Main forms of self-sabotage when trading (and how to prevent them)

You have just closed a position with benefits and your self-esteem is in the clouds, you can boast of your winnings and you are ready to continue the streak. Suddenly come a few losing trades and your perspective already changes completely, you are ashamed of your losses, doubts about your ability as a trader and you feel bad about yourself. Do you dream ?: These feelings are very frequent, especially among beginner traders, and they end up making your emotions and your ego the ones that take control of your decisions, inducing in many cases to make mistakes and preventing you from fulfilling your goals.

How many times have you tried to do something without success? If you did an objective and realistic analysis of these "failures" you would surely realize that there is usually something behind you that you have done wrong or something you have not done. This is based on self-sabotage and unfortunately many times we do not even notice. Most of the time we attribute a bad result to luck, circumstances, blame others or justify ourselves thinking that what we have to do is too complicated. It is always easier to make excuses than to analyze and find solutions.

"After practicing psychiatry for many years I have come to the conclusion that most failures in life are due to self-sabotage" (Alexander Elder's phrase).

In this article we will analyze the 7 most common forms of self-sabotage that we usually commit when trading and how we can prevent them. These are common mistakes that many traders make and you can learn to save a lot of time and money:

1. Feeling of depression after a loss

It's easy to feel a little depressed especially after facing a couple of consecutive losing trades. It is also easy depending on your personality or mood you choose one of these two options: blame yourself and discourage you to open new positions or try to take the revenge as soon as possible.

Either of these options is bad. In these cases you should remember that trading is a medium / long-term way and that a couple of obstacles in the form of specific positions do not mean that the direction is not appropriate. There is no reason to blame yourself for the result of a particular operation. Everyone loses often, even the most profitable traders. It is impossible to hit 100% of operations. Even with a lower percentage of winning trades than losers you can have a profitable system if you earn enough on the winners and you know how to cut losers in time.

2. Being too critical

Virtually any trader has good and bad months. Facing the good months is always easier than the bad ones. In the bad months you tend to be hard on yourself. You feel like you've made mistakes and missed good chances. This causes stress or regret. You can lose confidence in your trading system or think you do not have what it takes to be a profitable trader.

You must learn to cope with losses (and also profits) from the most emotionally neutral position possible. Before any losing streak take a break and analyze if there is something in your trading system that is not working or is only due to specific circumstances of the market that are not under your control. If you think you have to change something do it but calmly, without going crazy and analyzing the results again.

3. Falling into overinformation

We tend to think that the more information we read the more we are learning and therefore the better we will act and the more benefits we will get. This may be more or less true in other aspects of life but in trading it is rather counterproductive.

Read thousands of strategies, trading books, opinions of other traders, ... many times what it will do is confuse you, make you fall into contradictions and saturate information (this is known as infoxicación).

Many times the most profitable trading systems are the simplest. At first it is imperative that you learn the basic concepts that you will need to invest but then the most important thing is practice. The best way to learn to invest without risk is to open a demo account with an online broker and start putting your knowledge into practice as soon as possible.

4. Risking too much

The goal of many people who approach the world of trading is to make money in the shortest possible time and investing a minimum amount. They fall into the trap of the false promises they can find in advertising some brokers and sellers of "infallible" systems to get rich instantly, ...

These mirages cause them to be launched into the void without parachutes and assume such a high risk that they can jump their trading account in the air instantly. No one is going to "liner" or withdraw in an operation. If you want to be a profitable trader take these ideas out of your head and return to the real world.

The key is first to learn and gain benefits little by little as you are having more experience. You must have realistic expectations and be flexible. It is not positive to set goals from the beginning of how many benefits you want to get as it is easy to fall into the temptation to open positions too large to meet these goals and the most likely result is a greater loss.

5. Impulsive need to open operations

Many traders feel uncomfortable when they have not found opportunities to open positions for some time. They believe that more positions equate to more money and not participating in the market away from their goals. That is why they tend to self-deceive and push themselves to operate when the time is not really right.

In other businesses, the formula for more effort and time spent equals more money, but this does not usually happen in trading. You have to be patient and wait long enough to find good opportunities that fit your strategy. Think of trading as if you were hunting, it does not make any sense to shoot aimlessly, wasting bullets that are not going to hit any target and that can only bring you problems. It is about that you search your prey with intelligence and only pull the trigger if you have high chances to hit the target. There will be days when you have to pick up your things and go home without hunting anything, but there will be others who can do more than meet your goals.

6. Take profits too soon

This is a very typical mistake that we have all committed once. When a position goes into profits, it is common to feel some fear and want to collect profits as soon as possible so as not to lose them. In the end you end up betraying the analysis you've done before opening the position and closing before reaching your goals. Break with your risk / reward rules, develop bad habits and you're hardly going to be profitable in the long run.

When creating your own trading system you must have clear rules for detecting opportunities, setting a profit goal (take profit) and establishing a stop loss. Stay true to your strategy and let the position run. If your system shows you that it is not quite successful you can ask to make some change but if you skip it continuously and do not analyze anything hard you will be able to improve it.

7. Feeling of euphoria after a winning operation

If at the first point we saw the feeling of depression or guilt when facing one or more losing operations, the opposite case can also cause you a very negative result. A series of winning trades can inflate your ego, increase your arrogance and believe you have an invincible trading system. These emotions will make you make impulsive decisions and make you challenge the market that can soon give you a reality check and put you on your site.

To face the most neutral and objective way both winning and losing operations is the key. You will need to have patience and above all help you from the experience that only gives the practice.

Tips That Will Help You Succeed in Trading

In this article we have compiled a series of useful trading tips that we believe can help you on your way to becoming a profitable trader. We have included 45 tips among which you will not find miracle tricks but most key points in which many traders make mistakes and therefore, if you can identify and act properly, you can save a significant amount of time, money and effort.

These tips apply to online trading with any financial instrument (Forex currency market, stocks, indices, raw materials, ...) and are oriented to different aspects, not only from the point of view of the mental attitude that you must maintain when doing trading But also more practical ones focused on your daily operation. We hope you will be of help.

Tips for Successful Trading:

1. Take the trading seriously, it's not a game, it's not a casino or a type of bet, it's really a business.

2. You must leave your emotions out of this business. Greed or fear is very harmful. Much of the success in trading depends on psychological aspects. (Psychology of Trading: The 5 Keys to Success).

Do not think that you are going to get rich instantly or that it will be an easy way.

4. If your expectations are not realistic you will not get anywhere.

5. Do not think that it is impossible to succeed in trading. Practice, analyze, and learn enough before you make excuses and quit.

6. You can read and try hundreds of strategies but it is very complicated that you will find the perfect strategy. If you dedicate yourself to follow too many strategies you will be saturated with information and you will only get confused.

7. Try simple strategies and adapt to your needs. Remember: Simplicity in trading is the key.

8. Start practicing in a demo account, Broker forex teregulasi with free demo accounts.

9. Take the demo account seriously as if your money is at stake.

10. To be a profitable trader there are no shortcuts: Work, discipline and patience.

11. Launching too soon to a real account is not smart.

12. Being afraid to throw yourself into a real account when you have been practicing enough time is not smart either.

13. Understand the differences between a demo account and a real one.

14. Do not choose your broker online because it offers the most aggressive promotion. Look for a serious, reliable broker that fits your needs (How to choose the right online broker?)

15. Operate only with an amount of money that you are willing to lose. If you consider trading as a solution to your economic problems, your emotions will put you under negative pressure.

16. Relativize the result and focus on learning and optimizing your strategy.

17. Do not despair when the market moves against your positions.

18. When you open a position: define your objective of profit, always place your stop loss and remain calm, you have a plan of exit whether things go well or not.

19. Keep your position even if you get lost. It is preferable to jump your stop loss (if you have to jump) and analyze that it has failed to prematurely close your positions for fear and not being able to analyze anything.

20. Let your profits run until you reach the target you defined before opening the position. Do not close your positions on profits ahead of time for fear of losing.

21. Do not try to guess how the market will behave.

22. Look for signs of confirmation that the market is going in a certain direction and applies your strategy. Detecting the direction in which the market is is much easier than trying to predict what it will do in the future and try to anticipate something that may not happen.

23. Your job is not to guess but to detect and take advantage of strong trading opportunities that are taking place in the present.

24. Keep in mind the economic events and news that may affect your positions and your strategy. Have a good Economic Calendar handy.

25. Your focus must always remain on your strategy, it is your tool for success.

26. You can not claim to always win. The losses are part of the game and you must accept it or else you will only be frustrated and abandoned.

27. If you come from a losing streak, never try to defy the market or take the revenge.

28. If you have a bad day do not do trading, you will avoid mistakes and you will be able to take advantage of the opportunities the next day.

29. Do not spend time analyzing a possible investment opportunity. Spending too much time watching graphs will tire you or push you to see opportunities where there are none. If you do not find clear opportunities by applying your strategy, close the trading platform and try again the next day.

30. Do not push yourself to open positions or open too much (overtrading). Do not pretend to capture every opportunity.

31. Start using medium- or long-term time frames. You will avoid stress and false signals. (What is the appropriate time frame when doing trading?).

32. Understand the advantages and also the drawbacks of leverage. (How to use leverage wisely).

33. Do not risk too much by operation. (5 Basic Money Management Rules).

34. Plan to grow your trading account slowly but surely.

35. Do not be too confident. Always act with caution, prudence and controlling the risk.

36. Do not be too self-critical.

37. Do not let yourself fall into self-sabotage. Many errors that we comment are due to self-sabotage and we do not even notice.

38. If you are analyzing a possible opportunity too much, you are not sure at all, you give many laps, ... surely it is because you are pushing you to take a bad position.

39. Use logic instead of intuition or emotions.

40. Many traders lose money. Do not act like them or fall into their own mistakes.

41. You can learn from the mistakes that other traders have made without having to experiment with them in your own meat.

42. Do not try to reinvent the wheel. It will cost you time and money.

43. If you are not happy with your results try to change your strategy, your trading system, your attitude, but not your goal.

44. If you like what you do there is no reason to leave. Trading is exciting. Keep learning and improving.

Self-motivation and maintaining a positive attitude is the fastest and safest way to achieve your goals.

Surely we have left a good handful of useful tips in the foreground so we do not want this to be a closed article and we would like you to give us any advice or experience of own trading that you have learned that is not collected in The above tips. Do not hesitate to send it in the comments section that you have a little lower and sure that other traders can benefit as well.

Forex Trading Signals

The sites specializing in fresh forex signal signal forex gratis services are one of the most interesting means available to traders to successfully invest in financial markets such as the Forex. For this reason, the use of trading signals services has become increasingly popular, especially among investors who want to make gains in the Forex market and who do not have the time or knowledge to perform exhaustive analyzes and operate on own account.

The Forex currency market is one of the most profitable investment options available today because it is the most liquid financial market in the world, its high volatility and allows to operate with a high level of leverage, which means Which offers the possibility of making big profits with little investment. However, at the same time it can be a source of great losses, but one is taken care of, paradoxically for the same reasons explained above.

Many investors who excitedly opened a real account in a Forex broker terpercaya, saw their account drastically reduced or disappeared before they could even learn something very important: Trading in the Forex or another financial market is not easy, requires discipline , Patience and preparation. It is by no means easy money, and for this reason most beginner traders end up losing all their trading capital in a short time.

Once the investor has the necessary knowledge and experience (practicing their strategies in a demo account) you can start trading in a real account with the security of knowing what you are doing. It is vital that before you start investing in any financial market the person has learned what they consist of, what forces they move, how they work, types of orders, trading styles and other related aspects.

Also, an operator can use other resources to increase its chances of success in the market and to make a profit, such as trading signals services. In fact, many experienced traders and beginners of the forex market use Forex trading signal services in order to access new opportunities to make a profit in the market

The reality is that it is impossible to spend all day in front of the computer and unless the person is a professional trader, however much he wishes otherwise, he will constantly lose opportunities to perform good transactions in the market. That is why, through the services of trading signals, an operator that seeks to invest in the Forex but does not have the time to analyze the market on a constant basis, just wait for the signals to arrive and operate according to these by Of the broker of your choice (See list of Forex brokers) following the instructions that you receive by various means that will be seen next.

How do Forex signals work?

In this section we are going to concentrate on only the services of trading signals in which the trader executes the received signals manually. As for the automated trading services in which the signals are executed automatically in the trader's account, you can consult the following article: Automated Forex Trading.

Basically there are two ways to get Forex trading signal services:

1. Some Forex broker provide trading signals to customers who have a real account with these companies. These signals can be viewed on the broker's website or sent to the customer's email and / or mobile phone via SMS messages. They generally include comprehensive market analyzes that recommend operations in various currency pairs (and in other markets), indicating entry points, exit points (profit taking) and stop losses (to limit losses if the market moves against). They may be accompanied by technical analysis.

2. Companies and websites that are dedicated exclusively to sending signals Forex trading for a monthly fee. In this type of sites we will concentrate on this section. Basically what they do is send the customer signals about possible transactions with their respective entry price, exit price and stop losses. Trading signals are sent to the customer's email or mobile phone, or they can be reviewed on the company's website. In some cases they allow the customer to register and test the service for a period of 7-14 days. Due to the large number of sites of this type that currently exist, many offer promotions or seek to attract customers with affiliate programs through which the person can make a profit by recommending the service to others.