I have been trading for a year and I still am nervous to enter a trade even when I see a signal. Does anyone else have this problem? How long does this fear of "maybe I'm wrong" last? Do I just need a string of wins for the fear to go away? And why do I want to trade large amounts when I know I should only be trading 2% of my capital on my trade. Am I showing tendencies of blowing out really soon?
hesitating to pull the trigger suggests lack of confidence, imo. you'll get various opinions about your problem here on ET, some more informed than others. a trading psychologist that i know, recently did a webinar on self-confidence. i highly recc. you watch it and take notes. he's a pro and has seen it all. webinar http://bit.ly/dw9ALA
What are you trading, options? If so a good remedy is to put in a trade of $100.00 or so of options and call it the day. No lost sleep over $100.00, and it's better then no open trades.
Treat each trade as a losing trade until proven otherwise.......then you will not be disapponted. Accept the fact that there is NO certainty in trading and the best you can do is minimize a potential loss with an appropriate stop loss. Accept the fact that you will be wrong as often as you may be right... NiN
investigate accredited psychologist/hypnotists, they've often worked with traders and usually treatment only takes a few sessions @ $100-150 per
What this statement tells me is you have not backtested your method far back enough. Going back ten years or even five years, what is the largest drawdown if trading a one lot. What is the "mean" average of losers in a row? What is the largest numbers of losers in a row? What are the largest number of winners in a row and "mean average" ? If I have not backtested an idea back enough, I wouldn't want to pull the trigger either.
This is self destructive behaviour but the good news is that it is easy and fast to remedy. Get yourself as Taser and every time you want to trade more than your 2% rule or don't take a signal, just knock yourself out. After a dozen or so shocks you will discover a new behaviour pattern setting in. We always take the path of least pain. If you have any qualms about this, get a friend with a sense of humour to sit beside you to do the business.
Dr Steenbarger writes about this a lot, I'm sure there are articles out there. That Webinar is good too, I remember seeing it recently. What you can try is some visualization exercises. Visualize yourself seeing the signal, assessing your risk/reward for the trade, and then executing the trade. Do this over and over again and it should help. Might want to take it one step further and visualize what it will feel like to take the trade and exit at your profit target, make that feeling as real as possible. Then you can visualize not taking the trade, having it go to your target and feel the feeling as real as possible for missing the trade. Its also important to visualize you taking the trade and getting out at your stop point. After you do this for a few weeks for 20mins a day you it should help you taking the trade. Visualizations exercises have personally helped me in various areas of my trading. Also if you have proper risk management parameters then taking a trade you should automatically know what the worse is that can happen, and one trade in a career of trading is nothing. You can also concentrate on just hitting singles for awhile until you get your head back into the game, go in with half your normal size.
Dr. Ned Gandevani addresses this topic "Why Can't You Pull The Trigger" in his book "How To Become A Successful Trader"... Also his SFO magazine article (not sure which month/year) with same title. This book analyzes trader personality types/profiles while addressing key trading issues. regards, Suri PS: I am not affiliated to Dr. Gandevani and never used or read his other products/services.