A) Getting into a trade
B) Keeping a winning trade going
C) Accepting you lost
D) Doing nothing
For me it’s D.
You know doing nothing sounds easy.. When you’re sitting there looking at charts for 2 hours it’s a different story.
Something I keep catching myself doing is this:
* I will spot a setup early. I will not take it.
* Then the price starts moving how I expected it to move.
The price movement is what I thought it would be.
Then I feel confident entering the trade.
This does not make sense because the risk and reward is usually worse at that point.
I think I trust confirmation more than I trust my analysis of the trade.
The trade is what I am talking about.
But by the time things feel safe most of the move in the trade is already gone.
I am still trying to figure out the balance between patience and hesitation in the trade.
The trade is what I am trying to balance.
Do you guys enter the trade when things are uncertain or do you wait until the move, in the trade is already confirmed?
Sometimes I will have a view on a trade.
Then I open Twitter, Reddit, YouTube, Telegram and so on.
Suddenly I am confused again about the trade.
One person says they are bullish about the market.
Another person says the market will crash.
Someone else says it is a breakout for the trade.
After a while I do not even know what I think about the trade anymore.
I have noticed that some of my decisions about trading happen when I consume too many opinions about trading before entering a trade.
It feels like my confidence about trading disappears too many voices get involved in my decision making about the trade.
Do you guys avoid outside opinions about trading while you are trading or do you use these opinions about trading as confirmation for your thoughts, about the trade?
Looking back I notice that many of my trades had something, in common.
I would enter a trade after the big move had already happened.
At that time it seemed logical because:
* Everyone was talking about it
* The price was moving fast
* It felt like it was confirmed
Most of the time I was just reacting emotionally to the momentum.
I didn't realize this then.
Now when something feels urgent I actually trust it less.
I'm still working on getting better at this.
Do you guys struggle more with getting in early or too late?
Last year, I lost about ₹3.34L trading stocks.
Not through one trade... more like several bad calls.
In hindsight, my biggest error wasn't which stocks I chose.
It was the manner of my decision-making.
I was:
Making buy/sell decisions based on some random tips
Entering trades after the event had happened
Feeling my way around the markets instead of analyzing them
Worst of all – I didn't even know it at the time!
It all seemed sensible then.
But looking back now... obvious.
Recently, I've started breaking down old trades to look for any patterns in my behavior.
At first, I believed that bad trades resulted from poor analysis.
However, on the contrary, many of my worst trades occur when I’m simply sitting around waiting for action.
No setups, no movement, no excitement.
Then, after sitting there for too long staring at charts, suddenly average setups become “good enough” to trade.
And I enter.
Not because I believe the setup to be good.
because I feel I need to be doing something.
The end result is usually not a good one.
I think boredom is a far worse trading problem than most would ever imagine.
I've noticed something about my trades that doesn’t really make sense.
When I’m in profit, I feel uncomfortable.
I start thinking, “What if it reverses?” or “Maybe I should just take it now.”
So, I exit early. But when I’m in a loss, I suddenly become patient.
I think, “This can still work,” or “I’ll give it more time.”
It’s like my behavior flips.
When I look at it logically, it’s completely backwards.
Yet in the moment, it feels normal.
I believe this one habit explains a lot of my results.
I’m still trying to fix it.
Does anyone else do this, or is it just me?