Is there a psychology of trading? Are we all insane?

Much is said about the psychology of trading, books, ebooks and all manner of media, hyping, pumping and selling ways to overcome it. But, overcome what? Is there a unique psychology typical of a successful trader? I have been trading for many years and have met hundreds of traders, personally and virtually and the only thing they had in common was their difference. Ultimately we are all subject to the same universal laws, the difference is that some of us understand and accept it, whereas many still think that they are the center of the universe. It is said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. This may be true but as a statement is about as useful as throwing a drowning man an anchor. We act out the scenario time and time again for one single reason, we want to remain the center of attention at all costs, that’s not insanity, it’s just hard wiring. Knowing something intellectually means nothing, knowing something at the level of being is what really matters, and there are few quick and easy fixes to achieve that.
As traders, most of us have spent thousand on various course run by self appointed gurus, spent more thousands on stupid traded until eventually the pain became so unbearable that some give up completely and other go and spend a few more thousands on either new courses, or the advanced course of the gurus they frequented before. A vicious cycle if ever there was one. Just a work about these gurus, some are useless traders, but good at marketing and hype, some are great traders who only trade a couple of hours a day and have plenty of time to teach, and some are just good coaches, buy why do the good traders teach? I’ll get back to that later.
So, if you recognize even a fraction of yourself in the above, and have been trading and losing, or breaking even for a while I ask you to stop going on new courses, take a closer look at yourself and realize that the market, the charts you see are YOU! And you get into the same trouble with it as you do with yourself, you know how well you can create a drama and then go into self pity and enter the movie of ‘poor me’, ‘stupid me’ etc. When you take a losing trade, you can do one of 2 things; quickly assess the trade and move on, or start a good old sulk, lose all awareness of reality and start hitting back by making more stupid mistakes, which then re enforce your sulk and your sense of ‘self’, until the money runs out, or you go into complete catatonia.
Here’s my advice for you, if you are sulking, upset, unhappy turn the trading platform off, and come back when you’re balanced and content (easier said than done, as we want our money back right now). As those of you who’ve been reading my blog for a while know, I’m into meditation and mediate for about an hour twice a day, for me it’s good, may not be your cup of tea, maybe you need a good long jog or something else, find out what it is. Here is a link to an audio program by Guy Finley that I found very helpful and had a lasting affect on my state of trading: “Being unstoppable”. 

Trading for a living is an uncertain business

Like any business venture, trading is not a job, you have no boss, no hours to keep and no one kicks your butt when you make a mistake. I only trade for 4 hours a day, 2 hours at the London open and 2 hours at the US open, although I often spend more time time preparing, going through charts, news events and anything else that may affect the markets. I don’t expect to make the same number of points (or pips) everyday, but I do have a daily target which is just that, a target. In order to give myself a better chance I diversify, NO, not my trades, I rarely have more than 2-3 trades on the go at the same time, diversify my business is what I mean. There are plenty of opportunities to add some steady income on the internet, the simplest is promoting an affiliate program as it requires only a small investment and no more than a hour or 2 a day. Of course, the internet is full of BS and hype, pictures of Ferraris and beach front homes etc, so you need to find something that looks real. I am on twitter and use it to promote my blog and let me tell you, 99% of tweets try to sell you some kind of dream lifestyle, so maybe better to spend some money on google adsense. My twitter messages runs across the screen and I never look at them, except for those I grouped as interested in what they have to day. (I use Tweetdeck for that). Twitter is great to find like minded friends and communicate with them, also good to promote blogs and content rich sites.
Anyway an affiliate program that I am currently trying out and so far is working well is: “Create your own people search”

Automatic trading and trading Robots

As a rule, I am not a great fan of these, as they tend to work for a while under certain market conditions and then as quickly as they made profits, they hand it all back, however, with good money management they can be useful, particularly for those who think they must trade every single day, but may wake up in a state which is not conducive to good trading. So, I’ve been trying out this much talked about Fapturbo Forex robot and following the live results on Forexpeacearmy.com, which is an independent review site (no, honest, it is). Here’s a link to the live results from them Forex peace army Fapturbo results and reviews

And you can buy it Fapturbo Robot

I promise you nothing but the cost is only 1 bad trade, so worth a try for me.

Ok, that’s enough for a sunny Sunday here in London, wishing you all good trades, and a peaceful existence. For more technical setups and other trading info, please check previous posts listed below or use the search to search by keyword.

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