Forex Trading Education: 5 Tips For Keeping To Your System
One of the most important things you can learn in any forex trading education is how to keep to your chosen system or systems in a consistent way.
Hopping from one thing to another will kill any chance you have of making profits, but we are all tempted from time to time. If you find it hard to keep to one trading system, here are some techniques that may help you to learn to be consistent.
1. Consider carefully before you decide to follow any system. One successful businessman has said that the secret of his success was thorough research before a decision, and then sticking to it like iron. You need to be sure that your system is profitable … not necessarily the very best. And you need to be comfortable with all the actions that it will require you to take, whether things are going well or badly.
2. If you have problems with self discipline in other areas of your life, use those to train yourself in the skill before you start live trading. Do not pick the thing that you have most trouble with, but something that you could fairly easily master. It might be getting up at the same time every day,
3. Allow yourself a small ‘fun’ budget or have a separate mini account for trades that look so tempting that you cannot pass them up even though they do not fit your criteria. You will almost certainly lose this money over a period of time, so be sure you can afford it. If not, avoid the temptation and track these trades on paper instead or use a demo account. Be sure to track them all because we have a tendency to remember the few that would have profited us and forget the majority that would have lost.
4. Do not discuss your trades or your system with anybody else. It is fine to ask around on forums before you have decided on your system, but do not be drawn into debate about the merits of a system after you start using it. You will quickly be swamped by negativity from people who want to believe that their own system is better. Equally, do not discuss it with non trading friends or family members. They will often be negative simply because they do not understand.
5. Do not drink alcohol while you are trading. In fact, it is better not to even look at the markets when you have had a few beers. If you see a tempting trade that breaks your normal rules it will be much harder to resist when you are under the influence of alcohol.
So even though we all love the idea of working from home in our pajamas with a beer at one elbow and the cookie jar at the other, reality is that relaxing to this extent does not combine with successful forex trading. A mind that is even slightly fuzzed by alcohol will not be able to keep to a consistent trading plan.
An automated forex robot can help you out here. You can set it up to trade automatically for you, if you are not yet able to act consistently while you pursue your forex trading education.
