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It became clear to me that the rush of victory after a winning trade is just as high and dangerous as the frustration of failure after a loosing trade. It equally lures me into making another irrational trade right after either to continue to feel the winning or to seek revenge. How do you cope with that? I feel like a gambler after the day and it’s a terrible feeling because I hate the thought of leading myself to that hole and can not climb out...
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
You're in the right thread (https://nexusfi.com/psychology-money-management/) for psychological help, there is a lot of material that covers the types of issues you experienced and, to a certain extent, we all have.
For me it's a matter of experience, really: the more trades I take the less those issues affect me. It's not only that, of course, it takes hard work, a process and lots and lots of screen time, but it can be done, only if with perseverance.
I think this is common, one way that is currently helping me is to start to look at everything in probabilities similar to a the way a casino looks at doing business.. Do they get upset when you take home 200 no because they have that 200 covered from the next guy that sits down at the table. Once you know your win/loss rate you wont have to get upset about trades ( easier said the done) but you know that losing is a part of the game and you will eventually make it all back due to your edge.
That's how im trying to look at the market but it doesn't always work but we are all human...
I would suggest to start a journal it has helped me a lot and i know other traders here get a lot out of them.
Basically, set up a group of criteria, or rules, or scenarios, or whatever you like, so long as you can always specify whether a particular trade meets them or not, and so long as the whole thing is simple enough that you can make your decisions quickly under the time pressure of a changing market.
Then trade the plan/rules, in SIM if necessary, until you can be consistent with them. Pay little attention to whether you're making money, just whether you are executing your plan correctly. Only then will you know whether the plan is any good. If you are executing consistently and correctly, but not making money, then you know you have to change the plan/rules. Make small adjustments, or big adjustments, or whatever seems best, but once you have made them then go back to executing until you are consistent again. Then decide if the new rules are working or need to change. Repeat until done.
Also, set up a definite daily loss limit that you will not let yourself exceed so that you have a limit on your risk.
By the time you have done all this, the emotional highs and lows will be gone, or lessened enough to not interfere with your judgment.
Since trading in simulation is vastly different from trading with real money, once you have something you are consistent with, and which works, you will have to expose yourself to the real risks of trading, so don't rely on SIM too much.
As traders none of us likes to take losses , to be wrong or feel like a failure. It simply feels good to be right and ‘predict’ which way the market is moving. However trading the market does not work that way. Losses cannot be avoided its how you approach losses.
Feelings may never disappear (since they are natural human emotions), but they can be countered by becoming aware of the emotions and not letting them unconsciously determine your behaviour.
The reality of the market is that anything can happen at any time! markets can become ‘irrational’ and that they can stay irrational far longer than we as traders can throw money at it We can never really predict market behaviour .
The solution is to to understand probabilities and think in these terms , by developing a positive expectancy strategy.
It is not about any given trade or whether it’s a winner or a loser. Rather, it is about developing an overall edge or expectancy. So it’s about thinking in terms of a long series of trades and their overall outcome, with losing trades being a natural part of that long series of trades.
The losing trades are factored into your strategy’s expectancy, so there’s no reason to react emotionally ,realising that sometimes it’ll work and sometimes it won’t, and since you can’t predict which one will or won’t, you just execute all of them. Relying on a strategy that has a edge and just follow it.
There are a lot of interesting and unexpected events on the market, each of which deserves a detailed study, etc. So there are many more such moments and patterns that you need to understand and learn to use in the future.