solve that problem over time, it does take time and too many people give up along the way.

Today I want to expose another big problem I see — which really reared its ugly head in response to my charity’s latest $25,000 donation:**

I’m here in #lasvegas with @tbohen to donate $25,000 from my charity @thetimothysykesfoundation to the great charity @everytown that works to promote gun safety as we must do what we can to stop senseless violence and learn to love and support each other MUCH more as we’re all human beings no matter our different backgrounds and beliefs, so stay #vegasstrong and let’s come together in the wake of such tragedy @mikebloomberg #thetimothysykesfoundation #everytownforgunsafety #standforsomething #violenceprevention #jewstrong

A post shared by Timothy Sykes (@timothysykes) on Oct 12, 2017 at 8:05am PDT

…while I was trying to support one of my favorite cities, Las Vegas, in response to this tragic event in which several of my students died or were injured, my idea to try to lessen gun violence provoked some real nastiness in the comments from people who are very much pro-guns who were quick to tell me they would unfollow me and report my account too…both of which are a sad commentary on the state of our nation in which someone having a different viewpoint from you automatically offends people, and in some extreme cases, makes the people with two differing views enemies.

Now, I don’t want this blog post to get political (at all), but no matter what you believe, I think we ALL want there to be less violence in the world and while it’s going to be a difficult battle with no clear solution in sight, one thing I know we need is open discussion…hence why I just made this followup video:**

…and the reaction to that new video is significantly more positive and constructive mainly because when given the “okay” to debate differing views in a positive and useful manner, my students really get into it with each other and so far there’s been VERY few hateful/negative messages posted which is in sharp contrast to my Instagram video posted above.

Now, one reason might be because Youtube allows me a longer video time of several minutes as opposed to Instagram’s strict 60-second cutoff time so I could explain my position more thoroughly, or you might conclude that since I have 1+ million followers on Instagram vs roughly 200,000 on Youtube, there’s bound to be more negativity with the bigger audience, but I like to think of this event as a good example of how to think and behave vs how not to.

I’m curious to hear your own thoughts in the comment section of this blog post too as I welcome ALL feedback, just try to make it constructive and not rude (as tough as it is for some of you with strong opinions on this matter!)

And since I’ve traveled extensively to over 100+ countries the past few years, talking with people of SO many different backgrounds, I can tell you that we’re all a lot more alike with far more similar values than most of us realize and the main problem we have is we don’t communicate openly enough with each other and we let our emotions dictate our responses.

And while this is a political/social debate, how to behave, communicate and think vs how not to also applies to the stock market — I see FAR too many Trading Challenge students and non-students alike being narrow-minded in their strategies and approaches and they miss out on considering new ways of trading that could help them profit more often.

For example, if you watched this interview with one of my newest six-figure profit trading challenge students:**

…you know that Roland’s dad is a value investor, so he was VERY much against his son getting into penny stock trading.

While I don’t know exactly how it played out between the two of them, Roland ended up joining my Trading Challenge and now he’s turned $4,000 into over $300,000 this year alone (leave a comment below this blog post if you want me to do another interview with Roland since he’s more than doubled his account size since that interview we did just 3 months ago so I’m guessing he has some more lessons to share!).**

Now that he’s been so successful and the stage is set for him to become my next Millionaire Trading Challenge student if he continues working hard and studying a ton, his dad and him joke about their difference in opinion, but I know too many people who listen to their friends and family who base their anti-penny stock feelings on the movie The Wolf Of Wall Street, mistakenly believing all penny stock trading is just about actually believing these piece of crap companies, when in fact nearly all of my top Millionaire Trading Challenge students and I have made millions betting AGAINST these penny stock pump and dumps. ..see my favorite anti-penny stock pump and dump pattern HERE.

The problem with penny stocks isn’t the stocks themselves, it’s the misunderstandings and bitterness that penny stock promoters and their lies create — so it’s actually quite controversial for me to be pro-penny stocks when 99.9% of the world absolutely hates them.

The way that I look at it is like, what if I drove my Ferrari 220 mph in a 35 mph zone and crashed and died, is it the Ferrari’s fault or mine? It’s mine because I broke the speed limit…in this case, it’s not the Ferrari’s fault, it’s my fault…so why hate on the Ferrari?

The same holds true for penny stocks, if you learn and play by the proper speed-signage aka the penny stock rules I outline here, you’ll have a very good penny stock experience…and so you just need to learn those rules as they’re good for you!

In my mind, it’s little different with guns, we just need better rules and laws…and while I’m not a politician, I think there’s substantial room for improvement in the gun laws to reduce the violence we see in our nation today.

But, you tell me what you think in the comments below…seriously, communication and sharing each other’s views help cut through the hate and the BS I see everywhere on ANY controversial topic…whether it’s gun violence, penny stocks, or anything where people have very strong opinions.

Having strong opinions on a subject is not a bad thing, but being unwilling to listen to others’ opinions is…so today’s lesson is just to be more open-minded and respect each other more, along with our differences as it’s this liberty, freedom and ability to debate openly WITHOUT VIOLENCE is what makes our country and society so great in the first place!