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Confidence in Trading: The Approach

CONFIDENCE01
Have you ever seen a gorgeous goddess?  A woman so magnificent you just are beeming energy inside to go talk to her?  But as you walk over you start to notice how you’re walking, what facial gestures you’re making, where your hands are, confidence fading… You’re becoming self-conscious and that wonderful feeling of excitement has now turned into fear.  Do you remember the last time you talked to a woman in this energy? In this self-conscious / fear mentality?  Didn’t go so well did it?  Why is a stock any different?

It’s all about the approach and mental confidence prior to the trade.  When you approach an event with fear that energy gets transferred into it.  I’ve talked about how The Energy of Fear is Consumption in this prior post.  So if you’re feeling nervous before a trade take note of this.  Where is this fear coming from? Is it related to money? Lack of confidence in yourself? Lack of self worth? It could be a million different things but you need to find and focus on the one that resonates with you.  I’m currently working on a meditation that will assist you through the process of finding this fear and making it your ally.

Remember the emotion will come during the “approach.” Keep track of how you feel, as this will set the course of how the rest of your interaction with the trade will go.  Keep in mind that magnificent woman: Do you approach her as nervous, not confident, and fearful of reject or strong, confident and full of love?

Personality Traits

16780The research of Costa and McCrae suggests that personality traits fall into five broad categories, with each category displaying a number of facets. Their NEO-PI personality trait inventory labels these categories and facets as follows:

* Neuroticism – Anxiety, Angry Hostility, Depression, Self-Consciousness, Impulsiveness, and Vulnerability;

* Extraversion – Warmth, Gregariousness, Assertiveness, Activity, Excitement-Seeking, Positive Emotions;

* Openness – Fantasy, Aesthetics, Feelings, Actions, Ideas, Values;

* Agreeableness – Trust, Straightforwardness, Altruism, Compliance, Modesty, and Tender-Mindedness;

* Conscientiousness – Competence, Order, Dutifulness, Achievement Striving, Self-Discipline, and Deliberation.

Does Failure Motivate you ?

MOTIVATEI’ve been reading a wondeful book by Jerry Stocking titled Laighing with God.In that book the following dilemma is broght up ,and I’m going to rewrite the conversation a little to make it pertinent to trading/investing.

God :Do you want to win without losing ?

Trader :Of course.

God :If you win ,you must lose as well.But you weren’t honest with me.Your saud that you’d like to just win.If that were the case ,you’d win much  more often.

The possibility of failure motivates you much more than the possibility of success.your whole society thrices on failure  or at least the fear of lossing.If there were not the possibility of losing you could not take any credit for success.Making money in the markets would seen meaningless for you. (more…)

10 Pitfalls of Trading & Answers

What are the 10 major mistakes that these traders make that cost them dearly?

  1. Having no trading plan

When you don’t have a plan, you don’t have a template to follow. It becomes very costly when your emotions are high and you have to make decisions on the fly.

  1. Using strategies that do not match your personality

You hear of a trading strategy that has worked very well and you are anxious to follow it. One important factor to consider is: does it match who you are and your lifestyle?

  1. Having unrealistic expectations

Most traders assume that it is very easy to make money in trading. They have unrealistic expectations with regard to their initial capital, their risk profile and how much money they can expect to make.

  1. Taking too much risk

Usually when traders are down, they want to make their money back very quickly. Therefore, they increase their position size without thinking about the risk/rewards.

  1. Not having rules to follow

Most traders think if they have rules to follow, they are restricting themselves. It is on the contrary. Having rules allows you to be more flexible since you have thought about lots of issues beforehand.

  1. Not being flexible to market conditions (more…)

Be Unemotional

UnemotionalIf you have ever played poker, you will know the high of going “all in”. Your heart is racing like there’s no tomorrow, and you are hoping and praying that the cards will go your way. It’s the thrill of knowing you can double your money in a few moments and also knowing it can all disappear if things don’t go your way.

This type of excitement should not exist in any form in your trading. If you are a thrill seeker, go skydiving. If you are a gambler, go to a casino. If you are afraid to lose money, open a savings account.

Successful Day traders do not let their emotions interfere with their trading. Too often, we let fear, greed, or pride get in the way.

Fear

Fear will prevent you from making the right trades and make you lose out on immense opportunities. Fear stems from lack of knowledge and proper education. You are afraid because you can’t see that a trade is the right trade since you don’t know what the right trade looks like. Once you acquire the knowledge and training, you can begin to trust your decisions because they are based on facts and not emotion.

Greed

Greed is another emotion we must overcome to be successful. Many beginners experience “beginners luck”, and come out on top on their first few trades. Then they start believing that they should have traded with more money so their profits will be larger. So on the next trade, they trade with a large sum of money and they lose it all. Logic will dictate that they should trade with a smaller amount the next time around since they have less capital now. Unfortunately, humans are not logical creatures. Our greed takes over, and we start believing that if we put in more money, we will make up for the lost amount, and come out on top. Sadly, this cycle can only continue until you are completely out of money. The worst thing that can happen to a beginner trader is to have a successful first trade. (more…)

5 Principles of Leadership and Trading

What are these principles?

  1. Knowing why you are in the trading business

You can start by asking yourself:

    • Why are you in the trading business?
    • What was your initial attraction to trading?
    • Are you thinking about it as a business or a hobby?
    • Are you passionate about your trading?
    • Does trading feel like a lot of work?
    • What are your trading goals?
    • Are you enjoying the journey or just focusing on the end result?
    • What do you want to get out of trading?
      • Money
      • Excitement
      • Challenge
      • Power
      • Other things (more…)

    Courage and Trading

    According to Plutarch, “Courage stands halfway between cowardice and rashness…” Clearly, we don’t want to be reckless; and clearly, we don’t want to be hesitant and timid. What we need is a balance. As we go about our trading moderating our greed and our fear to a combination of healthy desire and clear minded caution, we use courage to go forward.

    Courage doesn’t mean closing your eyes, holding your nose, and jumping into the deep end. It does mean moving forward with clean and clear perception as well as steadfastness of purpose.

    You don’t need courage if you’re totally confident and unafraid. Courage, according to John Wayne, is being scared to death and saddling up anyway. Because people tend to fear the unknown, and the unknown is all that is certain about any given trade, we need to employ courage. Since trading is always new, since anything can happen and it often does, since the wildness lies in wait, we need to overcome uncertainty and fear so that we can appropriately enter, exit, and remain in trades.

    When asked what he meant by “guts”, Ernest Hemingway told Dorothy Parker in an interview “grace under pressure”. Trading is all about grace and gracefulness under pressure.

    The good news is that courage is like any muscle. It grows and becomes stronger the more you use it. Often as I trade I’m unaware of utilizing courage. I know I’m extremely alert. I may even be excited. I’m not aware of any fear until something starts to go wrong. However, that alertness and excitement is a product of adrenalin running. Excitement or fear comes from the interpretation you give to the adrenalin high. The more you act as if you’re unafraid, the less afraid you become. It all gets easier. Act the part and become the part. Make it your goal to trade with increasing grace under pressure.

    The difference between excitement and fear depends of what you are imagining.

    Are you imagining loss or are you imagining profit? Of course, you always have to keep the alternative in mind as trading is all about balancing the alternatives, profit with loss. But you don’t have to put loss into the foreground of your mind, because you never would put on a trade unless profit was the probable outcome. Direct your imagination towards profit, and suspend all thoughts of loss–once you’ve put your stops in.

    “Don’t cry before you’re hurt.” says a proverb. I would add, don’t mourn a loss before you experience it. Don’t even mourn it after you take it, get on with the next trade, and the next, and the next. Anticipate profit. That’s what you’re there to experience. Ah yes, and as another proverb states: “Fortune favors the brave.”

    Observation

    observation

    I don’t think the alternatives are trading to not lose vs. imprudent boldness. Rather, the alternative is to trade or not to trade. One should trade when there is a demonstrable edge in one’s favor: then it’s trading to win. If one lacks that edge and (rightly) fears losing, the rational choice is to refrain from trading. The pallbearers enter the picture when there’s a need to trade that exceeds the limits of one’s demonstrable edge. Such “boldness” also manifests itself in improper sizing of trades and poor trade management. It has nothing to do with trading to win–and everything to do with the need for stimulation. Trading to not lose is certainly more effort than it’s worth and also expensive. Unlike the “bold” trader, the fearful trader exits positions prematurely, fails to enter trades with good edges, and undersizes positions.Most trading problems boil down to deficient self-control and resulting impulsivity. The impulse for excitement and the impulse to avoid harm are flip sides of the same coin–and not infrequently alternate within the same trader. Both take the trader away from the prudent trading to win.

    Evaluating Yourself as a Trader

    Here I’ve shortened and republished ten items for self-evaluation:

    1) What is the quality of your self-talk while trading?

    2) What work do you do on yourself and your trading while the market is closed?

    3) How would your trading profit/loss profile change if you eliminated a few days where you lacked proper risk control?

    4) Does the size of your positions reflect the opportunity you see in the market?

    5) Are trading losses often followed by further trading losses due to frustration?

    6) Do you cut winning trades short because, deep inside, you don’t think you’ll be able to achieve large profits?

    7) Is trading making you happy, proud, fulfilled, and content, or does it more often leave you feeling unhappy, guilty, frustrated, and dissatisfied?

    8) Are you making trades because the market is giving you opportunity, or are you placing trades to fulfill needs–for excitement, self-esteem, recognition–that aren’t being met in the rest of your life?

    9) Are you seeking returns that are realistic given your level of experience and development?

    10) Can you identify the specific edges you possess over the many other motivated, interested traders that fail to achieve success in the markets?

    Many answers to trading problems begin by asking the right questions.

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