The moment people buy a stock, they expect it to double soon. They see the stock ticker 10 times a day. They call their broker a couple of times daily to find out what is happening.

I have one question for such people. Can you set up a steel plant in one day? Can you build a power plant over the weekend? Can you start a mobile company and expect to have 1 million customers on Day 1? No.

Businesses take time to set up, acquire customers and generate profits. Only when the companies increase their profits will the share price also increase.

Therefore, having bought a good business and good management, give it time to prosper. If you don’t have the patience, you might as well go to a casino or call-up Shah Rukh Khan at KBC.

Moral: The stock market is a serious long-term business, not a make-money-overnight casino.

Lesson 4

Another interesting aspect is the stories we hear in local trains, buses, parties, offices, of how so-and-so doubled/ tripled his money.

We end up feeling like fools not to invest in the market. At the first opportunity, we buy a few stocks without proper research and understanding.

I am not saying they are lying. But I would like to ask them about their other investments too. More often than not, for every successful investment, they would have made five other poor investments and lost money. They won't tell you about those.

The point is, when our investment is motivated by others' half-truths, we never have the patience and discipline required for successful equity investing.

Moral: Don’t be fooled by others' so-called success stories.

Lesson 5

As I mentioned earlier, people sold looking at the Sensex levels and lost out on the huge potential profits. There are many waiting for the Sensex to fall to the 'right' levels to enter the market.

There are two points here. I highlighted one earlier: watch the economy not the Sensex.

Second, timing. Given that humans can switch from irrational exuberance to extreme pessimism and back in a matter of days, I believe even God will find it difficult to time the markets.

Moreover, I bet not even 1 per cent of you will enter the markets if they started crashing from tomorrow. The Dalal Street was totally deserted during the historic crash of May 2006, which was actually a great time to buy.

So I suggest let's get over this fixation with timing the markets. Let us look at business potential and invest with a long-term perspective.

Moral: Time in the market is more important than timing the market.

Discipline and patience. That is the mantra to creating wealth on the stock markets. Unfortunately, both are in short supply. If you have them, you make your riches. If not, you could be in trouble.

I am not very sure how many would agree with the above lessons or even follow them. Such is human nature: guided by greed and fear, than by reason and logic.

The author, Sanjay Matai, is an investment advisor and can be reached at sanjay.matai@moneycontrol.com.