DEVELOP A WINNING MINDSET... always tell yourself that "I AM THE TOP 10%"...

One of the common question that we would always ask ourselves after taking losses or being attacked by a sudden big move in the market is: -

"Why the h**l did the market went against me in such a cruel manner? Why can't it happen before I entered this position so at least I can refrain myself from taking this trade, or at least do the reverse?"

Sounds common huh? Well... that is just part of the game. At times, you just feel that the market is always against you. Whatever you did, the market will just do the reverse. When you buy, it goes down and when you sell, it goes up... and it feels like the market is playing against you all the time. If this is true, then how are we suppose to make money from this market? The answer is...

Though you may feel that you are being bullied, or perhaps someone somewhere like the trading brokers or tycoons are controlling the market etc... the fact is indeed otherwise.

The fact is - the market doesn't even know that you're there in the first place. It's just you and yourself... whether you make or lose money, whether you're there or not, whether you ride your losses or profits... the market doesn't even care at all...

That is why I always like to use the phrase of taking advantage on the market. Second phrase is always keep yourself emotionally detached from the market all the time. Last but not least the third one is - regardless what your indicators are showing, always analyze the price actions first.

Let me explain in little bit detail why those 3 phrases are important.

1. Making Profits by Taking Advantage on the Market

- I never consider my presence in the market as important. I am nobody and any transaction that I am doing with my trading have no or maybe some pico-effect on the price movement. So, never ever think that you could move the market - NO WAY. But... it is the collective actions of traders who choose to become either bulls or bears that really create the big moves, apart from the BIG BOYS (ie Banks, Market Makers, Tycoons, Institutional Traders etc) whom normally provide the kick-start to these movements that later fuel up by the collective trades by the retail traders like us. The point is - the market is BIG and we small traders can only make money by taking advantage on this movement made by the market itself. We alone cannot move the market. That is the reason why instead of chasing the market, we should wait for the market to come to us and take the advantage accordingly. Never ever go against them.

2. Keep Yourself Emotionally Detached From The Market

- The main idea of keeping yourself emotionally detached from the market is to ensure that you could always make the correct assessment and analysis on the market. You see, normally when we do not have any open position floating in the market, we don't care and we look at the market objectively without any bias or prejudice opinion on the market condition. What we see is what we believe is happening. The case is different when you have an open position though. When you're emotionally attached, your judgment will favor your position and no matter what is happening in front of your eyes, you keep on looking for excuses for you to hold that position, especially a losing one. Try to be emotionally detached and you will feel the difference. The best part of this is on the defensive side, in which an objective analysis will either provide you with justification to hold or exit that particular position.

3. Always Analyze the Price Actions First


- This is another simple mistakes that new traders tend to neglect every now and then. Even if you have a proven winning system that wins 90% of the time, still you need to study the current price action itself, especially on the 1hr and 15M chart. Normally price action is in direct relation with market volumes and hence the higher the volume on that respective time frames, the clearer the price action is. My favorite time frame for intraday trading are always the 15M and 1HR candlesticks. In fact, using these two TF without any further indicators are good enough for me to scalp the market every now and then, by using the price action itself. But of course, the point of analyzing the price action on each TF here is to get the best possible entry regardless of what your trading decisions are, long or short. So say it is clear on the daily and 4hr bars that the market is going down, you need to check on the 15M as well as 5M chart on where the price is heading towards at that moment. If it goes up on these two candles, it may be worth for you to wait a little bit until it settles down due to small-bull fighting or due to short-sellers profit taking. Trust me, it's worth to wait.

So, in conclusion... this article is all about developing the correct psychology for trading. If you do not plan to develop this top 10% winning mindset from the beginning, chances are you can hardly survive in this market, blaming the market every now and then.

Remember, trading is a zero-sum game. There is no way for everyone to make money here because not everyone is like you willing to read this article until this line. But if you put enough effort and will power in mastering this market, the reward could be beyond your imaginations.

Just like Manchester United who won the Premier League last year, they didn't have to win every game for them to retain the title. It is the winning mindset and consistent performance in winning most of the games that counts towards becoming a real Champion...

Safe trade...