Why You Have to Learn to Lose Properly to Win at Forex Trading
I know it sounds cliché, but losing truly is part of winning, especially in trading. If you want to become a complete trader who truly knows how to trade properly, you must learn how to lose properly in addition to actually learning how to trade.
I know this isn’t perhaps a ‘fun’ topic to discuss, and you may not even want to read this article, but I promise you that is a huge mistake. You simply will never make money as a trader if you don’t understand the importance of losing properly in the market and how to do it.
So, for those of you who are looking for an ‘easy fix’ or ‘fast money’ without any losses, you may as well stop reading now. For the rest of you who truly want to have a chance of making consistent money trading the markets, read on…
Prime your brain for losing properly…
All too often, I see beginning traders trying to avoid losses in a number of different ways. It seems that people are pre-wired by nature to try and avoid losses, it’s a normal tendency. But, when it comes to trading, this pre-wired trait does us significant damage and will even result in blown out trading accounts and irreversible damage, if you allow it to.
Unfortunately, losses are part of trading, if they weren’t, everyone on Earth would be a billionaire, and we all know that isn’t possible. The simple reality of trading, is that you are going to have losing trades one way or another. If you don’t take predefined, calculated losses, you are going to take big, potentially account-blowing losses eventually. Remember; you can delay losses, but you cannot avoid them altogether, and there is typically a direct correlation between how long you delay a loss and how big it becomes.
As a trader, you need to simply view losses as a ‘cost’ of doing business in the market. Any business has costs that need to be overcome in order to turn a profit. If you own a restaurant you have operating costs like food, labour, rent, utilities, book keeping, etc. If your revenue surpasses all of these costs, you will turn a profit, if not, you lose money.
So, in trading, your costs are losing trades, broker fees / commissions and perhaps any equipment costs like a laptop etc. If you start viewing losing trades as just a part of the costs of trading, you will begin to shift your thinking from ‘trying to avoid losses’ into trying to MANAGE losses.
Why you need to learn to lose properly
By learning to lose properly you will be learning to control your losses below a predefined dollar amount per trade; the trade’s ‘R value’. The great thing is that YOU decide how much money you risk on any one trade, so that ability gives you the power to eliminate any ‘surprises’ and thus any emotion from your losses in the market.
Traders experience pain and frustration from losers for two reasons:
- They ‘expect’ to win on a trade but instead they lose.
- They lose more money than they are emotionally prepared to lose per trade.
Luckily for you, these two things are very easy to fix if you’re ready to be honest with yourself and face reality. To manage your expectations of a trade!