Cowardice As A Design Problem
"Life without a design is erratic. As soon as one is in place, principles become necessary. I think you'll concede that nothing is more shameful than uncertain and wavering conduct, and beating a cowardly retreat. This will happen in all our affairs unless we remove the faults that seize and detain our spirits, preventing them from pushing forward and making an all-out effort."
— Seneca, Moral Letters
I love the last line in today's meditation; "Don't try to make it up on the fly. have a plan" This is just the same for trading. If we just jump on a trade because it looks good, we can easily be caught off guard and end up thinking what the hell do I do now! You can't just hope to get it right; you must have a plan so that you know exactly what you need to do, regardless of what happens during a trade.
We have a set of rules/criteria for our strategies which we stick to rigidly 100% of the time. This means that we are prepared for whatever the market throws at us and we know we will either take our pre trade targeted profit or in the worse case scenario, take a controlled red at our pre arranged cut off point. This protects our bank so we can move on to our next trade and so forth.
Get to know your strategies inside out and always be ready to expect the unexpected! As successful traders we must be 100% focused and in the zone with zero distractions, ready to act to cut our losses should we need to! It is great when a few trades go to plan and we don't have to intervene and can let the trade run and take our targeted profit by locking the green in and moving on to our next opportunity. It is all in vain however if we get over-confident, cocky or complacent and start believing that we are unstoppable, getting hit with a big unmanageable red! We can easily wipe out the profits from the last couple of weeks or maybe even worse! If we are not ready to control every trade when we need to, the market will kick our ass big time! This is pretty much guaranteed!
When you are so familiar with your strategies, it will be in your mind exactly what you have to do given any scenario and this will breed confidence and consistency in your trading.
Patience, discipline, the correct trading mindset and full concentration are required for EVERY trade that you enter. There is no compromise, no short cuts. This is the way to success.