Good Habits Drive Out Bad Habits
"Since habit is such a powerful influence, and we're used to pursuing our impulses to gain and avoid outside our own choice, we should set a contrary habit against that, and where appearances are really slippery, use the counterforce of our training."
—Epictetus, Discourses, 3.12.6
When we have certain strategies that we use and we concentrate on, sticking to the rules/criteria for those strategies, we are becoming disciplined and patient, to wait until a potential trade fully meets our requirements. We will then manage each trade to completion, taking our targeted profit or cutting it short for a controlled loss at our pre-determined exit point, before the trade becomes unmanageable and a threat to our trading bank.
By doing this repetitively, day in, day out, rinse and repeat, we are becoming consistent and more and more confident of making the right trading decisions, because of our reactive actions, to different scenarios that the markets may throw at us. We should be able to react swiftly and decisively, without hesitation, regardless of the situation we may find ourselves in, during a trade!
Ultimately we are fostering and developing good habits and it also means that we are avoiding falling into the trap of using bad habits, such as taking unnecessary risks, hoping that trades that are going against us, may turn back in our favour, trading on impulse or jumping on other peoples trades, without prior research, or even bending or breaking our rules. Those rules are there to be adhered to for a reason! To protect our trading bank and ensure long term profitability.
So as the title says: "Good habits drive out bad habits". Always remember this and make sure that you stick to your trading plan 100% of the time.
You've got this; you can do it!