How to get rid of emotions when trading

[Ryker1]

I can say that you can't rid of your emotions while doing something, just like trading. I can say that you should expect less when it comes to income, don't expect big, you'll only feel stress if you haven't got what you expect. It's better to have something that you don't expect. And also be wise and mindful when it comes to transaction, so you won't be fooled easily.

[X7]

Our brain is hardwired to go into a fight or flight mode under stress, resulting in emotional responses like greed (taking too large risks), anger, fear (panic-closing) or fear of missing out. While this is a good thing when fighting lions in the savannah, it is a horrible thing when trading, and you need to make smart decisions and keep to your plan to keep making profits.
This topic will focus on how to get rid of emotions while trading, or at least make the best decisions which are not based on emotional responses of our ape brain. So how can we achieve that?

1 with good preparation
2 with checklists
3 with process orientation
4 with active emotional detachment

Good preparation:
If you watch a Football game or a Boxing match usually the team or player wins that has done the better preparation. The same goes with trading. Accumulate knowledge about the subjects of trading as much as possible. Start with small amounts and small leverages until you really know what you are doing. Be consistent, create good habits early on and keep them up. Make sure that you are mentally fit, live healthy, eat well, sleep enough and regularly, and exercise enough. Have a schedule. Track your preparation, track your results and analyse them. What were mistakes you could avoid in the future?

Checklists:
When things go down and away, it is always good to have a checklist. For example: surgeons usually have checklists that prevent them to go off the rails while performing a complicated procedure. Their checklists makes it absolutely clear in which order they need to perform what step, which frees up mental brain power for the actual process. So from your past make checklists what made your trades profitable and focus on those kind of trades that have done well in your past.

Process Orientation:
With the checklist, we should be able to make good trades more often than not. All we need to do now is focus our metal brain power on the process and not on the outcome. As we have built enough expertise and a checklist that we follow, we focus on rules and our discipline, not on the outcome of a single trade, because as we all know one trade can always be good or bad, independent of how well it was thought out.

Active emotional detachment:
There is something called Tilt in Poker. Some players will actively try to insult players after bad beats to make the go tilt, or "emotional". This will result in very bad decision making. Maybe you remember Zinedine Zidane in his very last World Cup Game, head butting the italian player and getting sent of the pitch with a red card. The worst possible outcome. TILT.
If you still feel like you get emotional about trades, there are a few things you can do: Lowering your margins, lowering your leverage, take a break, breathing exercises, watch your favorite series or listen to music. Get a little distance to your trades, before continuing. NEVER trade on TILT.

How are you dealing with your emotions? Anything to add or to take away from this?

I would suggest you feel the emotions which come up under these circumstances, rather than act on them. As the reactions you are feeling are in you for a reason (stored up and not felt)

You judge emotion quite strongly in this post, if you allowed yourself to experience some of the fear/grief etc WITHOUT acting on it i.e executing a trade - you will come out the other side much more level headed and with the understanding of what was driving you to take that action in the first place.

Good luck!

[arthotdog]

Sounds like a real trader dude the question is 'are you really a trader'?

Emotions is part of being alive and anything we deals our mind for sure will react unless youre in comatose so function is not necessary.

In trading mix emotions are part of thrill what we only need to prevent is panicking because this is the only mistakes you might commit if didnt controls

[Pursuer]

basically all you need is a good plan ahead of yourself so that you can stick to it and know what you must do under different circumstances.

for example when you buy an altcoin named X you should set 2 price levels for yourself. 1 for when price rises (everything goes according to plan) and you want to sell. during pumps it can be any percentage for example 10% profit or 30% profit is  the most common ones but you can sometimes go as high as a 100% profit during a pump. sometimes setting a time frame also helps like saying 10% in 3 hours or 100% in 24 hours.
another 1 for when things don't go according to plan and price falls under the level you bought altcoin X at. this is known as Stop Loss. in a highly volatile market it is hard to set this but it is a good thing to have. somewhere around 5 to 10% is a good place for me.

[el kaka22]

Akcepting loss is also important. Knowing that in trading nothing is certain. There is not a single trader that have 100% profitable trades. Thats why when you are trader you should consider your trading as a work and lost trades as a money spend on fuel to get to work. That will help you get over it without emotions, skip loosing trades and move on to next trade because you can do everyfing correct, made best analysis but still fail. Thats how it works.

Accepting loss as quickly as possible based on your strategy is always one thing to always know how to do in trading and that would help a trader hugely. That is where the main challenge of any new trader has always been most of the time even after learning and they tend to find out that if they had made decisions to stop loss at where they should have based on their knowledge without any emotion, they will do better.

It is normal but that is where experience now gradually comes in as one gets better making decisions without any form of emotion in the long run.

[beerlover]

Getting emotional for your money is normal but minding it for so long isn't. Getting rid of your emotions while trading might broke you. The right way to manage it is to control it example trading dedicate yourself into giving you heart and mind to pick the best suited for you being emotional on your loss won't give you knowledge instead learn from your mistakes and strong dedicate yourself from learning and soon controling your emotions will be natural.

Getting emotional is not normal as long as you know what you are doing. With full confidence that you are making the right decision, buying, selling or stopping loss, you will not place emotion by the side anytime you are trading at all. This is one important thing to always take note of as trading is not a child's play and you will need a lot of skill and knowledge to pull you through and without that, emotion is bound to always take a hold of you anytime any day with silly mistakes you would not have done normally if you had taken the time to learn.

[omonuyak]

Thank you for this information and advise as many of us has been placing and closing trade because of panic and emotional imbalance.  Understanding the nature of cryptocurrencies market and illiquid assets trading will help us ride our emotions during trading.  Many traders has loose bitcoin because of panic selling. If you know how this market work it is easy to control your emotions.  Bitcoin market has it own mind and you should always follow it trend if you want to succeed.

[whaawh]

Thank you for this information and advise as many of us has been placing and closing trade because of panic and emotional imbalance.  Understanding the nature of cryptocurrencies market and illiquid assets trading will help us ride our emotions during trading.  Many traders has loose bitcoin because of panic selling. If you know how this market work it is easy to control your emotions.  Bitcoin market has it own mind and you should always follow it trend if you want to succeed.

It seems to me that any person is subject to emotions and he will show them in any situation, Let it be either joy or irritation. It seems to me that all thoughts interfere with focusing and realizing their opportunities for trade. Although to behave in the hands is also a great art, like to have a huge experience in trading.

[pey]

I think getting rid of emotions when trading depends on trader if you invested more than you afford to lose, are in need of money you have emotions too.

[mornabo]

I can say that you can't rid of your emotions while doing something, just like trading. I can say that you should expect less when it comes to income, don't expect big, you'll only feel stress if you haven't got what you expect. It's better to have something that you don't expect. And also be wise and mindful when it comes to transaction, so you won't be fooled easily.

Yeah the expectation is too big may bring your emotions in, when the price is not in accordance with your expectations maybe you will release your emotions in the form of panic, so I think make a plan like a target price it will be very helpful, and do not forget to stay calm

[Reid]

I hope it is that easy.
Cannot get rid of the regret when a sudden bull comes and I already exchange my token to another one.
Same goes for the dump side thinking I should have just withdrew and could have been buying more by now.

This kind of things happens without our controls and a human reaction of different kind of emotions is just normal.

I have just one key as always. There are crypto currencies that always go up. Example is bitcoin. Trade it there and hold it. It just takes a lot of time though.

[Barbut]

I hope it is that easy.
Cannot get rid of the regret when a sudden bull comes and I already exchange my token to another one.
Same goes for the dump side thinking I should have just withdrew and could have been buying more by now.

This kind of things happens without our controls and a human reaction of different kind of emotions is just normal.

I have just one key as always. There are crypto currencies that always go up. Example is bitcoin. Trade it there and hold it. It just takes a lot of time though.

Its not easy, its impossible to get rid of emotions, all we can hope for is a little bit of control. Extraordinary people can have more or full control over their emotions, but even that is short breath, who can have control 24/7? Cryptocurrencies are going up but not all the time, before rise they fluctuate a lot around some points, but most people would like to see prices rising all the time, but that is impossible. I made a lot of profit with mid and long term trading, invest in coins that have a future, sooner or later prices will rise, its all about waiting.

[GoldenLad]

Its always not hard for people not to feel emotional in whatever they are doing cause they are born with emotions. I think the only way for people not to have emotions is to prevent themselves from constantly looking up on the price of their bitcoins or altcoins because constantly looking up on them can cause emotional discomfort. And they should learn to ignore all FUDs cause ot can stir them up emotionally.

[supermine]

Its always not hard for people not to feel
emotional in whatever they are doing

But experience will help us to do that...

Being an experienced trader will make help us to read the market condition very well and will help us to decide what will be best for the current situation of an market.For that all you need clear determination of what you have to achieve from your investment,don't do it just as an gambling then it may not help your to survive longer in this field.

[Rooster101]

It is hard to detach emotion from yourself when you are in trading but you can learn how to control it. Controlling your emotions take time and need to remind yourself that emotions is not allowed when you are trading. Many traders are still struggling on how get rid of their emotions during trading and the most vulnerable are the newbies who are easily affected by sudden price movement of the cryptocurrency they are holding.

[yhancel20]

Getting emotional for your money is normal but minding it for so long isn't. Getting rid of your emotions while trading might broke you. The right way to manage it is to control it example trading dedicate yourself into giving you heart and mind to pick the best suited for you being emotional on your loss won't give you knowledge instead learn from your mistakes and strong dedicate yourself from learning and soon controling your emotions will be natural.

I learn how to deal with my emotion as the time passed by specially when i met some reliable person when it comes to trading.Before ..when i am just a newbie in crypto i have a lot of fear specially on how to buy and what to buy asset.i'm afraid of losing my capital.Now,i just keep calm and continously searching for some knowledge about trading.

[ralle14]

I hope it is that easy.

For some it's easy to move on if you can't hold them it's fine to show emotions just don't let it take over you while you're trading.

I think getting rid of emotions when trading depends on trader if you invested more than you afford to lose, are in need of money you have emotions too.

It'll always depend on the trader since he's the one in charge of himself. This guide won't be helping anyone until it's followed and executed by the trader. A good management plan would help anyone that's looking to trade more than he can lose so he won't blow a big part of his budget and avoid getting emotional.

[taiwww]

Never thought that one can write whole article on how to control an emotion while making the trades.  
Well usually I am just looking forward to get into the crypto trades with normal open positions. When it starts to fluctuate then I will watch the market closely, will try to get more and more update about it in the forum. If something critical is going to happen then I will simply shut that trade with lets say 2-5% loss which I always bear on me no matter what. When your views are clear then no one can really stop you. So yeah surely it is way good to do it that way. No emotions nothing!

[vintages]

Nice article OP but it's just so unfortunate to know  that it won't work that way you have stated it or viewed it because  emotions either good or bad  are part of human make up. No human being is born without emotions, infact, this is what makes us a living thing so we can't get rid if it totally but on the issue of trading emotions can be put in control by not acting on it. I believe this is the only way for it to be better.

[Baofeng]

Just like in gambling, emotions are really hard to control. It is also applicable in trading as well. Perhaps in you gain enough experience then you have a idea on how to control it. However, for newbies, its going to be very difficult. But one way of dealing with it, at least personally, is not to be greedy and have some sort of entry and exit strategy in place. If if those criteria are satisfy then I immediately go out. With this method, I tend not to involved emotions but everything is being plan and written on paper.