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What Not to Do-What to Do

What Not to Do

  1. Have an opinion. One sure way to find yourself trading against the market is to have a market opinion. Trading with a rigid belief about what the market will do next can limit your ability to see what the market is actually telling you. 
  2. Have someone else’s opinion. Adopting some market guru’s market opinion is actually worse than having your own. Market gurus are notoriously inaccurate in their predictions.  Embracing another’s market judgment prevents you from learning to read the market on your own. Besides, it’s doubtful the guru will be texting you to let you know when his or her opinion has changed.
  3. Make your opinion public. Putting your bias into a chat room or forum thread makes it public. Making something public gives it a psychological life of its own. It’s hard to back off an opinion once you have announced it to others. 
  4. Let your ego get involved. Everyone wants to be right. In trading, learning to accept being wrong and the losses associated with being wrong is a big part of the game. This is no place for big egos.
  5. Ride a loser. Still wanting to be right? Having a bias, making it public, and getting your ego involved will cause you to hold losers far longer than you should.

What to Do

  1. Anticipate. Avoid having an inflexible bias. Identify areas where the market might turn, break out, or continue, and think through what that would look like. Anticipate the alternative ways the market may trade. When you see the market trading as anticipated, you already know what to do.
  2. Keep your own counsel. Avoid gurus. Jesse Livermore viewed trading as a “lone-wolf” business, and it is. Learn to read the market and make your own decisions.
  3. Avoid the forums while trading. Use the good ones as a source of education, but refrain from making your trades public.
  4. Check your ego. Be aware of when you want to be right. Ask yourself, “What is more important, being right or making money?” Then, make the correct decision.
  5. Cut losses short. Use hard stops and be merciless with losing trades. When the market turns against you, exit.

Five Trading “Don’ts”

Trading can be complicated to learn. Many traders spend hours every day on their charts, yet still find success elusive. Part of the difficulty can arise when little attention is paid to the mental side of the game. Developing a mental edge is just as important as possessing a technical trading edge. Here are five common mental “wrong steps” that can quickly derail your trading. These can blindside you no matter how good your technical skills. This brief discussion regarding these trading “don’ts” offers an introduction to trading psychology and some sensible solutions:

What Not to Do

  1. Have an opinion. One sure way to find yourself trading against the market is to have a market opinion. Trading with a rigid belief about what the market will do next can limit your ability to see what the market is actually telling you. 
  2. Have someone else’s opinion. Adopting some market guru’s market opinion is actually worse than having your own. Market gurus are notoriously inaccurate in their predictions.  Embracing another’s market judgment prevents you from learning to read the market on your own. Besides, it’s doubtful the guru will be texting you to let you know when his or her opinion has changed.
  3. Make your opinion public. Putting your bias into a chat room or forum thread makes it public. Making something public gives it a psychological life of its own. It’s hard to back off an opinion once you have announced it to others. 
  4. Let your ego get involved. Everyone wants to be right. In trading, learning to accept being wrong and the losses associated with being wrong is a big part of the game. This is no place for big egos.
  5. Ride a loser. Still wanting to be right? Having a bias, making it public, and getting your ego involved will cause you to hold losers far longer than you should.

What to Do

  1. Anticipate. Avoid having an inflexible bias. Identify areas where the market might turn, break out, or continue, and think through what that would look like. Anticipate the alternative ways the market may trade. When you see the market trading as anticipated, you already know what to do.
  2. Keep your own counsel. Avoid gurus. Jesse Livermore viewed trading as a “lone-wolf” business, and it is. Learn to read the market and make your own decisions.
  3. Avoid the forums while trading. Use the good ones as a source of education, but refrain from making your trades public.
  4. Check your ego. Be aware of when you want to be right. Ask yourself, “What is more important, being right or making money?” Then, make the correct decision.
  5. Cut losses short. Use hard stops and be merciless with losing trades. When the market turns against you, exit.

TRADING WISDOM

1. The market expects you to accept losses.  If you want to play in the market you better be prepared to play by the market’s rules.  Accept the losses, make them small based on proper risk parameters, and the market will consider it a tithe.  Just set it aside and help pay for a pew, not the entire church.

2.  The market wants you to admit when you are wrong.  Commit to admit.  If the market is always right, and it is, then go ahead and let the market know NOW that you understand and accept its omnipotence.  Broadcast it to the heavens and to depths of the earth; broadcast it to your friends and family; broadcast it to your neighbors; broadcast it in every chat room you use to brag in.   Let everyone know you will be wrong more often than right and that you are OK with that.  If the market knows you do not mind being wrong the market will leave you alone.

3.  The market will reward your discipline.  Let’s face it, the market is one disciplined son of a gun.  When it says it is going to crush the bears with their death cross and the bulls with their golden cross it does.  When the market says a bearish economic report does not matter I am going higher anyway it will.  When the market says that cute little support line you drew is nothing but “a lead pencil and I am an eraser”, then erasing it will go.  Stick to a discipline of listening to what the market is saying and the market will whisper its direction instead of shouting its lies.

4.  The market is the calculator.  If you are attempting to reach 10 via the calculator, there are many and various ways of getting there:  5+5, 2+8, 15-5, 25 –15, or even  2 + 2 –1 –1 –2 –2 +3 +3 +3 + 3.  When it comes to making money in the market our calculator may want to make it to 10 much quicker than the market does and we may want to add 5 + 5 to get there but be prepared for the market to take its own sweet time adding things up.  If all that matters is getting to 10, then make sure the road you take is paved with minuses along with pluses along the way or all your money will be going to the 5508 (punch this number into your calculator and turn it upside down to see what it spells), which will make the employee a very unhappy and broke individual.

Five Things to Avoid In Trading

What Not To Do

 
1.  Have an opinion.  One sure way to find yourself trading against the market is to have a
market bias.  Trading with an opinion about what the market will do next can limit your
ability to see what the market is actually telling you.  
2.  Have worse than having your own.  Market gurus are notoriously inaccurate in their predictions.   s market judgment prevents you from learning to read the market on
your own.opinion has changed.
3.  Make your opinion public.  Putting your bias into a chat room or forum thread makes it
off an opinion once you have announced it to others.
4.  Let your ego get involved.  Everyone wants to be right.  In trading, you have to ask
yourself 
5.  Ride a loser.  Still wanting to be right?  Having a bias, making it public and getting your ego involved will cause you to hold losers far longer than you should. 

What to Do


1.  Anticipate.  Avoid having a bias.  Identify areas where the market might turn or continue
and think through what that would look like.  Anticipate the alternative ways the market may
trade.
2.  Keep your own counsel.  Avoid gurus.  Learn to read the market and make your own
decisions.
3.  Avoid the forums while trading.  Use the good ones as a source of education, but refrain
from making your trades public.
4.  Check your ego.  Be aware of when you want   make the correct decision.
5.  Cut losses short.  Use hard stops.  When the market turns against you, exit. 

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