TRADE RELUCTANCE: DO YOU SEE YOURSELF?
Your ability to act is not based on your skill or knowledge level, but on your emotional state at that exact moment. Your state is largely controlled by your underlying values and beliefs. If you are moving toward your most important values, and keeping away from the things you most want to avoid, you will be in complete control and able to act. When you are in power, you feel powerful, and you easily act. When you are in a state of powerlessness, the inclination is to wait and see, perhaps avoid the situation (don’t trade).
| DAY TRADING – TRADE RELUCTANCE | A problem that plagues all traders from time-to-time, trade reluctance, or the inability to pull the trigger has many causes. Recognizing yourself among the following Trade Reluctance Types can go a long way toward eliminating the problem. |
| ALARMIST | Characterized by energy being diverted away from placing trades into over-vigilant preparation for low probability catastrophes. Habitual worrying about the worst-case scenario. |
| ANALYSIS PARALYSIS | Characterized by energy being over-invested in analysing at the expense of executing trades. Preparation for making trades is out of control. Trader is a walking encyclopedia of technical information with little or no profits to show for it. |
| HYPER-PRO | Characterized by energy being lost due to over-investment in the mannerisms and appearances of success. Energy is expended at the expense of goal-supporting behaviours such as analysing trade performance or analysis for the next trading session, which is viewed as “demeaning” and “unprofessional,” and/or “shouldn’t be necessary.” Often accompanied by over- stylised use of professional jargon, name-dropping, and a reflexive need to appear better informed and more sophisticated than the “average” trader. |
| STAGE FRIGHT | Characterized by avoiding or bypassing trade opportunities when other traders are present due to emotional discomfort. Highly targeted form of fear. Trading while alone may be completely unaffected. (This is primarily an issue for those employed as traders). |
| ROLE REJECTION | Disproportionate guilt and shame associated with making money by trading. Recognized by feeling fine after a losing day, but having a vague sense of emptiness after a good winning day. This trader will downplay his own success and most likely attempt to sabotage a winning trade strategy. Tendency to find fault with people who are better off than themselves. |
| KEYBOARDAPHOBIA | Opposite of Phonophobia: Characterized by the fear of mis-typing your order and finding finger paralysis to ensue. Ability to type correctly is impaired to the extent the trade is lost due to the time taken to input the order. Shaking hands, sweating palms, highly targeted signs of severe nervousness inhibit ability to execute the trade. OR trade parameters are entered correctly, but fear inhibits the ability to push the button with “What if….” visions dancing in your head. |
| CONGRATULATIONS JUNKY | Hard-edged type of trade reluctance characterized by high approval needs and low self-esteem. Result is ambivalent need for continuous positive reinforcement from family and friends that is then criticized and rejected as invalid (“I didn’t really trade well today…”). Compulsive need to argue, make excuses, and blame others after an unsuccessful trading session. These traders are emotionally unable to allow themselves to be coached, advised, managed or trained and refuse to learn from their mistakes. Many low producers remain low producers because of this form of trade reluctance. |