I keep meeting a lot of traders, both very successful and those who are not that successful. What I have observed, is that very successful traders take a break in their trading.
Most traders in the stock market keep trading everyday. They feel that I they do not trade on a day, then they are not doing their work. They believe that they must take a trade every day. This is not required. If a trade is not coming their way, they get restless. Well, I would like to remind you, trading is a means to achieve financial income and goals, and not the objective.
I always recommend to my community members that they must take a break every now and then. Consciously! I do not consider a break when no good trade has come your way, as a break from trading.
What I actually am saying is, at regular intervals, you should not ANALYSE. You should not look at the market at ALL. Take a planned break!
When we go on a long journey, we take breaks in between. Generally, these breaks come in at almost after the same number of hours or distance covered. I have experienced that whenever I am going on a road journey, we do stop at every 3 to 3 and half hours. Sometimes, it is voluntary. Few times, a necessary one, like nature’s call or simply stretch legs. I am sure you would have experienced the same. And then you feel rejuvenated.
There are FOUR (4) breaks that every trader MUST take:
- After a series of winning trades. Say, 8-10 successful trades. Take a short break. For 2-3 days.
- If you had 3 (three) consecutive losing trades. You should take a break for a week. Review your trades in detail. Review video / trading lessons. Review trading plan. And see what mistake you have committed or something that you might have overlooked. You will learn more from your losing trades, than from your winning trades.
- 2 Days every month. There should be at least 2 consecutive trading days, when you should NOT take any trade. You can pre-plan it for every month. These could be dates of the month, days of the week or anything that you prefer or like. These should be working trading days and not holidays. These 2 days should be used to review each of the trade that you took in last one month. What is the profit or loss? How many losing and winning trades? Their ratio? Average profit per trade and so on….
- A break to go on a holiday with your family every 6 months. Plan the month in which you will go. Set a target of profit that you will make and reward yourself with it. It need not be an expensive holiday. May not be far away. I recommend anywhere between 3 nights to a week. Don’t do anything related to trading while on this holiday. Except you may do something to learn, like reading a book, article or watching a video lesson, or something motivational.
Follow this and you will see how your trading results improve.
Your trading will feel REJUVENATED!
All the Best!