I'm a total newbie to stock trading. I have only been exposed to mainstream information out there. My interest in the stock market grew when back in 2009 I lost 25k flipping houses. The housing industry it said to be the most solid there is, little that I know when I bought a 180k condo in San Juan Puerto Rico it went down 50k in 6 moths. I never got the chance to sell the condo and I lost more than my investment, within 7k of down payment and closing costs, over a year work of rent, utilities, future, etc. When you are living paycheck to paycheck this is big lost, making me really skeptical on any investment. I don't measure my success for my losses I measure my success from my desire to making it, never give up on getting free from corporate America. In my life life I have to work for everything I have, nothing has been handed to me, so I value everything I have work for so far. Now looking into get into the stock market, I know is not easy, 90% of the trader lose money but in order to avoid losing you have to follow directions and strategies. Since joining I have been studying all I can, got the How to make millions DVDs and looking at any of the video reviews posted by Tim every day; but I have to say is not enough. Coming from not knowing anything about the stock market to being ready to trade and put on the line your own money is really scary. In many of Tim's videos, DVDs, posts, etc. he mentions that you need to study and I think that is an understatement and I want to take that even further. I'm a Technical Solution Architect, I know numbers, software and have many technical skills but opening the Interactive Trader Workstation for the first time was really overwhelming. The software has many capabilities and I don't think is the best scanning software out there, is not the more intuitive for sure, but there is many terms and options that you will not understand if you don't have the knowledge. 

Paper trading is offering me the opportunity to get the sense of what will it takes to trade. This is the closest thing you can experience before you actually put your money on the line. You want to have this experience before, you don't want to make silly mistakes that will make you lose money or trades. You have to know your tools. This is something that you have to take seriously, because you don't have any money while paper trading you will be tented not to put too much effort and that is the worst thing you can do. You have to be discipline about it, wake up early, fallow the rules read the trades, the charts and even research the companies you want to trade before you even take a position. You want this experience to be as close at it can be to help you prepare for the real thing. If you don't put all the effort you are just losing your time and will not learn anything. 

My advice paper trade but do it seriously!