Goal Setting and Trading- (this could be one of the keys to your success)

[4xtradingcoach]

Looking back on the starting point of my trading career, I realize how fortunate I was without even knowing it at the time.

I can say this because I have also had the privilege to help other traders work through the difficult times of their trading careers giving me a look into the other side that I didn't see in the beginning of my career.

What made my journey different than others in the beginning?
Well it wasn't that I was any smarter than anyone else, I attribute part of my success to my beautiful wife.

Without either of us knowing it, we both created an environment that supported the study and creativity in developing a successful trading system.
I was fortunate because I didn't have a time deadline. I didn't have someone putting unnecessary pressure on me to perform.

The key is in understanding that each of us as traders, will take a different length of time to achieve success.

Working as a coach, I have seen many traders lose their homes and families because of failure.
For many traders just starting off, they don't have the right mind set or the appropriate expectations and this sometimes leads to making promises that cannot be kept.

This additional pressure can secretly force a new trader to become over aggressive and skip the necessary reflection time to access personal performance.

I entered into this business with a rule in mind, “I could only fail if I quit” (thank you Tony)
Others unfortunately, start with the mind set that simply encourages chasing after goals that are self destructive and lead to sabotaging their potential.

Take for instance the typical goal of trying to earn 60 pips everyday.
(I actually tried this one in the beginning)

For two weeks I woke up every day to trade and my first thought was that I absolutely HAD to earn 60 pips. Obviously I didn't earn 60 pips every day. There were days when I would make mistakes and other days when there simply wasn't any decent trading opportunities.

So when I couldn't control the market and force it to produce trading opportunities, I did what most new traders do in the beginning, I took trades that didn't follow my trading plan, I chased price movement with no clear entry or exit strategy and ended the day negative.

Now I will admit that I didn't consider myself a loser at this point but I work with traders who consider themselves losers if they cannot meet goals like these.

At the end of two weeks I realized that this was simply not a approach that would support me, keep me motivated or encourage my desire to follow my trading plan.

Instead, I changed my daily goal to spend each day looking for trading opportunities that are my “type” of trades and by my rules.

I then graded the performance and execution of each trade.
If there wasn't a trade opportunity according to my trading plan, then I did nothing and I still felt good about the trading day, as long as I followed my trading plan.

Focusing on the discipline to follow my trading plan, only taking trades that I understood and grading my performance based on the execution of the trade took the pressure off of forcing trades where they didn't belong and I began to make money consistently, week after week.

Needless to say, I slept better on the weekends and enjoyed the time I had with my family before the market opened on Sunday so I could happily do it all over again.

The moral here is to clearly understand what your “real” goals are. Figure this out before you jump in and become overwhelmed with pressure to perform in a way that isn't possible.


Good luck trading
4x Trading Coach

 

[Emibluz]

Goal setting as you have rightly pointed out is really important. But the truth is that not all losses are a trader responsible for; even goal setters soon get set to quit forex- Why? They set goals, yes, but they eventually concede more goals and loss. For one thing, they seem not to be conscious that a broker can never be thoroughly trusted: the reason is because despite being a medium between interbanks and clients; they are there to make money. For now the minimum brokerage capital is $20m, so how do you expect them to realise all that just through honest commissions and spread income? The regulated ones could go dubious consequently widening spreads, freezing customer accounts; even refusing to reflect customer's deposits. Their license can't really prevent them from using evil boilerroom methods even like manipulating servers!

 

[lee.belisar]

Goal setting as you have rightly pointed out is really important. But the truth is that not all losses are a trader responsible for; even goal setters soon get set to quit forex- Why? They set goals, yes, but they eventually concede more goals and loss. For one thing, they seem not to be conscious that a broker can never be thoroughly trusted: the reason is because despite being a medium between interbanks and clients; they are there to make money. For now the minimum brokerage capital is $20m, so how do you expect them to realise all that just through honest commissions and spread income? The regulated ones could go dubious consequently widening spreads, freezing customer accounts; even refusing to reflect customer's deposits. Their license can't really prevent them from using evil boilerroom methods even like manipulating servers!

Regarding the broker, I think it actually depends. There are few brokers who care about their clients. I mean they help their clients to make profit, offering them various resources to learn more about Forex. When a trader earn, the broker also earn. That is why selecting a Forex broker is very crucial to those who are interested to try Forex trading. Thorough research and background and reputation checks are very important before signing up with any broker.

 

[Exness Support]

It is really important to set a realistic goal so that you can achieve it easily. If you make anything more than that it always good but its always wonderful to achieve your basic goal easily so you always feel good about trading and not get frustrated

 

[Aby123]

Really appreciate your effort in explaining. I agree that setting goals is as much as important as discipline, etc. and other factors that are essential to have a successful trade.

 

[joescholz]

In as much as I agree with you that goal setting is good, but discipline is more important than goal setting; some people go ahead to set unrealistic and unattainable goals and in the bid to reach the target they forget about discipline and in the process they start marking losses.

 

[Rambo35]

Trying to force the market to provide abnormal returns usually results in traders risking more capital than warranted by the potential profits. Forgetting the trade discipline and gambling on unrealistic gains means abandoning risk and money management rules that are designed to prevent market remorse.

 

[Ary Barroso]

It is really important to set a realistic goal so that you can achieve it easily. If you make anything more than that it always good but its always wonderful to achieve your basic goal easily so you always feel good about trading and not get frustrated

No doubt, it’s very much important issue, when I was a new trader then my monthly target was more than 100% (how ridiculous). Now interestingly, now I am trading with only 12% monthly target.