Plan your strategy when the market is closed when you are rested and thinking clearly. Logical thinking and planning is best done when traders are not under pressure to trade. A professional football team, for example, must not only train but also diligently strategize together before each game. The team and its coaches try to anticipate every possible situation and prepare strategies that will turn those situations to their advantage. In the excitement of an actual game, they do not need to spend time devising strategies. They simply have to recognize a pattern and exercise the discipline to put a predetermined strategy into play. Traders must plan their strategies with the same diligence, after the market closes, when they have time to think, and not in the midst of actually trading, when emotions such as anger, fear, and greed can easily cloud judgment
Do not read newspaper articles or watch newscasts that discuss the markets in which you have an interest. My favorite saying about trading commodities based on fundamental analysis is “to be a true fundamentalist, one needs the mind of God” in that God alone is omniscient and can take absolutely every detail into account. Many people are amazed that forecasters are able to call the market accurately without using fundamental analyses. However, most people who consider themselves fundamentalists are not true fundamentalists. Rather, they speculate on forecasts of fundamentals, such as what inventories will be, how many hurricanes will be experienced in a given season, and whether interest rates will be raised, as opposed to trading on “real” fundamental information
Remember that the objective is profit, not ego-stroking. It is more important to be long when the market is rising and short when the market is falling than to forecast the exact high or low of a move. Too many forecasters are sidetracked by thinking that the objective of their work is to be correct on calling the market. They forget that correct calls on market direction must be included within a comprehensive trading strategy in order to be effective
Have confidence in your own intuition. Do not rely on the advice or opinion of others, no matter how well respected they might be. Eighty percent of the money in the market is made by 20 percent of the people. If most people trading the markets consistently are incorrect and lose money, why bother asking for their opinions? This is absolutely self-defeating. John Kenneth Galbraith said it best when he observed that, when it comes to economic views, the majority is always wrong
When wrong, move on. Those who seek perfection can never achieve true success. Perfection is always elusive. The only way never to be wrong and never suffer a loss is to avoid forecasting and trading altogether. It is impossible for a trader to be any good unless he is willing to be wrong. A trader can succeed only if he is willing to risk failure within the constraints of his defined trading plan or system.
The objective is profitable trading, not proving a thesis or world view. I consider the Elliott Wave Theory to be a basic structure that assists in making accurate forecasts and conducting profitable trading strategies. Just as gravity pulls objects toward the center of the earth and we can act with confidence that a falling object will travel downward (though we may not know exactly where it will land), traders should not debate the minute details of a thesis but keep their focus on the goals of controlling risk and generating profit.
